1945

American explorer who has completed a number of risky—and record-setting—solo trips through the Arctic and Antarctic. Steger has explored and traveled his entire life, beginning with a raft trip down the Mississippi River at age 15. Since then, he has traveled in the Arctic and Antarctic, making the longest unsupported dogsled trip (1,600 miles [2,575 km], south to north across Greenland) in 1988, and the first dogsled trip across Antarctica (3,471 miles [5,586 km]) in 1989-90. He also made the first unsupported dogsled journey to the North Pole in 1986.