Dennis Rawlins (born 1937) is an American astronomer and historian who has acquired the reputation of skeptic primarily with respect to historical claims connected to astronomical considerations. He is known to the public mostly from media coverage of his investigations into two early twentieth-century

North Pole The North Pole, also known as the Geographic North Pole or Terrestrial North Pole, is the point in the Northern Hemisphere where the Earth's rotation, Earth's axis of rotation meets its surface. It is called the True North Pole to distingu ...

expeditions. In his first book, ''Peary at the North Pole: fact or fiction?'' (1973), Rawlins argued that

Robert Peary Robert Edwin Peary Sr. (; May 6, 1856 – February 20, 1920) was an American explorer and officer in the United States Navy who made several expeditions to the Arctic in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He was long credited as being ...

never made it to the North Pole in 1909. His second book (1993) is an edition of

Tycho Brahe Tycho Brahe ( ; ; born Tyge Ottesen Brahe, ; 14 December 154624 October 1601), generally called Tycho for short, was a Danish astronomer of the Renaissance, known for his comprehensive and unprecedentedly accurate astronomical observations. He ...

's 1598 catalogue of 1004 stars which detected ten star places that were fabricated, partially or entirely. In 1976, as the only astronomer on the

Committee for Skeptical Inquiry The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (CSI), formerly known as the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (CSICOP), is a program within the U.S. non-profit organization Center for Inquiry (CFI), which seeks to " ...

, he looked into the purported Mars effect. In 1996 he made headlines when page one of the ''New York Times'' covered his report to Ohio State University which concluded that in 1926 Richard E. Byrd's airplane flight towards the North Pole turned back 150 miles from the pole. Rawlins's third book, his detailed report on Byrd's trip and on the competence of lingering defenses of it, was co-published simultaneously in 2000 b
''DIO'' volume 10, 2000
and by the polar research center at the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

. Because explorer

Frederick Cook Frederick Albert Cook (June 10, 1865 – August 5, 1940) was an American explorer, physician and ethnographer, who is most known for allegedly being the first to reach the North Pole on April 21, 1908. A competing claim was made a year l ...

's story of reaching the North Pole in 1908 is generally rejected, the elimination of Peary and Byrd leaves fourth North Pole claimant

Roald Amundsen Roald Engelbregt Gravning Amundsen (, ; ; 16 July 1872 – ) was a Norwegians, Norwegian explorer of polar regions. He was a key figure of the period known as the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration. Born in Borge, Østfold, Norway, Am ...

as first there in 1926 in the airship ''Norge'' (Norwegian for Norway). Having attained the

South Pole The South Pole, also known as the Geographic South Pole or Terrestrial South Pole, is the point in the Southern Hemisphere where the Earth's rotation, Earth's axis of rotation meets its surface. It is called the True South Pole to distinguish ...

in 1911, Amundsen thus became the first to reach each geographical pole of the earth,''History Channel'' December 8, 2000 and May 7, 2001. as proposed in Rawlins's 1973 book.

Selected works

References

External links

* http://www.dioi.org/cot.htm DIO online, a compendium of several hundred of Rawlins's contributions.
Starbaby
by Dennis Rawlins, originally published in Fate Magazine, October 1981 {{DEFAULTSORT:Rawlins, Dennis Living people 1937 births Writers from Baltimore American astronomers American publishers (people) 21st-century American historians 21st-century American male writers Historians from Maryland American male non-fiction writers