The Three-Year Expedition 1931-34

The introduction of aeroplanes and airphotographs in the survey of Greenland on Lauge Kochs Three-Year Expedition to northeast Greenland 1931-34 set new standards for arctic cartography, and in 1933 Lauge Koch conducted two recognaissance flights over the country first surveyed by the Denmark Expedition in 1906-08.

Mapping from the air on the Three-Year Expedition.

From Meddelelser om Grønland, Vol. 130, No. 1, 1940.

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Handpainted sketch showing Koch flights over Kronprins Christians Land in 1933.

The map belongs to the Danish Arctic Institute.

 

In 1935 Koch presented the results of his flights in the Journal of the Swedish Geographical Society by a comparison of two maps. 

Again Koch was met with accusations of exaggerating his achievements. According to Henning Bistrup – a veteran from the Denmark Expedition 1906-08 – the proper counterpart to Kochs new mappings was the map of Northeast Greenland issued by the Commision for Scienfic Research in Greenland in 1918.

 

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Kochs map of the area before flights.

Journal of the Swedish Geographical Society, 1935

 

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Kochs map of the area after the flights.

Journal of the Swedish Geographical Society, 1935.

 

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Northeast Greenland (extract).

The Commision for Scientific Research in Greenland, 1918.

 

Koch dismissed the critique as being both unfair and emotional. The map he had used as basis for his counterpart was the latest map of the area published by the Geodetic Institute in 1933. Furthermore he pointed a number of errors and inconsistencies in the map proposed by Bistrup: 

1)   It shows to edges of the Inland Ice, although the 1st Thule Expedition in 1912 had already proved the easternmost edge to be correct.

2)   It shows the tip of Mylius Erichsen Land as rather hilly, while the Høegh Hagens remaining sketches of 1906 had already correctly described the area as flat.

3)   It does – for rather obvious reasons – not portray the results obtained by Lauge Koch on the Jubilee Expedition in 1921. 

“I have sometimes”, wrote Koch, “among cartographers who have gained their results through laborious work on sledge journeys, noticed a certain bitterness because mapping has now been greatly facilitated through radio and airplanes. As I have myself for several years done mapping work in North Greenland according to the old methods, I have all qualifications for understanding, and really do understand this bitterness.” 

In the map of 1918 the routes of earlier expeditions speak of the mapping of these region as a result of common and gradual achievement by a long line of Danish explorers. The way the tracks of the dogsleds follow the contours of the landscape, and the way the mountains and edges of the inland ice are marked as insurmountable slopes, speak of the unfavourable conditions under which the topography of Greenland was secured for Denmark in earlier times. In this context the map becomes homage to the heroic age of Danish arctic exploration. In contrast Kochs map comes across as a celebration of the technological achievements of a new age of arctic exploration, spelled out in new details and the straight lines of flight between sharply defined topographical points.

 

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Cooperation with Greenlandic sledge drivers was an absolute necessity in the early age of Danish exploration of North Greenland. Knud Rasmussen and Inukitsoq studies the map on the 2nd Thule Expedition. 

© The Danish Arctic Institute.

 

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The modern pioneer. Lauge Koch in artic aviation outfit. 1933.

 

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The final map of Kronprins Christians Land after the Three-Year Expedition 1931-34.

Meddelelser om Grønland, Vol. 130, No. 1, 1940.

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