The Genteel California Socialite Who Became the World’s Leading Female Arctic Explorer

In the Early 20th Century, Louise Arner Boyd Lived a Double Life—A Philanthropist in the States, and a Hero on the High Seas

Sailing towards the west coast of Greenland in the war-torn summer of 1941, the Effie M. Morrissey navigated its way through a narrow fjord and anchored off the town of Julianehaab. The American ship appeared vulnerable and run-down next to the impressive U.S. Coast Guard vessels Bowdoin and Comanche.

It was a perilous time. Only eight weeks before, a British cargo vessel had been torpedoed and sunk by a German U-boat off Cape Farewell just to the south. As newly minted members of the Greenland Patrol of the Atlantic Fleet, the …