Jan Eskymo Welzl

Jan "Eskymo" Welzl. A statue by Stanislav Lach (1998) in Welzl's hometown Zábřeh

Jan Welzl (15 August 1868, Zábřeh, Moravia, Austria-Hungary – 19 September 1948 Dawson City, Yukon, Canada) was a Czech[1] traveller, adventurer, hunter, gold-digger, Eskimo chief and Chief Justice on island New Siberia and later story-teller and writer. He is known under the pseudonym Eskymo Welzl or the nickname Arctic Bismarck.

Rudolf Těsnohlídek began to write down his adventures on the basis of conversations with him. Pavel Eisner continued this but did not finish and later Bedřich Golombek and Edvard Valenta completed the work. The book Třicet let na zlatém severu ("Thirty Years in the Golden North") had great success in Czechoslovakia and also abroad, where people suspected that "Eskymo Welzl" did not exist and that the real author was Karel Čapek who wrote the preface to foreign editions.

The asteroid 15425 Welzl, discovered on 24 September 1998, is named after him.

Bibliography

(Freedom below freezing - Stories and mysteries that left the greatest Czech explorer - John Eskimo Welzl)

Notes

  1. He used to describe himself as a "Czech of Moravian ethnicity"; see

External links

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