Search for the U.S. Revenue Cutter Bear

Background Information

The essays below will help you to understand the goals and objectives of the mission and provide additional context and information about the places being explored and the science, tools, and technologies being used.

  • Mission Plan

    By United States Coast Guard, NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research, and NOAA Office of National Marine Sanctuaries – Maritime Heritage Program

    Commemorative painting showing the 270-foot Medium-Endurance Cutter Bear and her namesake, Revenue Cutter Bear, under sail and steam.

    U.S. Revenue Cutter Bear is one of the most storied ships in Coast Guard history. Largely associated with polar exploration, and particularly its Arctic service, the ship’s history is a series of compelling stories of bravery, dedication to duty, and legendary exploits. Learn more about the goals, objectives, and operational plans to search for the Bear during this expedtion.

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  • Why We Search for the U.S. Revenue Cutter Bear

    By Bradley W. Barr

    U.S. Revenue Cutter <em>Bear</em> (no location/date/photographer identified).

    Given the Bear’s iconic status, it is fitting that such a search be conducted to find its final resting place, and this “Bear Hunt” offers an opportunity to not only insure the preservation of this important heritage resource, but to tell its compelling story, once again, to a wider audience.

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  • The Bear: Symbol for “Steadfastness, For Courage, and For Constant Readiness to Help Men and Vessels in Distress”

    By William H. Thiesen

    A posed crew photo on the deck of the Bear, including Asian enlisted men seated on bottom row.

    The Bear is more than just a famous ship; she is a symbol for all the service represents—for steadfastness, for courage, and for constant readiness to help men and vessels in distress. – Captain Stephen Evans, The United States Coast Guard, 1790-1915

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  • Search for the Bear, 1979-2019

    By William H. Thiesen

    Chart from the original 1979 search for Bear undertaken by Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Harold Edgerton and Coast Guard Academy cadets on board the Buoy Tender Conifer.

    The Bear’s story did not end with the sinking of the cutter. Instead, a new chapter of the cutter’s history had begun and, within about 15 years of its sinking, the search for Bear was on.

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  • The Bear—Built to Serve in the Ice

    By William H. Thiesen

    Colorized profile view showing hull and sail rig of Cutter <em>Bear</em>.

    In 1885, Bear began its service career along with Thetis, an Arctic whaler turned over to the Revenue Cutter Service by the U.S. Navy. By today’s standards, these first revenue cutters to operate in the ice were considered “ice resistant” vessels.

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  • Bear and Rescue of the Greely Expedition Survivors

    By William H. Thiesen

    An 1884 photograph of the survivors of the Greely Expedition, including Adolphus Greely, and men of the relief expedition.

    In 1881, Lt. Adolphus Greely, a member of the U.S. Army’s Signal Corps, led an expedition to Ellesmere Island, northwest of Greenland, to study its weather and winter conditions. Attempts to relieve Greely’s expedition in 1882 and 1883 proved unsuccessful and members of the expedition began to die of disease and starvation. In 1884, the U.S. Navy purchased Bear and the Arctic whaler Thetis to support a search for Greely.

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  • Captain “Hell Roaring’” Mike Healy—Tamer of America’s Western Sea Frontier

    By William H. Thiesen

    The colorful Captain “Hell Roarin’” Mike Healy, first African-American ship captain and famed skipper of the Bear.

    Born in 1839 on a plantation near Macon, Georgia, Healy was the son of a white plantation owner and a slave. Healy became the first U.S. sea service officer of African descent and the first to command a federal ship. His career tied him to the taming of America’s western maritime frontier, earned him the nickname “Hell Roaring” Mike Healy, and made him the most famous captain in Coast Guard history.

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  • Bear and Captain Healy’s Transfer of Reindeer from Siberia to Alaska

    By William H. Thiesen

    Painting showing the 1892 transfer of Siberian reindeer by Cutter Bear under the command of Captain Healy.

    The native people of Alaska relied heavily on whaling and fishing when the territory came under U.S. control in 1867. However, after foreign whaling, fishing, and sealing vessels entered Alaskan waters, fish and game numbers diminished dramatically, causing large-scale malnutrition and starvation in native towns and settlements. To solve the problem, Captain Healy tried to convince authorities that Siberian reindeer should be introduced to Alaska.

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  • Bear—Tamer of Alaska’s Wild Frontier

    By William H. Thiesen

    Photo of U.S. Coast Survey field party in Siberia transported by Cutter Bear.

    Revenue Cutter Bear served every year on the Bering Sea Patrol, which cutters had initiated in 1874. Each of the Bering Sea Patrols covered between 15,000 and 20,000 miles of cruising. Conditions on these patrols were harsh, dangerous, stressful and, at times, deadly (a fact demonstrated by Bear crewmembers buried in the Aleutian Islands). However, Bering Sea sailors experienced long periods of intense boredom punctuated by terrifying events.

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  • The Overland Expedition–Saving Lives Above the Arctic Circle Over 120 Years Ago

    By William H. Thiesen

    Bear officers, including Second Lt. Ellsworth Bertholf (front row far left), First Lt. David Jarvis (front row third from left), Captain Francis Tuttle (center), and U.S. Public Health Service Surgeon Samuel J. Call (back row far right).

    Revenue Cutter Service officer David Henry Jarvis wrote in his diary, journaling the Overland Relief Expedition, considered one of the most spectacular rescues in the history of the Arctic. As leader of the heroic expedition, Jarvis became one of the Service’s best-known officers to serve in the Alaskan maritime frontier.

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  • Bear and the Byrd Expeditions to Antarctica

    By William H. Thiesen

    USS <em>Bear</em> moored to the ice shelf at West Base, Antarctica, in January 1941 showing the vessel's pre-World War II configuration.

    By the mid-1920s, Bear had served Alaska for over 40 years and over 30 Bering Sea Patrols. During that career, the whaling fleet had sailed out of the Arctic fogs into the mists of memory and waves of miners had come and gone. As Alaskan settlements developed, civilizing influences once provided from the sea by Bear became locally available on land.

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  • The Bear in World War II and the Venerable Cutter’s Final Years Afloat

    By William H. Thiesen

    Appearing very different from her last Greenland visit in 1884, USS Bear (AG-29) returned in 1944 as part of the Coast Guard’s Greenland Patrol.

    During World War II, Greenland sat on the northern edge of the Battle of the Atlantic and, early in the conflict, the Germans established weather stations there to provide forecasts for their European operations. In 1941, the United States began military oversight of Greenland on behalf of occupied Denmark to prevent these German incursions, retain control of strategic cryolite mines, and build air bases for military aircraft flying from the United States to Europe.

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