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Volume 3036
HOW TO GET TO PELLUCIDAR I
(concluded in Part II: ERBzine 3037)
By Rick Johnson

People love Dinosaurs ~ People love Tarzan . . .
. . . And people love the idea of being a hero of the likes of Tarzan, Flash Gordan, John Carter, Indiana Jones, Alan Quatermaine and even Mirian Birmbaum, not to mention the dozens of others that inspire our imaginations with their journeys to far off "Lost Worlds" where adventure awaits, not to mention lovely young ladies and … dinosaurs!
EVIDENCE
In my earlier paper, ERBzine 2296: Where is the Opening to Pellucidar  I explored the theory (jokingly referred to as "The Swiss Cheese Theory’" that dinosaur survivals on Earth are NOT true survivals, but simply travelers along the terminus of a vast system of caverns and tunnels that connect Pellucidar to the Outer Crust.  These caverns occasionally lead to Mega-Caverns where entire dinosaurian eco-systems form as resting places until the migrations can reach such places as Maple White Land in Brazil, Island of the Skull in the Indian Ocean and, thanks to the thoughts of Den Valdron, possibly even Isla Sorna off the coast of Costa Rica among others.


Example of a Migration Route from Earth to Pellucidar

The reason for this argument is simple, the average 8-ton elephant eats between 220-440 pounds of vegetation per day!  A breeding population requires about 200 individuals to survive over time.  It requires ten food animals to feed one predator.  But, unlike elephants that have no natural predators, the Sauropod and hadrosaurs did!.  Thus for a breeding population of predatory dinosaurs to survive, they must number 200.  These 200 carnosaurs require 2,000 herbosaurs.  As each ton of animal requires about 60 pounds of food per day, and an Iguanodon weighs about 4 tons, the average hadrosaur is eating almost 200 pounds of vegetation per day. Do the math for a heard of apatosaurs or other sauropods yourself!  You see how fast even a family group would strip an area bare.

Thus it is clear that it is impossible for an area as small as described in the literature to be able to support even a too-small family group of dinosaurs.  These dinosaurs must come from someplace and the only viable possibility is Pellucidar via a vast cavern-cave-tunnel network as described in my previous paper.

Here are some examples:

MAPLE WHITE LAND  (aka Lost World)


Maple White Land Map per E. Challenger

First "discovered" by Maple White in the late 1800s, this place was described by Edward Challenger (as told to H. G. Wells in The Lost World 1912) who followed Maple White shortly after the turn of the century into Brazil to find a population that includes: Pterodactyls, Iguanodons, Stegosaurs and even Allosaurs.

As the size of the plateau is described to be (very) roughly 20x30 miles, it is clear that no population of even iguanodons could survive there for long without stripping the land bare.  Thus, Maple White Land must be a Migration Terminus from Pellucidar.

ISLAND OF THE SKULL (aka Kong Island)


Island of the Skull Map

First "discovered" by a Norwegian sailor, his map and description fell into the hands of Carl Denham, a film-maker who saw this as an opportunity to become rich and famous.

His journey was made into a documentary film (King Kong1933) which showed not only an ape-like anthropoid (for more info see ERBzine 1520: King Kong I: The Lost Civilization of Skull Island by Den Valdron  but a number of highly aggressive dinosaurs including: apatosaurs, stegosaurs, styracosaurs, a three-clawed tyrannosaur among others.  There were also monstrous arthropods in the caverns.

The island is described as once the seat of a grand civilization until the dinosaurs drove the inhabitants into savagery and restricted them to one small part of the island.

The unanswered question is: how could any civilization locate, inhabit and build such a civilization while fighting off the local dinosaurs?  THEN, be driven out?  And how could such a small island support such a large population of dinosaurs?

Obviously, the natives had discovered the island and built their civilization in safety when the most dangerous indigenous creature was the Kong.  Only after the civilization had been established for some centuries did an earthquake open a Migration Route to Pellucidar.  Considering how aggressive the herbosaurs were and the size of the arthropods, it is possible that this migration Route was a very long and stressful one that encouraged only the most aggressive to survive the journey.

ISLA SORNA


Isla Sorna map

Actually a series of islands, Sorna where the ‘dinosaurs’ were ‘created’ and Nebular where they were exhibited and a possible third island, these were established by InGen as a theme park where that company claimed to recreate dinosaurs (as described by reporter Michael Crichton in Lost World, 1995).   InGen‘s claims have since been shown to be false.

First of all, Dominican Amber is only a few million years old, not the hundred million years old required to provide dinosaur DNA.  Second, InGen claimed to splice frog DNA with that found in the mosquitoes when any paleontologist would have recommended bird DNA.  Third, the result was too dinosaur-like considering the amount of frog DNA included by their claims. And Finally, DNA degrades quickly and cannot survive centuries, much less the dozens of millions of years claimed.

Den Valdron has suggested that Isla Sorna is a Migration Terminus from Pellucidar (based on his studies that most of these are on or near a tectonic plate fault) where InGen either found a few recently dead bodies or perhaps an occasional survivor.  They then cloned that DNA and claimed the Amber story to protect their discoveries from the various governments that would confiscate their find.

FORBIDDEN VALLEY (aka Valley of the Gwangi)


Gwangi or 3-toed T-Rex from the Forbidden Valley

Discovered first by the Native American, Turok and his companion, Andre, this was later rediscovered by Tuck Kirby and T. J. Breckenridge (recorded by William Bast as The Valley of the Gwangi 1969) where they captured a three-clawed Tyrannosaur to exhibit in their Wild West Show at the turn of the 20th century.  Another report places this in Depression-era America though it is possible that there were two events that got confused into one event.

Although described as being in New Mexico by Turok, it is clear that the Indian Turok did not understand the difference between New and Old Mexico and became confused by the openness of the border at that time, thus the Gwangi report may be considered to be the more accurate as to location.

Considering that the Forbidden Valley is described to be sparse desert, it obviously cannot support even the single styracosaurs described, much less a breeding population and so this, like the Island of the Skull, must be a Migration Terminus.  Especially as this Gwangi is identical to the T-Rex fought by King Kong half the world away.

SAVAGE LAND
This is an anomaly indeed.

Buried under nearly a mile of Antarctic ice, this small area is home to a host of dinosaurs as well as sapient races that defy classification.  Stories about the origin of the Land range from a surviving Lost World to a valley created by an alien race to study Earth Evolution.  However, the proximity of the Savage land to the Southern Polar Opening (to which it may be connected) indicates else wise.


Map locating the South Polar Opening

Map of Caspak.  Per E. R. Burroughs
CASPAK
First discovered by the Italian navigator, Caproni, who followed Captain Cook, this is an anomaly.  A mega-volcano of a size that is unknown today, the interior contains an ecosystem that superficially resembles Earth.  But, upon closer examination, it is found that every animal (and presumably plant) upon the Island lays eggs which follow the evolution of that species, taking seven generations at each stage to advance to the next evolutionary step.

Obviously, this is so different from normal Terrestrial biology it should not exist.

Yet it does!

The solution was proposed by one corespondent (whose name and letter I have unfortunately lost) who suggested that Caspak may be an experiment by advanced aliens to study Earthly Evolution.

It was suggested that the Reptilian Race (aka Reptoids, aka Cylons)  had discovered Earth some 50 million years ago and established Caspak as an experiment in “Oontogeny recapitulates Phylogeny”.  Which translates as an abandoned theory that all life on Earth repeats its evolutionary history before birth.  Considering the Reptoids (and their Grey slave race) inability to learn human biology, despite repeated abductions and constant anal probing, it must be accepted that they are a slow learning race indeed.

Thus, the current theory is that Caspak is neither a Migration Terminus nor natural, but a created site.

PAL-UL-DON


Map of Pal-ul-Don  per E. R. Burroughs

Described by Greystoke shortly after WW I to his famous biographer, Edgar Rice Burroughs (Tarzan the Terrible 1918), only one dinosaur was described.  Although he mentioned dangerous saurians in the swamp that surrounded this land, none were described as dinosaur survivals and so could as easily be large snakes and monitors.  The one dinosaur described was the Gryf, a 75' long omnivorous Triceratops.  Even the Smilodon is absent, save as a saber-tooth tiger/lion hybrid.  Note that I suspect the Sauropod Cryptid often seen in that area is probably a large long-necked monitor lizard.

Thus, lacking any credible reports, Pal-ul-Don is probably little more than an isolated area where a single dinosaur managed to survive while evolution ran wild.  Considering that human DNA would stretch from Earth to the Sun and back 40 times, we possess much, if not most of our ancestral DNA and a series of mutations or regressions within an inbred area would enhance such matters as a prehensile tail and fur into a new genus of humanity.  Reports of the occasional child born with a tail show the possibility of this when the Ho-Don and Waz-Don races are described.

FIRST CONCLUSION
It is obvious that no dinosaur could survive the dozens to hundreds of millions of years from the Mesozoic Era to Modern Times.  It is equally clear that no viable population of Dinosaurs could survive in such a small area as Maple White Land, Island of the Skull or Isla Sorna without stripping it bare within weeks to months, then starving to death.

Therefore these surviving dinosaurs MUST come from another place and that place can only be Pellucidar.  Well, they can arrive through time-warp and a few other ways but these are so rare as to be negligible. Thus I will focus on the Migration Theory to account for Dinosaur sightings on Earth.

Den Valdron has postulated the idea of ‘vortexes’ that form like fluidic earth whirlpools between Earth and Pellucidar to transport living being from one to the other.  I admit to being skeptical so will encourage you to read his numerous papers on the subject yourself.

It is also clear that every person who explored these sites made the same fundamental mistake.  They believed that they were observing an isolated eco-system that had managed to survive well over 100 million years.  Had they realized that this was impossible, they would have explored further and found a Migration Route to Pellucidar that would be large enough to allow a herd of sauropods to easily traverse.  If so, then a large group of human explorers would have no trouble following this Route back to the Inner World.

OTHER JOURNEYS
In July of 2008, David Critchfield described a number of methods of reaching Pellucidar in his work ERBzine 2347: How Bad Do You Want to Go to Pellucidar? and although outdated and incomplete, it is still an excellent resource.

Mr Critchfield describes a number of ways to reach Pellucidar:

  •  Submarine
  •  Mysterious Portal
  •  Volcano/Cavern Network
  •  Rope
  •  Matter Transmitter
  •  Mind Projection
  •  Polar Opening
    • Although outdated and based on incomplete reports, the basic idea is still valid… mostly.  There has been an unconfirmed report of an attempt to reach Pellucidar via Diving Bell, the ‘Mysterious Portal’ or ‘Stargate’ has since been shown to be a Schrödinger Wormhole and has been used a number of times. The Volcano/Cavern network is most famous by the Journals rewritten by Jules Verne and is the main topic of this paper.  Rope... ok , 500 miles of rope?  I’ve repelled and even 200’ of rope weighs a lot!  Even repelling a hundred or even 500’ at a time would take years.  Until I read that report, I shall ignore this method.  Matter Transmitter has been used on at least three known times.  And Mind Projection, though interesting, is of limited value to the common man.

    Which leaves the Polar Openings as the best way to enter Pellucidar.  Of these, there are at least two, one at each pole though the Southern Opening is buried under a mile of ice and the Northern Opening is NOT at the actual North Pole but offset by some miles.

    What I shall do with this paper is to describe the known attempts to reach Pellucidar by each method.  My pattern is simple:  I will list every known expedition by date and the method used to enter Pellucidar (or the attempts for an attempt to reach the ‘center’ of the Earth is included even when failed).  This will be followed by an examination of each journey, grouped by type of method.  Finally I will toss in a few ideas that I believe are worthy of further examination.

    IMPORTANT NOTES:
    Although this paper can stand alone, it would be a good idea to stop reading and reread the earlier mentioned papers to get a decent background.  Feel free to stop reading this paper and expose yourself to the references cited.

    Many of the expeditions mentioned in this paper are still difficult to locate so I have glossed over them.  When I manage to get a copy, I shall update this paper.  If you have a copy of the report (on paper or video), please let me know so we can negotiate a trade.

    All reports based upon Animated and Television Series are cheerfully ignored as I believe that they do not report actual expeditions and so are for entertainment purposes only.  This includes the various "Journey to the Center of the Earth" cartoons and TV series as well as the various Tarzan cartoons and TV Series that describe such travels.  I am also giving limited credence to any comic book or graphic novel for the same reason.

    Although my method of organization and my decision as to what to include and exclude may seem haphazard and capricious, I do have a system that seems to work for me so enjoy.

    EXCLUDED WORKS
    I have excluded the following for any of a number of reasons mentioned above.  If you feel that they should be included, please reply with your reasons.  It would be helpful if you would attach a copy for me to reconsider.

    Comics and TV series:

  • Tarzan in Savage Pellucidar-
  • Blood Money and Human Bondage-
  • Tarzan and the New Atlantic-
  • Tarzan Returns (Tarzan the Epic Adventures)-
  • Tarzan at the Earth's Core (Tarzan, Lord of the Jungle)-
  • Tarzan and the Hidden World  (Disney TV series)-
  • Tarzan and the Beast from Below  (Disney TV series)-
    • Movies:
    Journey to the Center of the Earth (2009) starring Emo Phillips - Actually refers to an underground civilization and not to Pellucidar.

    THE ATTEMPTS:
    Ideas are like seeds.  They flit around seeking the fertile soil of an imaginative mind, fading away from starvation then trying again.  Finally, when the time is right, the idea sprouts, spreads and everyone seems to discover that thought, independently but united in time.

    The most widely known thought concerning this is the discovery of America. First found by pre-Asian hunters some 12,000-20,000 years ago by two separate routes (the land route between glaciers and the coastal route along the western American shore), it lay forgotten, then was re-discovered multiple times over the centuries.

  •  The Romans during the time of Nero.
  •  The Chinese in 495 then again in 1421
  •  The Irish in 550
  •  The Norse in 1000
    • And so on by many others from West Coast Africans to Japanese fishermen.  The evidence is overwhelming.

    Each discovery was an idea, yet each became lost for the minds in which the seeds of America settled could not nurture the thought and so America was discovered, lost and rediscovered again and again until 1492 when the time was right and the explorations of Columbus provided the fertile soil that allowed the New World to remain, finally, discovered.

    Aviation is another.

    Everyone knows that the Wright Brothers invented the first heavier than aircraft in 1904 ... yet everyone is wrong.

    From Daedelus in Ancient Greece to Da Vinci in the Renaissance and on and on and on, many people discovered the idea of heavier than air flight but around the year 1900, the idea took root and spread.

    By 1904, there were no less than a dozen men around the world experimenting with heavier than air craft.  One Polish immigrant built an aircraft eight years before the Wright Brothers, flew it five miles over Lake Michigan, got scared, turned around, flew back to land and landed safely.  Compared to that, the later Wright flight that could have taken off and landed (crash landed actually) on the wingspan of a Boeing 747 sounds childish.

    Yet, around 1900, the time was right for flight and dozens of people experimented, most with considerable success.  It was the Wright Brothers who saw the value of Public Relations and made certain that a reporter with camera was present... thus they entered history and the rest who possessed better machines much earlier... were forgotten.

    Attempts to explore the Interior of the Earth are the same. An idea that flitted about, seeking fertility and failing until…

    Yet, when you actually look at the attempts to reach the Inner World, the wonder is that a regular tourist service hasn’t already been established.

    QUESTION
    It is clear from the records that a number of expeditions have attempted to reach the “Center of the Earth” and equally clear that none have succeeded… speaking historically in the ‘who discovered America’ vein that is.

    Why?

    For two reasons.  Either the Earth is hollow or it is not.

    If the Earth is hollow, the ‘center’ is a central sun of high temperature, possibly a Schrödinger Wormhole anchored to the external Sun and held in place by gravitational equilibrium.  If the Earth is NOT hollow, the ‘center’ is a viscous ball of molten iron.  Neither of which are conducive to tourism, or the survival of the visitors

    So what do we mean when we mention the “Center of the Earth”?

    If the Earth is hollow, it consists of a shell some 500 miles thick.  The gravitational field will exist at the 250 mile depth so that those on the inner world will face ‘down’ as seem from our perspective.  The central sun is an anomaly with many theories but no conclusive proof.  My personal thought is that there is a Schrödinger Wormhole (Google Dr Schrödinger yourself)  that connects the outer Sun (Sol) at the Source and is anchored to the actual geographic center of the Earth as a Terminus to the Wormhole.  But this is theory only and I am willing to entertain other thoughts.  Hopefully some physicists and astronomers will use this paper to enter Pellucidar and examine this Central Sun.

    Upon the Inner Surface live a wide variety of plants and animals, mostly from the Outer World.  Some identical to their Outer counterparts, some mutated while others continued to evolve from Terrestrial forms.

    This is not unheard of for the Horseshoe Crab has remained virtually unchanged for hundreds of millions of years.  Why change when you don’t need to?  Living things do not evolve, they adapt and if the conditions are idea and unchanging, why should they adapt?  Sea Urchins are an example.  Some living species are identical to those that coexisted with the dinosaurs. Others are new species that evolved quite recently.  Thus in Pellucidar we would find some species that remained the same as their Jurassic compatriots but others that continued to adapt such as the leaping Allosaur, the gliding stegosaur and the sentient Horibs and Mahars.

    And some of these may occasionally find their way to the Outer World as some of us find our way to the inner.

    HIKING TO PELLUCIDAR
    First of all, let's do some simple math here.

    If the Earth is 500 miles thick, and as the average hiker can do 20 miles a day, it would take 25 days minimum to reach Pellucidar.  Assuming that the hiker were casually walking down then up a sheer cliff.  That null-field where the gravity changes from ‘up’ to ‘down’ must be really confusing.

    Instead, we should assume a 20 to 30 degree incline with the occasional drop which simple High School trigonometry will show the trip to be now 1460 miles or more which expands your trip to 70-80 days.  Assuming you continued to walk at such a slant for two-and-a-half months.   I’m going to include the occasional free drop via rappelling for some hundreds of feet and the occasional easier and more level walk and so add a month.  So a hike to Pellucidar will take three to four months.  And although some of the journals of the explorers show a much longer trip, most reveal a journey of days or, at most, weeks.  The famous Lidenbrock Expedition of 1863 entered the Volcanic crater of Snaefellsjokul in Iceland on 28 June 1863 and exited via the Stromboli eruption on 28 August, 1863, a total of two months.  And they only penetrated a calculated total of 85 miles down!  (note the Von Hardwigg expedition of 1871 that followed the Lidenbrock Journey took a week less but claims that their penetration was 105 miles down)


    Distance to hike via simple Trigonometry

    Can you carry that much food on your back?  I Discussed this with a cross-country backpacker who once hiked the Pacific Trail from Mexico to Canada and he claims that a pound of food per day was required, not to mention water, bedding, tools, etc.  Sixty pounds of food plus hammers, walking sticks, bedding, soap, scientific tools, rifles, and so on…  (Sort of like how a television cowboy could pack all his camping gear, including a large coffee pot, into such a small saddlebag that doesn’t bulge)  Not to mention problems resulting from lack of sunlight (vitamin-D) and scurvy  (vitamin-C).  At 8 ½ pounds per gallon, even at  a half-gallon of water a day, it is clear why the leaders of the Journeys insisted that they would find ample water underground.

    Yet, many people claim to have visited the Inner World, at least some of whom were mistaken.    If they did so, many of these hikers stopped when they found a Mega-Cavern but a few miles beneath the Outer Surface as described in the Johnson Hypothesis of the earlier paper.

    To recap from the earlier paper, the Earth is closer to Swiss Cheese than solid and many of the known cave systems (like Carlsbad in New Mexico and Colossal in Arizona) have never been completely explored because they continue on for miles and miles, further than the explorer can carry food and water and light.  Some of these tunnels enter large caverns before continuing on.  Some of those tunnels are large enough for a dinosaur to enter and traverse while some of these Mega-Caverns are dozens to hundreds of miles across. What appears to be mountains with cloud-hidden peaks in a hidden valley are actually columns and short walls that have eroded to resemble mountains.  Some Mega-Caverns are so large they even have weather to complete the illusion of a cloudy valley.  Some have lighting that ranges from electrical discharges to phosphorescent moss to other methods yet undescribed to produce light.  It is currently unknown how UV is produced or if local diet renders UV superfluous to our biological needs.

    If a dinosaur enters one of these caverns, it will drop excrement along the way, eventually dieing if it does not exit.  Seeds in the excrement will germinate to produce food to support the next plant-eating dinosaur, the body feeding the carnosaurs who follow.  And the next dinosaurs will move a bit further, using the first as a sort of base-camp.  Parasites will drop off, to mutate, adapt, grow within the darkness and caverns.  Eventually, generation after generation of these creatures will reach a Mega-Cavern and some will remain, others will return to Pellucidar or Earth along a path that now has enough food to support them and so a Migration Route will form, though over centuries or millennia.  Most of the Migration Routes will end at a Mega-Cavern, others will continue to the other surface where certain people have discovered a colony of living dinosaurs in an area too small to support the population.  Maple White Land in Brazil and Island of the Skull in the Indian Ocean being the most famous..  Thus, what we perceive as “Dinosaur Survivals” is really the occasional solitary dinosaur or herd that managed to follow the migration from Pellucidar to the Outer World.

    THE JOURNEYS by Date:
    Glancing at a Timeline for the Inner World, we note that the earliest visitors were the earliest life on Earth.  If a trilobite exists in Pellucidar, it probably came from the Outer World.  Thus regular travel has existed for some time.  If we were to restrict this list to humans, we would find the following  (note that not all reached Pellucidar but I give them an A for effort):
  • ??? Early man.  Probably ancestors of the Inuit or Siberians or proto-Europeans:  Via the North Polar Opening
  • c.900 Vikings from the Greenland colony:  Via the North Polar Opening
  • Mid-1500    Arne Saknussemm: Via the Snaeffels Crater
  • c1600 Spanish Pirates: via Polar Opening
  • 1829 Olaf Jansen & father: Via the North Polar opening
  • 1862 Casper Hastings: Via Taurnaga Crater
  • 1863 Professor Otto Lidenbrock.  THE most famous journey.  Following Arne Saknussemm: Via Snaeffels Crater
  • 1865 Edward Dennison: Via Baronof Isle fissure
  • 1869 Theodore Lytton following Casper Hastings: Via Taurnaga Crater
  • 1869 Jonathan Brock following Edward Dennison: Via Baronof fissure
  • 1871 Professor Von Hardwigg following Arne Saknussemm.  Equal to Lidenbrock in fame: Via Snaeffels Crater.
  • 1871 Samuel Harkins.  Follows Arne Saknussemm but always just behind Von Hardwigg: Via Snaeffels Crater
  • 1880 Oliver Lindenbrock.  Follows Arne Saknussemm: Via Snaeffels crater
  • 1898 Professor Otto Lidenbrock.  Presumed to be Lidenbrock’s second attempt: Via Snaeffels Crater
  • 1904 Abner Perry.  This was an accident as he was simply trying to build a cheap mining machine:  Via Mechanical Mole
  • 1920?  Clive Neville:  Via North Polar opening
  • 1930  Tarzan in the O-220 dirigible: Via North Polar opening
  • c1942  Byron Wells in a P-38J fighter: Via North Polar Opening
  • 1947 Admiral Richard Byrd by airplane: Via North Polar Opening
  • 1971 William Gilmour by Helicopter: Via North Polar Opening
  • 1976 Christopher West: Via Matter Transmitter.
  • 1979 Eric Carstairs to Zanthodon: Via cavern in Egypt
  • 1984 two teams. Information unknown: One via Mechanical Mole ~ One via Diving Bell
  • c1986 Maureen Birnbaum: Via Mind Projection
  • 1993 Anthony LaStrella.  Information unknown
  • 1995 Tarzan.  Information unknown.  Probably a fraud: Via Cavern network.
  • 1997 Max Anderson: Via Snaeffels crater
  • 1999 information unknown:
  • 2004 Professor Lindenbrock:  Information unknown including the date.  May be the 1880 journey under a new name.
  • 2007 Trevor Anderson.  Follows Max Anderson:  Via Snaeffels Crater
  • 2007 Homeland Security flight: Via North Polar opening
  • 2007 Fiona O’Neil following the HS flight: Via North Polar Opening
  • 2008 Estrith Mormor: Matter Transmitter
  • 2008 Thomas Tucker by dirigable: Via North Polar Opening
  • 2008 Kristen Radford: Via Matter Transmitter
  • 2008 Joseph Harnett follows Kristen Radford: Via Mechanical Mole


    • There are probably more attempted, most failing, others where the explorers died in route or on site, still others whose journeys remain unrecorded or unknown by me.

    Therefore, not counting the prehistoric journeys, there have been a total of 36 known attempts to enter Pellucidar or the Center of the Earth, not all succeeding.  Of these:

  •  14 via the Cavern System (few reaching Pellucidar)
  •  11 via the North Polar Opening (the Southern Opening is buried)
  •  3 by Mechanical Mole
  •  3 by Matter Transmitter
  •  5 by methods that are unknown or unusual such as diving bell or submarine or by mental projection.


    • THE JOURNEYS  by type

    THE NORTH POLAR OPENING

    Location to North Polar opening


    Sea Bottom map to North Polar Opening

    Pre-historic
    The earliest human visitors to Pellucidar must be the prehistoric races of the Ice Age.  I suspect that the Sagoths entered via the Cave-system as there are no apes or man-apes in the vicinity of the Polar Openings.  By the time hominids moved that far north, they had evolved into Humans.  Others such as the Bison-Men and Tarag-Tooth Man are obviously mutations or evolutions of normal biota that appeared inside Pellucidar.

    As to why I suspect that date of the Ice Age?  It has only been within recent times that ship-building technology enabled man to approach the Polar Opening by sea but during the Ice Ages, walking would be easier (once the initial problem of food were solved).

    The vast majority of the inhabitants resemble Cro-Magnon or Modern man who evolved between 17,000 and 30,000 years ago.   The known mythology of the Giliks of Pellucidar does not refer to arriving from a place ‘of alternating light and dark’, which implies an entry so long ago that all legends were lost. And they speak a unified language and possess a uniform ability to find home.  All of which would take time to develop from a small inbred group that entered long ago.

    Vikings
    After that, we have no records until around the year 1000 ce when the Vikings entered.  These appear to have been the Norse colonists of Greenland who decimated the local ecology and were forced to head north to the ‘happy hunting grounds’ of the Inuit or return home to Iceland & Norway.  These are shown to be in Pellucidar in 1932 as recorded by Conrad H. Rupert in The Vikings in Pellucidar (1932)

    Spanish
    Again history fades for some half a century when Spanish Pirates (Corsairs) entered through the Polar Opening around the mid to late 1600’s to interbreed with the local Giliks to form the Korsairs.

    Olaf Jensen
    In 1829, Olaf Jansen was taken on a fishing trip north from Franz Josef Island until they reached Pellucidar.  They appear to have had a pleasant outing and returned safely to Sweden as described in his Journal "The Smoky God" (1908).

    Clive Neville
    Sometime before 1920, Clive Neville and Alistair Simmons enter Pellucidar as described by Sean Edward (Tony) Phillips in 1902s Pellucidar Revisited (1997).  Although it is not stated exactly how the duo reached the Inner World, internal reading suggests dog-sled and other mundane methods.  The reasons for this early and undocumented date is that Mr Simmons had been aquainted with Abner Perry who left for Pellucidar in 1904 and who never returned to the Outer World.

    David Innes
    By 1930, David Innes had been captured by the Korsars (descendents of Spanish Pirates) and the request was made for rescue.  Tarzan captained a solid airship dirigible, the O-220, which was taken into the Inner World along with a crew that includes: Tarzan as Commander, Jason Gridley, Zuppner the German captain & Von Horst, Duff and Mines, 10 Waziri tribesmen, 12 engineers, 8 mechanics, a negro cook and two Philippino cabin boys.  All of these made it out successfully as described by that master historian, Edgar Rice Burroughs in the classic Tarzan at the Earth's Core (1930).

    Byron Wells
    During the early days of World War II, Byron Wells, on patrol in the North Atlantic in his P-38J fighter, entered Pellucidar via the North Polar opening.  He met with a technical civilization on the Dead Moon as well as the traditional local woman to love.  This report was published by Andy Nunez as Moon Maid at the Earth’s Core (2001).

    Richard Byrd
    In 1947, Admiral Richard Byrd flew into and out of Pellucidar.  He received the Congressional Medal of Honor for this feat, a curious act as the Medal of Honor is restricted to action performed IN COMBAT against ENEMY FORCES!  What actually happened to the Admiral in Pellucidar will never be known as his reports were immediately classified by the US Navy and remain so to this day with only the occasional rumors finding their way to the people.

    William Gilmour
    In 1971, a short visit was made into Pellucidar by helicopter by William Gilmour, Vern Coriell, Stan Vinson and Bob Hyde and recorded in the biographical report Back to the Earth’s Core (1971) by William Gilmour. I admit to not reading this report so have no further information.

    HS/O'Neil
    Shortly before 2007, a Homeland Security flight carrying a number of civilians, prisoners suspected of terrorism and HS agents flew off course and crashed within Pellucidar at the snow-line.  Most of the crash-survivors were killed by velociraptor packs with the remaining saved by the fortunate action of Fiona O'Neill and Major Barry Sullivan of the USAF (a Search & Rescue pilot) along with the assistance of suspected terrorist Jason Obrien and a number of Spetznost soldiers from Russia in a converted M-24 Hind helicopter.  This report was leaked under the name of Rescue from Pellucidar (2009) by Rick Johnson.

    Thomas Tucker
    The final known entry via the North Polar Opening was by wounded Gulf War Vet Thomas Tucker when he answered an internet dating ad and was taken within by dirigible as recorded in The Sun Inside (2009) by David Schwartz. This is another report that I have never read.

    NPIEE
    The North Pole Inner Earth Expedition @ http://www.npiee.org had planned a trip into Pellucidar to be scheduled the Summer of 2009 but their current website keeps moving the date.  So far, this well-planned expedition has not happened but donations are still being accepted and one may purchase a ticket upon their ice-breaker if you wish to make the attempt.

    CONCLUSION
    It is clear that despite the North Polar Opening NOT being at the Geographic center of the planet, many people have managed to find this Path into Pellucidar and so this is currently the Path with the greatest success rate and comfort.
    Continued in ERBzine 3037
    Visit the Pellucidar Film Galleries
    GALLERY I  |  GALLERY II

    Rick Johnson Feature Articles and Fiction in ERBzine
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