Cook, Frederick Albert (1865-1940)

US explorer who was surgeon to the Robert Peary's Arctic expedition of 1891-92, and the Belgian Arctic Expedition, 1897-99. In 1909 he startled the world by announcing that he had reached the North Pole in April 1908, a year before Peary. His claim, rejected by some, is still a subject of controversy.

He was born at Calicoon Depot, New York and graduated in medicine at New York University. He later served a prison term for fraud in connection with questionable stock promotion. He wrote Through the First Antarctic Night (1900), My Attainment of the Pole (1911), and Return from the Pole (edited by F J Pohl; 1953).