Hannah and Joe on the Map

Hannah (Tookoolito) and Joe (Ipiirvik or Ebierbing,)

about whom I have written the last three articles in ­Taissumani, are the greatest Inuit heroes of Arctic ­exploration.

They met the eccentric American explorer, Charles ­Francis Hall, early on his first visit to what is now the ­Canadian Arctic, and accompanied him on the rest of that journey, guiding him and translating for him, and teaching him the ways of the Inuit.

Accepting his invitation, they travelled with him to ­Groton, Connecticut. Two years later, they returned with Hall to the Arctic, this time to Foxe Basin and the central Arctic on an expedition that lasted five years.

In 1871, again with Hall, they participated in the famous Polaris expedition, and the even more famous ice-drift from northern Greenland to the North Atlantic. Through their skill, and that of Hans Hendrik, the well-known Greenlandic guide, they ensured the survival of the entire party, which included a number of qallunaat who would surely have perished without them.

It is appropriate, then, that their names are commemorated on maps of both northern Canada and Greenland.

In Canada, we owe the appearance of their names to Hall himself who unashamedly sprinkled new place names, ­English and Inuktitut, wherever he travelled, oblivious to the fact that many of the places had perfectly good Inuktitut names already.

The names of the couple in question appear among the names in the jumble of islands, bays and promontories that clutter the waters off Hall Peninsula, the promontory separating Frobisher Bay from Cumberland Sound. Both are bodies of water north of Cyrus Field Bay, and both use the famous couple's Inuktitut names.

And so we find Tookoolito Inlet at 63° 05' North latitude and 54° 45' West longitude. Nearby we find Ebierbing Bay at 63° 14' N and 64° 55'W. These remain, thankfully, the official place names of these locations.

It should be noted that on the map that accompanied the publication of Hall's first book in 1864, the names were spelled differently. Tookoolito's name was spelled Too-hoo-li-to (Hall generally spelled Inuktitut names in syllables separated by hyphens) and Ebierbing was rendered as E-bien-bing. Although Hall was atrocious at spelling Inuktitut names, he wasn't usually this bad, and he did spell their names correctly in the text of his book.

I'd like to suggest that the strange spellings on the map should be attributed to the difficulties the map's lithographer, J. Schedler of New York, had in understanding Hall's difficult handwriting.

In Greenland, we must look very far to the north to find the names of our famous couple. And they are commemorated differently than they are in Canada. Whereas in Canada, both names are affixed to bodies of water and labelled in Inuktitut, in Greenland, they are both in English and refer to tiny islands.

Joe Island is a few miles north of Cape Morton, off the tip of Petermann Peninsula, at 81° 12' N, 63° 28' W. It's been described simply as "a mushroom-shaped islet several hundred feet high."

Hannah Island is a little to the south, lying in the mouth of Bessels Bay. It is 120 feet high and was described simply as an immense heap of pebbles and drift which appeared to be the terminal moraine of a large glacier, now extinct.

Although Hans Island, a considerable distance to the south, had an Inuktitut name, given it by the Inughuit of northern Greenland, it is doubtful if either of these islands had a native name in historic times, for it is doubtful if Inuit travelled that far north in the years before they were routinely recruited by American and British expeditions as guides and assistants.

It's not certain who gave Hannah and Joe islands their names, but it may well have been Emil Bessels, scientist on Hall's Polaris expedition. Had it been Hall, before his death, he probably would have used their Inuktitut names.

Joe and Hannah were adopted as the official names of both islands by the Danish Committee on Geographical Naming on April 29, 1957, but of course the English word for "island" was replaced by the Danish word, the single-letter "Ø." So today they are officially Joe Ø and Hannah Ø.

In August 1875 Captain George Nares of the British ship, Alert, accompanied by Commander Albert Hastings Markham climbed to the top of Hannah Island and erected a cairn. In 1905 Robert Peary's, ship, Roosevelt, made fast to the ice foot on Joe Island and Peary climbed to the island's summit to survey ice conditions ahead.

Other than these few references, the Hannah and Joe islands go generally unremarked in the record of northern history. But they are there, and that's what counts, permanent reminders on the northern map of the presence and heroism of this most amazing Inuit couple.

Taissumani recounts a specific event of historic interest. Kenn Harper is a historian, writer and linguist who lives in Iqaluit. Feedback? Send your comments and questions to kennharper@hotmail.com.