Piracy: Here is the story of a mutiny with the prize being a fabulous treasure carried by the Oceanic. The Helldiver makes its first appearance here, being the personal craft of Captain Chauncey McCluskey.
This is the first of Dent's "pirate" stories but it won't be the last. The pirate theme is reused again and again in several later stories. Dent was very interested in treasure hunting. Dent spent some time out west panning for gold. Dent eventually bought a small boat, the Albatross, on which he lived for several years. During this time he went on several excursions looking for lost Spanish gold. The pirate theme is reflection of his interest in this subject.
Dent’s choice of the name for the ship may have been purely romantic but in 1928 the White Star Line ordered a new ocean liner that was to be named Oceanic. Construction did not go smoothly and the ship was eventually stopped and the order cancelled.
Treasure: The Oceanic treasure consists of $50,000,000 in gold and diamonds lost during World War I.
Jules Verne’s character Captain Nemo conquers the South Pole in his vessel the Nautilus. Doc and his crew prevail over the northern ice in The Polar Treasure.” Whereas the Nautilus has a near disaster after being trapped in an icy sepulcher, Doc's vessel, the Helldiver, carries a quantity of liquid chemicals that will melt the ice should their ship become similarly trapped.
Dent’s story has some basis in fact. In 1931 famed explorer George Hubert Wilkins set off for the North Pole in a surplus World War I submarine, the USS O-12, now christened Nautilus. It’s also interesting to note that Wilkins middle name, Hubert, was used in The Man of Bronze for Hubert Robertson. Perhaps Dent was paying homage.
As Will Murray points out in the recent The Polar Treasure - Pirate of the Pacific reprint, the former story was influenced by the famous Wilkins-Ellsworth Submarine Expedition. It seems likely Dent interjected the Helldiver into the story as a way of grabbing onto some of the excitement surrounding this notable and exciting scientific adventure. Both the submarine and the local in which the story takes place can be attributed to this newsworthy event.
But there is more going on in this story than the Wilkins-Ellsworth Submarine Expedition. Dent included significant elements from another source in The Polar Treasure. Consider the plot in this story. A treasure map is found. An expedition is mounted to recover the treasure. The main characters charter a craft to take them to a remote location. The ship’s crew learns of the treasure, filling the ship with a sense of unease and foreboding. At one point, a person disappears from the ship and is presumed lost at sea. They arrive at the treasure location which is supposed to be deserted only to find an inhabitant on the island. The treasure has been moved from its original location. A battle ensues in which the pirates are defeated and the treasure recovered by the rightful parties.
Does any of this sound familiar? It should if you have ever read Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson as it is the basic plot for that novel. Treasure Island starts off with two pirate factions trying to get the map showing the treasure location. The Polar Treasure begins in exactly the same way.
1. Just as in Treasure Island, Doc and his men set out on a charted vessel to a remote location in order to obtain the treasure. It turns out that they pirates are also on the same boat.
2. The mate on the Hispaniola, Mr. Arrow, disappears at sea. Doc wakes up on to learn that Monk and Renny have disappeared.
3. Ben Gunn moves Flint’s treasure while Ben O’Gard’s men move the Oceanic treasure. Ben Gunn is marooned on the island. Victor Vail’s wife and daughter suffer a similar fate.
4. The treasure has been moved. In Treasure Island it is Ben Gunn who has moved it. In The Polar Treasure, Keelhaul de Rosa learns that Ben O’Gard’s faction has moved it.
5. Treasure Island has the pirate blind Pew. Victor Vail mirrors this malady as well as actually being the treasure map.
6. Captain Flint's ship was named the Walrus. Dent persistently refers to Captain McCluskey as a "walrus."
7. Like Long John Silver, Ben O’Gard puts one over on the treasure seekers who believe him to be trustworthy.
8. The Admiral Benbow Inn becomes Doc’s headquarters.
June 1, 1933 – Black Colossus by Robert E. Howard is published in Weird Tales.
June 4, 1933 – The USS Ranger (CV-4) is commissioned.
June 5, 1933 – Aviator James Mattern disappears over Siberia, Russia while attempting a new around-the-world record.
June 6, 1933 – The first drive-in movie theater opens in New Jersey.
June 16, 1933 – President Franklin Roosevelt signs the National Industrial Recovery Act into law. He also signs the Banking Act of 1933 creating the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. The Act also prohibited banks from investing in the stock market.
June 17, 1933 – The Kansas City Massacre occurs when Pretty Boy Floyd kills four FBI agents in Kansas City, Kansas.
June 19, 1933 – William Hamm of the Hamm’s Brewery family is kidnapped and held for ransom.
June 21, 1933 – The Supermarine Walrus makes its first flight.
June 22, 1933 – The Illinois Waterway officially opens.
June 26, 1933 – The cover story for this issue of Time Magazine is on General Italo Balbo, Italy’s Minister of Aviation.
