The Ice Diaries: The True Story of One of Mankind’s Greatest Adventures – Captain William R. Anderson, with Don Keith

When I was a kid, one of the few things in the adult world that captured my attention was the USS Nautilus. I suppose this was because pretty much everyone at that time was interested in it. In the dim reaches of my memory, I seem to recall wanting to get a model of the submarine to put together, but I won’t stake my life on that.

The USS Nautilus was not just any submarine: it was the first nuclear powered submarine. It caught the world’s attention by the science-fictiony method of power and by all the records it broke due to it’s unique abilities enabled by that power source. For us in the United States, it was a matter of national pride in the time of the Cold War.

While the main story of Captain Anderson’s book is the Nautilus’ efforts to circumnavigate the Arctic Sea via the North Pole under the Arctic ice, he relates much more of the history of the Nautilus than this. Having previously told this story, this version benefits from much information having lost its Top Secret classification, allowing the author to give us much more detail.

This is a non-fiction book, but that doesn’t mean that it isn’t a good story. I have to admit, though, that I’m a bit prejudiced. During the Vietnam War, when it became apparent that I was going to be up for the draft, I thought about joining the Navy with an eye towards serving on a submarine. Things didn’t work out, but that didn’t dim my interest in submarines. This book just helped feed that interest a bit. It’s a good tale written by the captain of the submarine, who had an obvious pride in the submarine, its missions and its crews.

Finished 4/30/17