THE BUILDER MARCH 1917

DR. ELISHA K. KANE: ARTIC EXPLORER
BY BRO. J.W. EGGLESTON, P.G.M., VIRGINIA

I WISH to bring to the notice of the Masons of the 20th century one who lived
his Masonry and, actuated by Masonic impulse, not only did things but set a
high example under great difficulties.

In the 1850's Dr. Kane was America's hero and perhaps the world's most
conspicuous man, Kings, Princes and Potentates not excepted.
He was born Feb. 20, 1820, in Philadelphia, and from childhood,
brilliant in brain and of dauntless courage, but of feeble frame
and all but deformed. Old saws, reverenced as they are, sometimes
prove untrue in individual cases, even those coming down from the
classics. "Sano mens in corpore sano" was one to which Doctor, or
better still, Brother Kane, was a striking exception. He was so
unprepossessing in appearance that once he and a friend were
struck by the contrast presented by a splendidly formed and
handsome emigrant woman and her pitiful looking little husband.
The friend said, "What do you suppose are that woman's thoughts
when she contemplates that as her lord and master?" Kane sadly
replied, "to save some lady similar emotions I long ago resolved
never to marry."

To the writer he was the one boyhood's hero. I pored over his
works and read all the current literature regarding his wonderful
career, and in 1857, in the midst of the great blizzard of that
year had the melancholy satisfaction of standing on the bank of
the Ohio river, shivering in the high snow-laden wind, and seeing
the steamer Telegraph, draped in black, bear his remains up the
river. Great as was his well earned fame in the '50s, as a
scientist, explorer and a Mason after whom many Lodges were named,
the awful events of the 60s, overshadowed him and he has been
almost forgotten. In early manhood he decided to complete his
education at the University of Virginia because that Institution
permitted an elective course. He afterward studied medicine and
was assigned first to the navy and later to the army. He pursued
his scientific investigations in South America, Ceylon, China and
the Philippines and was the first white man to cross the Island of
Luzon from Manila to the Pacific Ocean. He traveled in India and
became a favorite of one of the chiefs under whose auspices he
explored the Himalayah Mountains. He penetrated equatorial Africa
before Livingstone or Stanley were known to fame. Lady Franklin's
piteous appeals to the world, to try to find and rescue Sir John
Franklin, then with his expedition, lost in the Arctic, aroused
him greatly. He announced that Sir John, like himself being a
Mason, and his ties being few, it was his duty to try to find him.
In the first expedition he went as a subordinate in his medical
and scientific capacity. Returning he devoted all he possessed,
and all he could earn by lecturing, to helping to finance the
second Grinnel expedition, Still endeavoring to relieve his
distressed brother Mason. This should be called the Kane
expedition, which he commanded. It would have been so called but
for his own modesty. We all know, of course, that his Masonic
object entirely failed, but it was through no fault of his great
heart. He discovered and mapped Grinnel Land, discovered and
described the open polar sea, and went nearer the pole than had
any living man, and that record stood for many years. While he did
not reach the pole he taught how, only, it might be done, and the
great marvel now is, how he did so well with his meager equipment,
with which few navigators would today attempt to explore even
Greenland's western coast.

The above condensed sketch gives a very slight glimpse of his
marvelous exploits. From early life, in addition to a slight
frame, he suffered greatly with organic heart disease. He stated
that medical men of high rank had warned him that he must never
undergo great physical exertion or great mental excitement, or he
would risk sudden death. And yet in his latest years he said that
he had never for a moment heeded the advice and had never been
free from pain save when under great excitement or great physical
strain. His works, on the two expeditions, are classics and read
like novels. Having done, perhaps, as much for science as any
predecessor had done even in a long life, he died in Havana at 37.
So great was his fame that he was honored by monarchs and
scientific societies all over the world. His funeral was the
greatest America has yet known. His remains were taken from Havana
to New Orleans where they laid in state and the Grand Lodge, City
and State governments, paid all possible honor to his memory.
Thence up to Memphis, where like ceremonies were held. At
Louisville the civic and Masonic organizations of both Kentucky
and Indiana joined in doing him honor as was true at Cincinnati,
Columbus, Baltimore, and Philadelphia where his body was finally
laid to rest. It is in print that every station on the Baltimore
and Ohio Railroad was draped in mourning and many of them were
thronged with sorrowing people as his funeral train passed. Great
as he was, he was a simple Master Mason, actuated all his life by
Masonic impulses and devoted to its principles. Who can measure or
imagine his sorrow at not being able to find and relieve his
brother Mason who perished miserably of cold or starvation in the
Arctic? He did his very best and his example of heroic devotion,
like that of our exemplar of old, should stimulate all to do what
lies near their hand to do, be it little or much.

