Albert
Peter Low was born in Montréal in 1861 into a loyalist family
that had left the United States in 1783. After graduating from
McGill, where in 1881-1882 he helped invent the now global
sport of ice hockey, it was his job as a geo-scientist for the
Geological Survey of Canada to explore and document huge swaths of
the unknown wilderness in the new country of Canada - mostly land
that had not yet been assigned to Québec.
In his day, AP Low explored one of the largest unknown areas in the world. Of particular significance, in 1903 and 1904 Commander Low led the Crown expedition to the Arctic on the steamship Neptune; which resulted in Canada officially claiming the Arctic Archipelago. Often referred to as the 'Iron Man of Canada', Low went on to direct the Geological Survey of Canada.
It takes intensive planning, coordination, negotiation, and technical skills to pull off a successful expedition.
 Neptune in winter quarters, 1903-1904, igloo at right |
 Carving of a caribou, made for Low by an Inuit Chief |
A.P. Low information and image credits: the Government of Canada, Hugh Stewart, Peter Black, Max Finkelstein, James Stone, and the Canadian Museum of Civilization