Robert Edwin Peary, Sr. (May 6, 1856 – February 20, 1920) was an American explorer who claimed to have led the first expedition, on April 6, 1909, to reach the geographic North Pole. Peary's claim was widely credited for most of the 20th century, though it was criticized even in its own day.

Robert Edwin Peary was born in Cresson, Pennsylvania, in 1856. Peary graduated from Bowdoin College, Phi Beta Kappa, in 1877. He was also a member of the Theta chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon while at Bowdoin, and the flag of DKE was one of the five flags that he took with him to the North Pole. His home in Fryeburg, Maine, still remains in pristine condition as an inn known as the Admiral Peary House.

Peary made several expeditions to the Arctic, exploring Greenland by dog sled in 1886 and 1891 and returning to the island three times in the 1890s, including the Peary Relief Expedition to Greenland of 1892. He twice attempted to cross northwest Greenland over the ice cap, discovering Navy Cliff. American artist F. W. Stokes joined some of these expeditions.

"The Man" is a slang phrase that may refer to the government or to some other authority in a position of power. In addition to this derogatory connotation, it may also serve as a term of respect and praise.

The phrase "the Man is keeping me down" is commonly used to describe oppression. The phrase "stick it to the Man" encourages resistance to authority, and essentially means "fight back" or "resist", either openly or via sabotage.

The earliest recorded use^{[citation needed]} of the term "the Man" in the American sense dates back to a letter written by a young Alexander Hamilton in September 1772, when he was 15. In a letter to his father James Hamilton, published in the Royal Dutch-American Gazette, he described the response of the Dutch governor of St. Croix to a hurricane that raked that island on August 31, 1772. "Our General has issued several very salutary and humane regulations and both in his publick and private measures, has shewn himself the Man." ^{[dubious – discuss]} In the Southern U.S. states, the phrase came to be applied to any man or any group in a position of authority, or to authority in the abstract. From about the 1950s the phrase was also an underworld code word for police, the warden of a prison or other law enforcement or penal authorities.