North Pole Tenderfoot. Doug Hall

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      On the stage was the actual dogsled we’d taken to the North Pole, along with a near perfect replica of one of Admiral Peary’s sleds, designed from photographs taken at the Berkshire Museum in western Massachusetts.

      To bring the full theater experience alive we had Styrofoam blocks cut to look like ice and a team of four Inuit dogs—well, actually they were children’s stuffed animals. At the back of the set stood a monstrous rear projection screen, on which we’d project the images, video, and audio of my adventure.

      I’d chosen to create and perform this one-man play to fulfill a dream as well as to improve the chances of success for this book. Of my four previous books, the two that had been best sellers—Jump Start Your Brain and Jump Start Your Business Brain—had been performed as lectures before they were written. The two that sold poorly, Maverick Mindset and Meaningful Marketing, had been written without being performed.

      From this sales history, I could reach three possible conclusions: I should only write books titled Jump Start Your Brain; I should never write a book with a two-word title with each word beginning with M; I should perform all books before writing them to improve the storytelling.

      Truthfully, I’d never intended to become an author. In fact, I studied chemical engineering at the University of Maine, in part, because it required mostly math and science courses and virtually no English classes.

      However, in the early 1990s, a story about my Eureka! Ranch in the Wall Street Journal caught the eye of three book editors, and following a spirited bidding process I landed a hefty advance and a contract to write a book. Frightened of writing, I followed my instincts and assembled a lecture, telling the story of what would become the book. I performed it for audiences around the world. After refining the story based on the performances, I wrote the book quickly.

      I filled a half dozen journals with notes—my primary focus was on what it “felt” like to be in the high Arctic.

      But books about business creativity are far different from an adventure memoir. In the world of corporate innovation, my Eureka! Ranch team and I have had the honor of helping some of the world’s greatest companies grow their business—from Nike to Walt Disney to American Express. We’ve invented cat foods, candy bars, chips, colas, and caskets. In those books, I knew what I was doing. This time I was, to use an appropriate cliché, standing on thin ice. Still, as I paced in the wings, waiting for the curtain to rise and to meet all those eager faces in the audience, I knew I had stood on even thinner ice—at the North Pole.

      A middle-aged guy with “no business” going on a North Pole expedition

      On that expedition, I was a “tenderfoot,” as Admiral Peary called George Borup, George MacMillian, and Dr. John Goodsell, the Arctic rookies on his 1909 expedition. I was a first timer who, frankly, had no business going to the North Pole. I was forty pounds overweight and out of shape. If there were such a thing as an obese-o-meter, I would have registered somewhere beyond plump. Sure, I knew a textbook ton about exercise, but there is a vast difference between knowing about fitness and actually being fit. I was a forty-year-old man in a fifty-year-old body.

      With the play, and with this book, I find myself in a similar role—the tenderfoot. My literary inspirations include George Plimpton’s classic Paper Lion and Bill Bryson’s A Walk In the Woods. Their adventures and misadventures inspired me to not let inexperience get in the way of participating in great adventures.

      I do not presume that this book matches their literary genius. My goal simply is to show what it’s like for an ordinary, middle-aged, overweight guy to travel to the North Pole as Admiral Peary did. This is my story of the Aspirations! Expedition as I remember it. It’s filled with my perceptions, misconceptions, and delusions. I am sure that my expedition teammates have their own perceptions, misperceptions, and delusions.

      Still pacing in the wings, I heard Erskin Smith, the artistic director of the Playhouse and the director of North Pole Tenderfoot, explain to the audience that there would be one intermission. He mentioned the Playhouse’s upcoming schedule, announcing that in a few weeks, they could see the world premiere of Anne and Gilbert, based on the writings of islander Lucy Maud Montgomery. It would be a professional musical that tells the story of Anne Shirley’s life after the events made famous in Anne of Green Gables.

      He ended with my cue, “But first we travel to the top of the earth. Ladies and gentlemen, the Victoria Playhouse is proud to present the world premiere of North Pole Tenderfoot.”

      I heard the opening strains of “I’m Looking Over a Four Leaf Clover,” as performed by my father’s Dixieland band, The Presumpscott River Bottom Boys. I’d selected it because it was a personal favorite and I figured four-leaf clovers were lucky.

      The rookie took to the stage.

      As the song came to an end, the lights came up and I sprang onto the stage reciting as Erskine had directed.

      Tonight we’re going on an adventure to the North Pole—to the top of the earth, to the spot around which the whole earth spins. Leading our expedition will be Paul Schurke of Ely, Minnesota, a genuine adventure hero. My name is Doug Hall. By day I help the world’s leading companies invent big and bold innovations. On this trip I’m a rookie, a raw beginner, a tenderfoot, as Admiral Peary called rookies.

      The purpose of our expedition is to recreate Admiral Peary’s last dash for the pole.

      Tonight’s performance is like those performed in halls like this at the beginning of the century before last. It’s an adventure story told with slides and audio as Admiral Peary, Shakelton, Admunsen, and Nansen would have done to raise funds for their next adventure.

      I’m not here to raise funds. I’m here to raise awareness for the need for parents and grandparents to help inspire children’s aspirations. To that end, as you entered the theater you received a free audio CD with a program designed to help you inspire your children.

      As a special bonus, tonight on this stage I will reveal the answers to the three great mysteries of Robert Peary’s 1909 North Pole Expedition. Tonight you will learn the answers to three questions:

      1 Why was Peary so silent upon his return to the ship?

      2 Why did he take Henson instead of Bartlett to the pole?

      3 Did he actually make it to the pole?

      And that was how the story that became this book began…

      Giving lectures was one of Peary’s primary sources of funding for his expeditions.

      Chapter 1

      Why Are You Going to the North Pole?

      “WHY ARE YOU GOING TO THE NORTH POLE?”

      It was the most common question from family and friends when I announced my plans to join a dogsled expedition to the North Pole.

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