Fort Conger
Fort Conger
Fort Conger is a former Arctic base on Ellesmere Island, Nunavut, Canada. It sits on the northern shore of Lady Franklin Bay in Grinnell Land, inside Quttinirpaaq National Park. The area is grassy and rugged, with high cliffs and little timber. Today it is uninhabited.
History and purpose: Fort Conger was built in August 1881 as an Arctic exploration camp for the Lady Franklin Bay Expedition, led by Adolphus Greely. This expedition was part of the United States’ contribution to the First International Polar Year. About 25 people lived there for two years in a three-room wooden building with tar-paper walls and lean-tos for supplies. The fort was named after U.S. Senator Omar D. Conger, who supported the expedition.
Robert Peary later used Fort Conger on his Arctic trips. He found the original building unsuitable for polar winters, tore it down, and reused the wood to build smaller adjoining structures, some of which still stand and are now Federal Heritage Buildings. The site was used in various forms through 1935, and several later expeditions passed by or used it as a base.
Key events: In 1899, during his attempt to reach the North Pole, Peary reached Fort Conger and suffered severe frostbite. He reportedly wrote “I shall find a way or make one” on a wall. Peary’s 1905 and 1908 expeditions also visited the fort. The MacGregor Arctic Expedition attempted to reoccupy it in 1937. Discovery Harbour, across from Fort Conger, had previously been used by HMS Discovery during the British Arctic Expedition of 1875 led by George Nares.
Science and heritage: Fort Conger hosted many scientific projects, from pendulum observations to studies of microbes in the old huts. The University of Minnesota conducted microbial research on the wood at Fort Conger and the Peary huts. In 1991, several structures were designated Classified Federal Heritage Buildings. Large amounts of arsenic have been found at the site in recent years, likely from sample preservation.
In popular culture: The 1974 Disney film The Island at the Top of the World features Fort Conger as a stopover for arctic explorers in 1907.
This page was last edited on 3 February 2026, at 12:58 (CET).