A modern-day explorer takes on the Antarctic, the business world, and eventually the U.S. Government.

Ben Koether was born into a boating community on the edge of Long Island Sound, learning to maneuver a small penguin class sailboat on his own through the fog by the time he was eight years old. The water became his playground. He would go on to spend an entire summer on the Atlantic when he was fourteen, helping to sail the famous VEMA, captained by none other than the renowned Lou Kenedy.

But the beginning of his greatest adventures took place in 1959, when he set sail for the uncharted waters of the Antarctic and became the youngest navigator of the then largest Icebreaker in US History. His exploits there earned him a bay named in his honor: Koether Inlet on the north coast of Thurston Island.

This is the story of a modern-day explorer, a throwback to the earliest seafaring adventurers, and how his life’s journey led him from Pelham, New York, to the Antarctic, to the edge of the Bay of Pigs invasion, and, later, to a position on President Nixon’s inauguration team and a meteoric rise through the business world. In the end, Ben finds himself fighting for the life of the USS GLACIER, the very ship he navigated and fell in love with on the Antarctic Ocean.

Inside These Pages:

•  THE PHANTOM COAST Navigating through sixty-foot waves and crushing sea ice to reach waters no ship had ever penetrated. The Glacier pushed farther south into the Bellingshausen Sea than any vessel before, mapping what had only been blank spaces on the charts.
• BESET IN THE ICE The moment every polar navigator fears: trapped 600 miles from open water as Antarctic winter descends. With fuel running low, food supplies dwindling, and darkness closing in, 600 men faced the possibility of becoming permanent residents of the ice.
• CLASSIFIED OPERATIONS Cold War missions that have remained secret for decades, including an unbreakable coded message that may have altered the course of history during the Cuban crisis.
• BEYOND THE BRIDGE The journey didn’t end when Koether left the Navy. From confronting the KKK while integrating a Louisiana factory to pioneering computer technology that revolutionized the fast-food industry, this memoir reveals how the same dead reckoning skills used to navigate polar ice helped navigate the uncharted waters of American business.
• THE MISSION TO SAVE THE GLACIER Decades later, Koether led a passionate campaign to save his beloved ship from the scrapyard—a story of dedication, bureaucratic battles, and the fight to preserve maritime history.

Ben Koether is a businessman, a sailor, a husband, and father of three children: Roz, George, and Christian. He founded (FAST.) in his garage in 1969. He now lives in Fort Lauderdale with his wife Joan, where he is never more than a stone’s-throw away from the water.