Impressed by Henson’s experience at sea, Peary offered him the job. Of course, Henson was capable of far more. But eager to escape the hat shop, he accepted Peary’s offer. Little did he know how this decision would change his life—and history.

As Henson would discover, Peary was a man of fierce ambitions. As a white man trained as an engineer, Peary, unlike Henson, had many opportunities to make his dreams come true. And Peary had big dreams. More explorers were venturing into the Arctic, racing to be the first to reach the North Pole. The winner of this race would become famous. Peary decided that man should be him.

When he and Henson returned from Central America, Peary began planning for a yearlong trip to northern Greenland, the land closest to the North Pole. He wanted Henson to come along as his “manservant.”

By then it was clear to Peary how much more Henson could do; he had impressed Peary on the Central American trip. Henson had taken on complex jobs, working alongside Navy engineers. But Peary’s eyes were clouded by racist ideas. No matter what Henson did, Peary would never see past the color of Henson’s skin to treat him as an equal.

Surely Henson was embittered by this injustice. But he couldn’t resist the chance to see more of the world. 

Henson and Peary set sail for Greenland in June 1891 with four other men and Peary’s wife, Josephine. One month later, they came ashore and set up camp near a bay. As planned, the ship sailed away and would return in one year to pick them up.

They had made it to the Arctic. But they were still 700 miles from the North Pole. Getting there would mean weeks of trekking through killing cold and ferocious blizzards.

To succeed, they would need help from experts in Arctic survival: Inuit people. The Inuit were skilled ice fishermen and hunters of arctic animals like seals, walruses, and polar bears. They wasted not a single scrap of an animal. They ate the meat and blubber and often drank the blood. They made clothes from skins and furs and carved bones into tools.

The team’s plan was to spend the first months in Greenland preparing food and other supplies they’d need to explore Greenland and find the best route to the North Pole. Peary hired Inuit women to sew them fur clothing and sealskin moccasins, which didn’t freeze and split open in the cold like leather boots did.

During this time, Henson began to forge close friendships with the Inuit people they met. Unlike Peary, Henson learned their language and joined their celebrations. Henson’s Inuit friends taught him how to hunt and ice fish. They taught Henson to drive a dogsled pulled by a team of eight arctic dogs. No other American or European explorers had these kinds of skills. 

In the coming years, Peary and Henson would make five more trips to the Arctic. They faced many near disasters. They got lost in blizzards and at times ran so short of food they nearly starved.

On one trip across the ice, Peary’s feet became so frostbitten that eight of his toes snapped off. He would have lost his feet completely had Henson not pushed him back to camp on a sled, an 11-day journey.

Despite these setbacks, Peary became famous. Back in America between trips, newspapers ran glowing stories about his daring adventures. Henson was rarely mentioned, except as Peary’s “manservant.”

Yet Henson had become as determined as Peary to get to the Pole. And in 1909, on their sixth trip to the Arctic, it seemed their dream was about to come true.

On April 3, they were pushing across the ice. Henson was leading the way along with four Inuit men: Seegloo, Egingwah, Ooqueah, and Ootah. Based on Peary’s measurements, they believed they were about 150 miles from the North Pole. 

But then came the moment when disaster struck. Henson slipped and tumbled into the frigid Arctic waters. Death comes within minutes in water that cold. Muscles turn to knots. Blood slows. Vision blurs as the brain powers down. Henson was just hours from achieving his dream. But he was sure he was about to die.

And then with a sudden whoosh! he practically flew up out of the water. Ootah, one of the Inuit men, had grabbed Henson, saving his life.

Three days later, Peary, Henson, and the other men all reached the North Pole. Henson planted the American flag in the snow.

But when they returned to America, it was Peary who got sole credit for “discovering” the North Pole. He took his glorious place alongside Ferdinand Magellan and Marco Polo as one of history’s famed explorers. 

In the coming decades, Henson won some small awards. Within African American communities, he was deeply admired. But history books mostly ignored Henson’s achievements and those of most African Americans and nonwhite people. Henson lived a quiet life in New York City with his wife, Lucy, working as a messenger. His niece, Olive Henson Fulton, once proudly told classmates that her uncle Matthew was a famous Arctic explorer. Her teacher punished her for lying.

But by the time Henson died in 1955, America was changing. African Americans were fighting for equal rights. In the 1960s, new laws outlawed discrimination based on race. The accomplishments of African Americans began to rise out of history’s shadows. 

In 1988, Matthew Henson’s body was moved to Arlington National Cemetery, the burial ground of many of America’s admired heroes. The gravestone says:

Matthew Alexander Henson

Co-Discoverer of the North Pole.