The Explorers Club is a professional society dedicated to scientific exploration

Exploration

Exploration is the act of searching or traveling around a terrain for the purpose of discovery of resources or information. Exploration occurs in all non-sessile animal species, including humans...

 of Earth

Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...

, its ocean

Ocean

An ocean is a major body of saline water, and a principal component of the hydrosphere. Approximately 71% of the Earth's surface is covered by ocean, a continuous body of water that is customarily divided into several principal oceans and smaller seas.More than half of this area is over 3,000...

s, and outer space

Outer space

Outer space is the void that exists between celestial bodies, including the Earth. It is not completely empty, but consists of a hard vacuum containing a low density of particles: predominantly a plasma of hydrogen and helium, as well as electromagnetic radiation, magnetic fields, and neutrinos....

. Founded in 1904 in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

, it currently has 30 branches world wide. In addition to sponsoring expeditions and lectures, the Explorers Club is known for their adventurous, exotic cuisine served at their banquets.

Many of the founders of the Explorers Club had experience in the Arctic

Arctic

The Arctic is a region located at the northern-most part of the Earth. The Arctic consists of the Arctic Ocean and parts of Canada, Russia, Greenland, the United States, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Iceland. The Arctic region consists of a vast, ice-covered ocean, surrounded by treeless permafrost...

 including Adolphus Greely

Adolphus Greely

Adolphus Washington Greely , was an American Polar explorer, a United States Army officer and a recipient of the Medal of Honor.-Early military career:...

  and David Brainard

David Legge Brainard

Brigadier-General David Legge Brainard was an American arctic explorer and soldier.-Early life:Brainard was born in Norway, New York, the fifth son to Alanson Brainard and Maria C...

, survivors of the Lady Franklin Bay Expedition

Lady Franklin Bay Expedition

The 1881-1884 Lady Franklin Bay Expedition into the Canadian Arctic was led by Lt. Adolphus Greely and was promoted by the United States Army Signal Corps. Its purpose was threefold: to establish a meteorological-observation station as part of the First International Polar Year, to collect...

, and Frederick Cook

Frederick Cook

Frederick Albert Cook was an American explorer and physician, noted for his claim of having reached the North Pole on April 21, 1908. This would have been a year before April 6, 1909, the date claimed by Robert Peary....

. Others, such as Carl Sofus Lumholtz

Carl Sofus Lumholtz

Carl Sofus Lumholtz was a Norwegian explorer and ethnographer, best known for his meticulous field research and ethnographic publications on indigenous cultures of Australia and Mesoamerican central Mexico.-Biography:...

 and Marshall Howard Saville

Marshall Howard Saville

Marshall Howard Saville was an American archaeologist, born at Rockport, Mass. He studied anthropology at Harvard , engaged in field work under F. W. Putnam, and made important discoveries among the mound builders in southern Ohio. After 1903 he was professor of American archæology at Columbia...

, explored the tropics

Tropics

The tropics is a region of the Earth surrounding the Equator. It is limited in latitude by the Tropic of Cancer in the northern hemisphere at approximately  N and the Tropic of Capricorn in the southern hemisphere at  S; these latitudes correspond to the axial tilt of the Earth...

. The club first allowed women to join in 1981. Famous members of the club have included Robert Peary

Robert Peary

Robert Edwin Peary, Sr. was an American explorer who claimed to have been the first person, on April 6, 1909, to reach the geographic North Pole...

, Matthew Henson

Matthew Henson

Matthew Alexander Henson was an African American explorer and associate of Robert Peary during various expeditions, the most famous being a 1909 expedition which it was discovered that he was the the first person to reach the Geographic North Pole.-Life:Henson was born on a farm in Nanjemoy,...

, Roald Amundsen

Roald Amundsen

Roald Engelbregt Gravning Amundsen was a Norwegian explorer of polar regions. He led the first Antarctic expedition to reach the South Pole between 1910 and 1912 and he was the first person to reach both the North and South Poles. He is also known as the first to traverse the Northwest Passage....

, Edmund Hillary

Edmund Hillary

Sir Edmund Percival Hillary, KG, ONZ, KBE , was a New Zealand mountaineer, explorer and philanthropist. On 29 May 1953 at the age of 33, he and Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay became the first climbers known to have reached the summit of Mount Everest – see Timeline of climbing Mount Everest...

, and Neil Armstrong

Neil Armstrong

Neil Alden Armstrong is an American former astronaut, test pilot, aerospace engineer, university professor, United States Naval Aviator, and the first person to set foot upon the Moon....

.