Munsey's Magazine, May 1924

# Museum Catalog Note

This issue of Munsey's Magazine (May 1924) features "Beyond the Pole," a complete novelette by Philip M. Fisher, Jr. The science fiction narrative concerns the fate of the converted German dirigible Z 397, renamed the U.S.S. Rappahannock, which vanished during a secret 1920 polar expedition. The story, narrated by an officer sidelined with a broken leg, follows the airship's launch from Aluakat Island in the Aleutians on a course toward the North Pole via the 170th meridian. After thirty-four successful hourly position reports documenting steady northward progress, all communication ceases three degrees short of the pole. The narrative expands into technical discussions of radio transmission, terrestrial magnetism, and electricity's properties before shifting to a 1921 relief expedition dispatched by sea and air to locate the missing vessel. The search party establishes supply caches across the Arctic ice and conducts systematic expeditions, finding no wreckage. The fragmentary conclusion suggests an unexplained mystery awaits revelation.