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"Realm of Ice and Sky" - A Book To Read · Conversations: Special Guests with Preston Scott

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: And it is great to have with us for the
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  Speaker 1: third hour. Buddy Levy Bud. He's the author of more
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: than ten books. He has appeared on the History Channels
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  Speaker 1: programs Greatest Mysteries and The Unexplained, and his latest book
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  Speaker 1: is Realm of Ice and Sky. It's a true story
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  Speaker 1: subtitled Triumph Tragedy in History's Greatest Arctic Rescue. Buddy, welcome
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  Speaker 1: to the program. How are you, sir Preston.
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  Speaker 2: I'm doing well.
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: Thanks for having me my pleasure. I appreciate you joining
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  Speaker 1: us here. I've got to ask on the front end here. Now,
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  Speaker 1: more than one of your books deals with cold temperatures.
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  Speaker 1: I'm curious do you just when you start researching, do
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  Speaker 1: you find stories that have never been told? As you're
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: researching one story and decide, okay, this needs to be
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: told in a later book.
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: That's exactly what happens. You know. I bumped into Realm
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  Speaker 2: of Ice and Sky, the story of the first attempts
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  Speaker 2: to fly yourrigibles to the North Poll while I was
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: researching my book. And so you know, I'm on an
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  Speaker 2: Arctic swing here. This is my third one in a row,
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  Speaker 2: and yeah, I can't seem to get enough of icebergs,
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  Speaker 2: freezing rain, sleet and you know floating ice flows.
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  Speaker 1: All right, set the stage for this particular story. Give
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  Speaker 1: us kind of the time frame what was going on,
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  Speaker 1: because when you say darrigibles and the Arctic, that almost
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  Speaker 1: seems oxymoronic.
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  Speaker 2: That's a great observation. Yeah, so it's it's the turn.
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  Speaker 2: It's the early nineteen hundreds, and you know, the right
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  Speaker 2: brothers have just started testing out in the planes at
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  Speaker 2: Kitty Hawk, and the airship or dirigible or what we
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  Speaker 2: think of now is a blimp is a very new technology.
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  Speaker 2: And men have been batting their head against the ice
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  Speaker 2: for one hundred or two hundred years trying to get
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  Speaker 2: to the North Pole. And this American name Walter Wewman
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  Speaker 2: has the great idea to try to fly a prototype
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  Speaker 2: lamp essentially to the North Pole. And the story is
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  Speaker 2: really a three part story about the men who attempted
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  Speaker 2: to fly to the North Pole when it looked like
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  Speaker 2: making it there by the traditional dog sled method was fraud,
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  Speaker 2: let's say, fraught with terror and death and tragedy.
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  Speaker 1: Is this a typical story when you talk about you know,
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  Speaker 1: Walter Wellman and his pioneering of you know, obviously not
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  Speaker 1: just the polar thing, but the transatlantic airship aviation thing.
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  Speaker 1: Is this one of those classic stories of well, we're
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  Speaker 1: going to do it because it's there and no one's
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  Speaker 1: done it before.
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  Speaker 2: I think that's part of it, Preston, But you know,
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  Speaker 2: there's also we're on the cusp at this period of
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  Speaker 2: a great technological advancement and scientific discovery, and so North
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  Speaker 2: Pole is this big blank space on the global maps.
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  Speaker 2: Certainly there's an element of fame and immortality involved, you know,
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  Speaker 2: it to be the first one to make it to
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  Speaker 2: the North Pole guarantees financial just I mean, you're untold
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  Speaker 2: rich is really a lecture tours and book deals and
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  Speaker 2: newspaper articles, and so you've got this kind of frenzy
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  Speaker 2: to try to be the first. And there's also a
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  Speaker 2: great deal of national pride involved. So in the book,
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  Speaker 2: you know, we've got the American named Walter Wellman, this
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  Speaker 2: famous Norwegian explorer ruled Almondson, then this Italian airship designer
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  Speaker 2: later named Lumberto Noble. So there's a whole lot going on,
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  Speaker 2: and so I would couple it with you know, discovery
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  Speaker 2: exploration and then also a search for the unknown.
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: Joining me on the program is Buddy Levy. The book
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  Speaker 1: is Realm of Ice and Sky. You know me, I
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  Speaker 1: don't do novels around here. True stories is what we
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  Speaker 1: focus on the program. Buddy. It seems to me that
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  Speaker 1: one of the things that your book accomplishes, whether intentionally
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  Speaker 1: or not, is you recategorize Walter Wellman. He seems like
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  Speaker 1: a guy that, prior to your book and your writing,
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  Speaker 1: is kind of noted in history as sort of an
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  Speaker 1: also ran, a guy didn't quite get much done.
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  Speaker 2: That's true. I actually had never heard of him, to
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  Speaker 2: be honest, and the guy is really fascinating. I mean,
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  Speaker 2: he's just as well Ohio born, self taught kid who
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  Speaker 2: ended up starting his own newspaper at age fourteen, and
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  Speaker 2: by the time we met him really in the book,
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  Speaker 2: you know, he's middle aged and is one of the
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  Speaker 2: most famous journalists in America. He hobnobbed with captains of
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  Speaker 2: industry like JP Morgan and Andrew Carnegie, and he ended
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  Speaker 2: up having a hustle because he's really interested in science
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  Speaker 2: and exploration as an Arctic explorer. And you're right, you know,
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  Speaker 2: if you put him on the Mount Rushmore, you would
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  Speaker 2: not put him on the Mount Rushmore. Of Arctic explorers,
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  Speaker 2: and he's kind of a footnote. But the way I
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  Speaker 2: interpret him is that he's an incredible pioneer because he's
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  Speaker 2: the first to attempt to fly to the North Pole
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  Speaker 2: in an airship, and he also makes the first to
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  Speaker 2: attempt flying across the Atlantic in an airship later. I
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  Speaker 2: don't want to give too much away, but he's really
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  Speaker 2: really fascinating and was also, you know, the first to
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  Speaker 2: create wireless technology at the Arctic, in the Arctic and
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  Speaker 2: using Marconi's new wireless telegraphy, and so the guy was
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  Speaker 2: just kind of a polymath. Really.
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  Speaker 1: It's interesting because you know, you talk about the aviation
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  Speaker 1: component of this story, and if we try to push
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  Speaker 1: above that and go to take the sixty thousand foot
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  Speaker 1: view of this, like you say, not give a ton
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  Speaker 1: of way, but still kind of paint the picture of
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  Speaker 1: this book. You've mentioned some names that a lot of
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  Speaker 1: people know. They know the name Robert Pierry, they know
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  Speaker 1: the name rold Emonson. They've at least they've heard those names,
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  Speaker 1: and they connect that with Arctic exploration. What's the nexus
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  Speaker 1: of all of these players. How do these people end
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  Speaker 1: up kind of in the same world.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's that's great question. You know, there's this confluence
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  Speaker 2: happening where the airplane, as I mentioned, and the airship
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  Speaker 2: are both being developed simultaneously, and we forget that that
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  Speaker 2: it was not exactly a done deal that the airplane
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  Speaker 2: was going to have supremacy of disguise. In fact, when
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  Speaker 2: this book sort of opens in nineteen oh six, oh
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  Speaker 2: seven oh eight, the airship has a lot of advantages,
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  Speaker 2: and so men are trying to see which technology is
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  Speaker 2: going to be the most practical, not only for military
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  Speaker 2: capabilities but for commercial travel. That's sort of the primary driver.
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  Speaker 2: And so I like that you point that out, because
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  Speaker 2: after the Wellman section of the book, which is part one,
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  Speaker 2: we encounter Roll Dominson, who's mostly known because you know,
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  Speaker 2: he was the first to the South Pole, first through
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  Speaker 2: the Northwest Passage, and then I argue and others concur
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  Speaker 2: with me that he was verifiably the first of the
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  Speaker 2: North Pole. But you also have characters in this book
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  Speaker 2: like Richard Byrd who ends up in this and they
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  Speaker 2: all convene ultimately in this place called Spalbard, which is
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  Speaker 2: roughly halfway between northern Norway and the North Pole, which
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  Speaker 2: is a kind of ground zero for leaping off to
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  Speaker 2: attempts at the North Pole, and you know, you've got
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  Speaker 2: this incredible scene where you got Richard Byrd and his
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: Josephine Ford and then this massive airship called the norga
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  Speaker 2: three hundred and fifty foot long airship, and you know,
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  Speaker 2: there's sort of this race for the North Pole and
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  Speaker 2: it's a global media event. There's many journalists are up
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  Speaker 2: there in the far frozen North and it's just an
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  Speaker 2: amazing scene.
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  Speaker 1: Buddy. We we've talked a little bit about the airship
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  Speaker 1: component of this. I'm still fascinated by the fact that
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  Speaker 1: how did they think that an airship which relies on
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  Speaker 1: air for you know, it's its ability to stay aloft
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  Speaker 1: along with you know, the motor component over such cold temperatures.
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  Speaker 1: Who thought that was a good idea?
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  Speaker 2: That's a great question. Well, so the these airships were
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  Speaker 2: in their fledgling stages, and you're right. I mean when
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  Speaker 2: Wellman initially begins, you know, he he straps a seventy
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  Speaker 2: five horsepower motor on a hydrogen inflated, flammable, hydrogen inflated
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  Speaker 2: one hundred and eighty five foot craft, and you know,
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  Speaker 2: you kind of wonder what could go wrong? But by
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  Speaker 2: the time we reached the second and third parts of
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  Speaker 2: the book, the airship has developed significantly with Zeppelin in
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  Speaker 2: Germany and the Italians in the military. Mussolini's Italian military
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  Speaker 2: had created these three hundred and fifty foot long really
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  Speaker 2: advanced airships which could then go seventy five miles an
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  Speaker 2: hour at a top speed, but they cruised at about
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  Speaker 2: fifty and there was still a lot of danger involved
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  Speaker 2: because you've got you know, flat gasoline powered engines connected
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  Speaker 2: to a hydrogen filled craft. But they were you know,
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  Speaker 2: and some had blown up. I mean, this is twenty
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  Speaker 2: years before the Hindenburg. Right by the time Amunsen and
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  Speaker 2: Umberto Noble, the Italian designer, get involved, but there had
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  Speaker 2: been an accident, so it was always a lumining fear.
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  Speaker 2: But what was amazing to me is that, you know,
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  Speaker 2: Aminson and Nobila, they buy Amondson buys this airship from
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  Speaker 2: the Italian government and makes a journey in nineteen twenty six,
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  Speaker 2: and they have a degree of success. You know, the
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  Speaker 2: covers has triumph, tragedy, and history's greatest artic rescue. So
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  Speaker 2: there is some triumph, but there's also this a bunch
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  Speaker 2: of national pride involved, and you've got the Norwegians buying
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  Speaker 2: against the Italians even though they're working together for one
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  Speaker 2: of the flights. And in the third part of the
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  Speaker 2: book we really get into Umberto Noble, having had success
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  Speaker 2: with Almondson crossing over the Polar Sea, decides he's going
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  Speaker 2: to try to do this with an all Italian crew
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  Speaker 2: for the honor of Italy to take credit for the
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  Speaker 2: design and the exploration, and we end up, you know,
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  Speaker 2: they fly up to North Pole and are besieged by
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  Speaker 2: hurricane force winds and they make a turnaround to try
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  Speaker 2: to go back to Svalbard, which I mentioned was halfway
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  Speaker 2: between northern Norway and North Pole, and the weather, sleep
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  Speaker 2: deprivation and all sorts of freezing rain and sleep force
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  Speaker 2: the airship lower and lower, and eventually there's this catastrophic
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  Speaker 2: contact with the ice which rips the control car, which
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  Speaker 2: is the sort of on the bottom of the airship.
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  Speaker 2: Off of the craft. Six men are up inside the
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  Speaker 2: envelope which is the gas that filled bag, and the
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  Speaker 2: nine men are thrown onto the ice, including Umberto Noble.
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  Speaker 2: Bones are fractured, men are dying, and fortunately one of
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  Speaker 2: the men has had the wherewithal to leap from the
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  Speaker 2: crashing control car onto the buckle polar ice with the
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  Speaker 2: emergency radio. And it's kind of like, you know, it's
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: kind of like where's Waldo Or They're out in the
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  Speaker 2: middle of the polar Sea, hundreds of miles above of Svalbard,
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  Speaker 2: and they begin to try to piece together some survival
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  Speaker 2: and they've got some food. They shoot a polar bear,
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  Speaker 2: and they end up spending a great deal of time
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  Speaker 2: sending SOS calls on this radio, and amazingly, a man,
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  Speaker 2: a farmer in Russia, here's this, like a you know,
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: an amateur radio guy. Here's this SOS call from the
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  Speaker 2: Italian which by now this is global news. You know,
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: it's all over what happened to the Italia airship? Where
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: is it? And his calls? He ends up contacting the
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  Speaker 2: Italian government. It says, I've got this message and it
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: has some like cryptic coordinates. And this starts the most
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  Speaker 2: amazing multi pronged multi national rescue operation in Arctic history.
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  Speaker 2: And you know, there are many many countries involved, the US, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Italy,
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  Speaker 2: uh and they're going by ship, by icebreaker, by airplane
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  Speaker 2: and it is just an amazing story. Last third of
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  Speaker 2: this book about will will anyone find these guys? And
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  Speaker 2: so I cut back and forth between the rescue operations
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: and then the men on the ice and some of
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  Speaker 2: the men leave to go try to strike out, to
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  Speaker 2: make it across the ice and find land to get help.
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  Speaker 2: Is very dramatic.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, My last question is this how many movie companies
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: have reached out for screenplay rights? That's a movie.
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: Some my Arctic books have gotten some heat. People are interested,
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  Speaker 2: you know, there's I think that the period piece, the history,
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: thanks you know, in part to our man Taylor Sheridan,
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: has brought back an interest in, you know, in historical works,
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: and this would be an amazing film. I got to
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: admit or series.
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: Well, you described the back third of the book. In
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: the back and forth. That alone is how a movie's done,
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  Speaker 1: my friend, That's how you do it.
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah. This was not lost on me as I was
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  Speaker 2: writing it.
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: What a story, realm of ice and sky. Gotta get
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: that book.