Stanley, Livingstone & Man v. Nature

Can you find the white man in this picture?

We’re off the coast of Zanzibar and scheduled to land in the morning.

As such, I am thinking of Henry Morton Stanley, who arrived here in 1871, to begin his search for Dr. David Livingstone.

Stanley was an American journalist, in the employ of The New York Herald.  The Herald was in the business of selling newspapers, and as such, the Herald’s owner, James Gordon Bennett, the Rupert Murdoch of his day, hired Henry Morton Stanley, a Civil War reporter, to go on a great adventure for the paper – FIND DAVID LIVINGSTONE.

You could not ask for a better arc of story.

Livingstone was something of a legend and something of a nut – more a figure out of Heart of Darkness than anything else.  Livingstone had been a missionary, dedicated to bringing Christianity of Africa.  Based on little more than his own personal beliefs, and not much in the way of facts, he convinced prospective settlers that the land north of the Zambizi river in present day Zambia was a kind of temperate African Switzerland.  He turned out to be very very wrong.  It was more Devil’s Island than Davos and almost everyone on the ill fated expedition died of disease or the heat.

Livingstone’s disaster in Africa seemingly only fired his inspiration to become a full fledged African explorer and he set out for Zanzibar in 1866 to find the source of the Nile. More years of lost wandering, disease, death and expenses followed.  The more Livingstone failed, the more a messianic figure he became.

By 19871, he was hopelessly lost and the perfect ‘thing’ for Stanley to search for.

And what great fodder for the paper.

Africa in 1871 was about the Moon in 2010. Really far away, and almost no one went there.  And the land of myths.

Stanley outfitted an expedition from Zanzibar with 200 porters to schlep his crap more than 700 miles through the jungles of East Africa.  It was no easy trip.  Tomorrow, the Crystal Serenity arrives in Zanzibar and the ship has issued warnings that the buses that will meet the passengers may not be air conditioned.

Things were a bit rougher in 1871.

Malaria stalked the expedition, but Stanley, journalist that he was, was not above exaggerating the dangers of death, disease, privation and native attack.  Those 200 porters might not have been carrying Carrier 2000 BTU air conditioners, but you can bet that 95% of what they were carrying was to make life as comfortable for Stanley as possible.

Reading the account of Stanley’s search for Livingstone reminds me of nothing so much as watching an episode of Man v. Wild.

Those of us in the TV business understand that Bear Grylls is not exactly alone.  Who do you think is shooting the adventure?  And you can bet that the crew comes extremely well-equipped.

If you have ever watched one of those National Geographic programs where an adventurer climbs up a sheer cliff of solid ice using only an ice pick, you will know that scene where he plunges the ice pick into the ice face and with a grunt pulls himself up another few inches.

Amazing.

So let us then have a moment for the cameraman who had to get up the ice face first, plant himself, and by the way, is not only clinging to the ice face, but also is humping a camera and getting the shot.

ahem…

Stanley was the first of the adventurer/journalists.

On November 10, 1871, Stanley found Livingstone (who was lost only to the readers of the Herald).  It was not until July 2, 1872 that The Herald published the news, along with the soon to be immortalized quote from Stanley, “Dr. Livingstone, I presume”.

8 months to get the story to the paper.

That was before CNN.

But the concept remains the same.

It was a great story – the unpleasant realities of the truth of the story aside.

It was what makes Survivor such a popular series.

Africa, adventure, danger, arc of story….

Sells newspapers.

Or today, gets ratings on TV.

The tragedy, of course, is that the real story of what is going on in places like Tanzania is far more terrifying that one perhaps lost, and certainly mentally unstable white man.

Disease, death, poverty, war, violence, privation.

It’s here in Africa by the bucketload.

Has been since the time of Henry Morton Stanley.

It’s just that African people don’t really sell newspapers… or rate on TV.

Too bad for them.

And for us.