EXPELLED.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLIV, Issue 55, 10 March 1910, Page 3

EXPELLED.

DR COOK AND THE EXPLORERS'

CLUB

The board of governors of the Explorers' Club met at New Yor,k on 23rd December in executive session, and, standing in silence, voted with bowed heads that Dr Frederick A. Cook be dropped ,f rom the rolls of the club for frauds practised on its members and on the public. Coming hard upon the heels of the crushing verdict lately rendered by the university of Copenhagen the action of the Explorers' Club is the result of independent investigations which in no way touch upon the polar controversy, and the weight of its disapproval thus becomes cumulative.

Preliminary to its vote of expulsion, the board met to pass upon the report of its committee, which has been investigating the validity of Dr Cook's assertion that he reached the summit of Mount M'Kinley. This committee, in concluding an exhaustive report, recommended that "Dr Cook's claim that he ascended the summit of Mount M'Kinley in 1906 be rejected by the Explorers' Club as unworthy of credence." The committee's recommendation was based on its finding that "Dr Cook had repeatedly made statements tna£ have not been in accord with the facts, and that he had entered into agreements which he has failed to keep, and that the misstatements and broken agreements deal not only with matters appertaining to discovery^ but to ordinary financial transactions, so that no credence can be given to statements made by him."

Among the seven signatures appended to this arraignment are those of Caspar Whitney and Anthony Fiala, both personal friends of Dr Cook. The committee is further explicit in its statement that it undertook its investigation only after first apprising Dr Cook of its purpose, which he approved in person; # and that it has disregarded entirely the testimony of Edward Barrill, Dr Cook's guide, and of Frederick Printz, his packer—although such testimony was before them—because it wished