Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-r5fsc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T21:55:22.107Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Northward ho! Obama, Diefenbaker and the North American Arctic

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 October 2015

Klaus J. Dodds
Klaus J. Dodds*
Affiliation:
Department of Geography, Royal Holloway, University of London, Egham, Surrey TW20 0EX ([email protected])
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

President Barrack Obama became, in September 2015, the first US president to travel north of the Arctic Circle. Having started his Alaskan itinerary in Anchorage, attending and speaking at a conference involving Secretary of State John Kerry and invited guests, the president travelled north to the small town of Kotzebue, a community of some 3000 people with the majority of inhabitants identifying as native American. Delivered to an audience in the local high school numbering around 1000, the 41st US president placed his visit within a longer presidential tradition of northern visitation:

I did have my team look into what other Presidents have done when they visited Alaska. I’m not the first President to come to Alaska.Warren Harding spent more than two weeks here – which I would love to do. But I can't leave Congress alone that long. (Laughter.) Something might happen. When FDR visited – Franklin Delano Roosevelt – his opponents started a rumor that he left his dog, Fala, on the Aleutian Islands – and spent 20 million taxpayer dollars to send a destroyer to pick him up. Now, I’m astonished that anybody would make something up about a President. (Laughter.) But FDR did not take it lying down. He said, “I don't resent attacks, and my family doesn't resent attacks – but Fala does resent attacks. He's not been the same dog since.” (Laughter.) President Carter did some fishing when he visited. And I wouldn't mind coming back to Alaska to do some fly-fishing someday. You cannot see Alaska in three days. It's too big. It's too vast. It's too diverse. (Applause.) So I’m going to have to come back. I may not be President anymore, but hopefully I’d still get a pretty good reception. (Applause.) And just in case, I’ll bring Michelle, who I know will get a good reception. (Applause.) . . .. But there's one thing no American President has done before – and that's travel above the Arctic Circle. (Applause.) So I couldn't be prouder to be the first, and to spend some time with all of you (Obama 2015a).

Type
Note
Information
Polar Record , Volume 52 , Issue 2 , March 2016 , pp. 252 - 255
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Brinkley, D. 2010. The wilderness warrior: Theodore Roosevelt and the crusade for America London: Harper Collins.Google Scholar
Diefenbaker, J. 1958. Opening campaign speech 12 February 1958, Winnipeg. URL: http://www.usask.ca/diefenbaker/galleries/virtual_exhibit/federal_elections_1957–1958/campaign_speech_1958.phpGoogle Scholar
Diefenbaker, J .1961. Opening of Inuvik speech. 21 June 1961. URL: http://www.inuvikheritage.com/Feature1.htmlGoogle Scholar
Dodds, K. 2011. ‘We are a northern country’: Stephen Harper and the Canadian Arctic’. Polar Record 47: 371–374.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grace, S. 2002. Canada and the Idea of the north. Kingston and Montreal: McGill and Queen's University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harper, S. 2008. Speech on the geo-mapping for northern energy and minerals program, 26 August 2008, Ottawa. URL: http://www.republicofmining.com/2008/09/01/honourable-prime-minister-of-canada-stephen-harper-geo-mapping-for-northern-energy-and-minerals-program-speech—26-august-2008-ottawa-ontario/Google Scholar
Kollin, S. 2001. Nature's state: imagining Alaska as the last frontier. Chapel Hill NC: University of North Carolina PressGoogle Scholar
MacDonald, B. 2012. ‘North Star’ of Herschel Island. The last Canadian Arctic fur trading ship. Victoria BC: Friesen Press.Google Scholar
Obama, B. 2015a. Kotzebue Middle/High School speech’, 3 September 2015 . URL: http://www.adn.com/video/video-full-obama-speech-kotzebueGoogle Scholar
Obama, B. 2015b. My Alaska visit – closing thoughts. URL: https://medium.com/@PresidentObama/my-visit-to-alaska-closing-thoughts-e9528ba4e268Google Scholar
Piggott, P. 2002. From far and wide: a complete history of Canada's Arctic sovereignty. Toronto: Dundurn Books.Google Scholar
Porteous, J. and Smith, S.. 2001. Domicide: the global destruction of home. Kingston and Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Plumer, B. 2015. The controversy over Shell's Arctic oil drilling, explained. Vox Explainers 2 September 2015. URL: http://www.vox.com/2015/9/2/9248593/shell-arctic-drilling-obamaGoogle Scholar
Powell, R. 2008. Science, sovereignty and the nation: Canada and the International Geophysical Year 1957–58. Journal of Historical Geography 34: 618–638.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Robertson, G. 2000. Memoirs of a very civil servant: Mackenzie King to Pierre Trudeau . Toronto: University of Toronto Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wynn, G. 2007. Canada and Arctic north America: an environmental history. Santa Barbara CA: ABC-CLIO.Google Scholar