Jeremiah N. Reynolds

Jeremiah N. Reynolds (1799–1858), also known as J.N. Reynolds, was an American newspaper editor, lecturer, explorer and author who became an influential advocate for scientific expeditions. His lectures on the possibility of a hollow earth appear to have influenced Edgar Allan Poe's The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket (1838) and his 1839 account of the whale Mocha Dick, "Mocha Dick: Or the White Whale of the Pacific", influenced Herman Melville's Moby-Dick (1851).

Mocha Dick, The White Whale of the Pacific, by Jeremiah N. Reynolds, 1932 cover, Charles Scribner's Sons, New York. Illustrations by Lowell LeRoy Balcom.

Early life

Born into poverty in Pennsylvania, he moved to Ohio as a child. In his teenage years and early 20s, he taught school, saved his money and attended Ohio University in Athens, Ohio for three years. He then edited the Spectator newspaper in Wilmington, Ohio, but sold his interest in it in about 1823.[1]

The next year, Reynolds began a lecture tour with John Cleves Symmes, Jr.. Reynolds had become a convert to Symmes' theory that the earth is hollow. Symmes' idea was accepted as possible by some respected scientists of the time.[2] The two presented talks on the subject. When Symmes died, Reynolds continued his lectures, which were given to full houses in Eastern U.S. cities (with a charge of 50 cents for admission).[1]

Over time, Reynolds became willing to accept the possibility that the theory was wrong. In Philadelphia, Reynolds and Symmes parted.[3]

Adventures

Gaining the support of members of President John Quincy Adams' cabinet, and speaking before Congress, Reynolds succeeded in fitting out a national expedition to the South Pole. But Andrew Jackson opposed the project, and after he became president it was squelched.[1]

Reynolds garnered support from private sources and the expedition sailed from New York City in 1829. With much danger, the expedition reached the Antarctic shore and returned north, but at Valparaíso, Chile, the crew mutinied and set Reynolds and another man on shore.[1]

In 1832, the United States frigate "Potomac" under Commodore John Downes arrived. The ship had been ordered to the coast of Sumatra to avenge an attack on an American ship, "Friendship", of Salem, Massachusetts and was returning home in what became a circumnavigation of the globe. Reynolds joined Downes as his private secretary for the trip and wrote a book about the experience.[1]

Later life

Back in New York City, Reynolds studied law and became a success as an advocate. In 1848 he organized a stock company in New York City for a New Mexico mining operation.[1]

Reynolds missed joining the Great U.S. Exploring Expedition of 1838-1842, even though that venture was a result of his agitation. He did not participate because he had offended too many in his call for such a trip.

His health broke down and in 1858 he died in New York at age 59.[1]

Influence on Poe's "Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym"

Edgar Allan Poe was influenced by Address on the Subject of a Surveying and Exploring Expedition to the Pacific Ocean and the South Seas (1836).
The Southern Literary Messenger, February, 1837, containing the second installment of "The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym".

In the January 1837 issue of the Southern Literary Messenger, Edgar Allan Poe reviewed Reynold's "Address, on the Subject of a Surveying and Exploring Expedition to the Pacific Ocean and South Seas (New York, 1836) first given to the House of Representatives on April 2, 1836."[4]

"Poe used some seven hundred words of Reynolds' Address in the fifteen hundred words of Chapter XVI of The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym," wrote Daniel Tynan of The Colorado College in an article about the Poe text, adding a synopsis of "sections from Chapter IV of Reynolds’ Voyage and Chapter XIV of Pym, indicating to what extent Poe borrowed from Reynolds’ book for his own purposes".[5]

Tynan's assumption, however, that the "Mr. Reynolds", Poe praised as "the prime mover of this important undertaking", the United States Exploring Expedition (actually not in January 1837 in the SLM but only in September 1843 in Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXIV No. 3),[6] can be identified with Jeremiah. N. Reynolds seems more than doubtful.

Influence on Melville's Moby-Dick

The Knickerbocker of May 1839 published "Mocha Dick: Or the White Whale of the Pacific", Reynolds' account of Mocha Dick, a white sperm whale off Chile who bedeviled a generation of whalers for thirty years before succumbing to one.[7] (see "Mocha Dick" section in "External links" below)

Other literary influences

The novel Our Plague, A Film From New York (1993) by James Chapman includes scenes of Reynolds as a character, making his way in scientific circles and delivering a lecture in New York. He appears too in "The map of the sky", of Felix J. Palma Felix J. Palma.

For further information

Official papers on funding an expedition

Reynolds was mentioned in numerous documents related to the federal government's decisions to fund exploratory missions:

"On the Expediency of Fitting Out Vessels of the Navy for an Exploration of the Pacific Ocean and South Seas" (Washington: Gale's & Seaton, 1860):

From the same volume of the same title, but published in 1861:

Other, similar published collections of federal documents:

(Washington: Gale's & Seaton, 1860)

Footnotes

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Web page titled, "The Romantic History of Jeremiah N. Reynolds" at the "American Studies at the University of Virginia" Web site, accessed August 12, 2006
  2. ↑ Philbrick, Nathaniel, Sea of Glory, pages 19-20, Hereafter: Sea of Glory
  3. ↑ Sea of Glory, page 20
  4. ↑ pp. 68-72 quod.lib.umich.edu
  5. ↑ Web page titled: "Text: Daniel J. Tynan, 'J. N. Reynold's Voyage of the Potomac: Another Source for The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym,' from Poe Studies, vol. IV, no. 2, December 1971, pp. 35–37." From the Web site of the Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore, accessed August 12, 2006.
  6. ↑ p. 165 books.google
  7. ↑ Web page titled "Mocha Dick: Or the White Whale of the Pacific: A Leaf from a Manuscript Journal", by J.N. Reynolds, Esq. (from The Knickerbocker, Vol. 13, No. 5, May 1839, pp. 377-392, babel.hathitrust.org)" part of "The Plough Boy Anthology" Web site, which is in turn part of Tom Tyler's Plough Boy Journals website at the University of Denver, accessed August 12, 2006

External links

Mocha Dick

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