Gjøa[jøː.ɑ] is a museum ship and was the first vessel to transit theNorthwest Passage. With a crew of six,Roald Amundsen traversed the passage in a three-year journey, finishing in 1906.[1]
The 70 by 20 feet (21.3 by 6.1 metres) square-sternedsloop of 47net register tonnage (4,700 cubic feet [130 cubic metres]) was built by Knut Johannesson Skaale inRosendal,Norway in 1872, the same year Amundsen was born.[1] She was namedGjøa after her then owner's wife, and for the next 28 years the vessel served as aherring fishing boat.
On March 28, 1901, Amundsen bought her from Asbjørn Sexe ofUllensvang, Norway, for his forthcoming expedition to theArctic Ocean.Gjøa was much smaller than vessels used by otherArctic expeditions, but Amundsen intended to live off the limited resources of the land and sea through which he was to travel, and reasoned that the land could sustain only a tiny crew (this had been a cause of the catastrophic failure ofFranklin's lost expedition fifty years previously). Her shallow draught would help her traverse the shoals of theArctic straits. Perhaps most importantly, the ageing ship was all that Amundsen (who was financing his expedition largely by spending his inheritance) could afford.
Amundsen had little experience of Arctic sailing, and so decided to undertake a training expedition before braving theArctic ice. He engaged Hans Christian Johannsen, her previous owner, and a small crew, and sailed fromTromsø in April 1901. The next five months were spentsealing on thepack ice of theBarents Sea. Following their return to Tromsø in September, Amundsen set about remedying the deficiencies inGjøa that the trip had exposed. He had a little 13horsepower (9.7kilowatts) marineparaffin motor, connected with a winch, for navigation in light winds and to facilitate handlings.[2][3] Much of the winter was spent upgrading her ice sheathing, as Amundsen knew she would spend several winters iced-in.
In the spring of 1902, her refit complete, Amundsen sailedGjøa toChristiania (now Oslo), the capital of Norway. At this timeNorway was still in a union with Sweden, and Amundsen hoped the nationalistic spirit which was sweeping the country would attract sponsors willing to underwrite the expedition's growing costs. After much wrangling, and a donation from the Swedish King,Oscar II, he succeeded. By the time Amundsen returned, Norway had gained its independence, and he and his crew were among the new country's first national heroes.
Amundsen served as the expedition leader andGjøa's master. His crew were Godfred Hansen, a Danish naval lieutenant andGjøa's first officer;Helmer Hanssen, second officer, an experienced ice pilot who later accompanied Amundsen on subsequent expeditions; Anton Lund, an experienced sealing captain; Peder Ristvedt, chief engineer; Gustav Juel Wiik, second engineer, a gunner in theRoyal Norwegian Navy; andAdolf Henrik Lindstrøm, cook.[4]
Gjøa left theOslofjord on June 16, 1903, and made for theLabrador Sea west ofGreenland. From there she crossedBaffin Bay and navigated the narrow, icy straits of theArctic Archipelago. By late SeptemberGjøa was west of theBoothia Peninsula and began to encounter worsening weather and sea ice. Amundsen put her into a natural harbour on the south shore ofKing William Island; by October 3 she was iced in.[5]
There she remained for nearly two years, with her crew undertaking sledge journeys to make measurements to determine the location of thenorth magnetic pole and learning from the localInuit. The harbour, known as Uqsuqtuuq ("much fat") inInuktitut, has become the only settlement on the island –Gjoa Haven,Nunavut, which now has a population of over a thousand people (1,349 at the2021 census).[6]
Gjøa left Gjoa Haven on August 13, 1905, and motored through the treacherous straits south ofVictoria Island, and from there west into theBeaufort Sea. By OctoberGjøa was again iced-in, this time nearHerschel Island in theYukon. Amundsen left his men on board and spent much of the winter skiing 500 miles (800 kilometres) south toEagle,Alaska to telegraph news of the expedition's success. He returned in March, butGjøa remained icebound until July 11.Gjøa reachedNome inAlaska on August 31, 1906. She sailed on toSan Francisco,California, where the expedition was met with a hero's welcome on October 19, the day after thecity was ravaged by an earthquake
Rather than sail her roundCape Horn and back to Norway, theNorwegian American community in San Francisco prevailed on Amundsen to sellGjøa to them.
After being anchored atMare Island for three years,[7] the Gjøa was given to San Francisco in 1909[8]
The ship was donated to the city of San Francisco, and the ship was dragged up the beach[9][10][11][12] to the northwest corner ofGolden Gate Park, surrounded by a low fence and put on display. Amundsen knew that because of the fame that his exploits aboardGjøa had earned, he would be able to gain access toNansen's shipFram which had been custom-built for ice work and was owned by the Norwegian state. Therefore, Amundsen leftGjøa in San Francisco. He and his crew traveled back to Norway by commercial ship. Of the original expedition members, only Wiik failed to return to Norway, because he had died of illness during the third Arctic winter.
Souvenir hunters and vandals necessitated a fence be erected and a caretaker hired — the gentleman lived in the ship and was enumerated there during the 1910 United States Census...The city installed a seal tank behind the stern of the ship and, according tothe Call, the Alaskan fur seal that occupied it acted as an additional nighttime guardian of the boat...Occasionally, the city would be spurred to make repairs and give the Gjøa a paint job (a 1968 visit to the city by Norway’s King Olav provided motivation for one such spruce-up), but generally the vessel that survived the crushing ice of the Arctic seas was a helpless victim to neglect and vandalism.[13]
Over the following decadesGjøa slowly deteriorated, and by 1939 she was in poor condition.
In 1939,Erik Krag founded the Gjoa Foundation and undertook a complete refurbishment that was completed in 1949.[14]
Refurbishment was delayed byWorld War II, and repairs were not completed until 1949. Being displayed outdoors and having faced 66 years of high winds, ocean salt and sand, the boat once again suffered deterioration, and evidence of campfires,[15] until in 1972, with the help of Erik Krag, a Danish American shipping company owner (Inter-Ocean Steamship Corporation) of San Francisco,Gjøa was returned to Norway. Krag was knighted by the king of Norway for his efforts in shipping homeGjøa.[16]
Gjøa was displayed in theNorwegian Maritime Museum (Norwegian:Norsk Maritimt Museum) inBygdøy, Oslo. In May 2009 the Norwegian Maritime Museum and theFram Museum (Norwegian:Frammuseet) signed an agreement for the Fram Museum of Bygdøy to take over the exhibition ofGjøa. It has been displayed in a separate building at Fram Museum.[17]
Abauta (memorial pillar or standing stone) now stands nearGjøa's former home in San Francisco.[18]Gjøa was also featured as a filming location in the 2005 documentary,The Search for the Northwest Passage, in whichKåre Conradi played Amundsen.
Media related toGjøa (ship, 1872) at Wikimedia Commons59°54′13.44″N10°41′56.32″E / 59.9037333°N 10.6989778°E /59.9037333; 10.6989778
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