18th November, 1832 was born Nils Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld

Nils Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld - Swedish (Finnish), geologist and geographer, Arctic explorer, historian and cartographer.

Nils Adolf Erik is known to be the first to pass in the years 1878-1879 the Northern Sea Route from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

Nordenskiöld was born in Helsingfors (now Helsinki). From 1849 to 1853 he studied at the local university (now - University of Helsinki), where he studied mathematics and geology, as well as, to a greater extent on his own, chemistry and mineralogy.

In 1861 he participated in the Swedish expedition to Spitsbergen led by Otto Torell. In 1864-1868 and in 1872-1873 expedition led by Nordenskiöld made shooting maps of Spitsbergen, with Nordenskiöld first crossed the Eastern ice field. In 1870 and 1883 he led the Swedish expedition to Greenland, initiated research of its ice shield. In 1875 and in 1876 Nordenskiöld sailed from Sweden at the mouth of the Yenisei and supervised research papers.

In 1878-1879 Nordenshёld on the steamer "Vega" was the first to sail through (with hibernation on the way) the Northeast Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific and returned to Sweden (1880) through the Suez Canal thus surpassing for the first time the whole Eurasia. 

On the map the name of Nordenskiöld is seen on: archipelago north of Taymyr Peninsula, bays off the coast of Novaya Zemlya, and the North-East Land of Spitsbergen, Svalbard Peninsula West (Nordenskiöld Land), an asteroid, and others. The Laptev Sea until 1935 bore the name of Nordenskiöld.

This Day in History 18-11-2014