The name Robert is a Germanic given name, from hrod "fame" and beraht "bright". It is also in use as a surname.

After becoming widely used in Continental Europe it entered England in its Old French form Robert, where an Old English cognate form (Hrēodbēorht, Hrodberht, Hrēodbēorð, Hrœdbœrð, Hrœdberð) had existed before the Norman Conquest. The feminine version is Roberta. The Italian form is Roberto.

In Italy during the Second World War, the form of the name, Roberto, briefly acquired a new meaning derived from, and referring to the Rome-Berlin-Tokyo Axis.

Ann Bancroft (born 29 September 1955) is an American author, teacher, and adventurer. She was the first woman to successfully finish a number of arduous expeditions to the Arctic and Antarctic.

Ann Bancroft grew up in St. Paul, Minnesota. She described her family as one of risk takers. It is reported that she struggled with a learning disability, but nevertheless graduated from St. Paul Academy and Summit School. Bancroft was a camper and staff member at YMCA Camp Widjiwagan. Bancroft became a wilderness instructor and a gym teacher in Minneapolis (at Clara Barton Open School) and St. Paul.

She gave up her teaching post in 1986 in order to participate with the "Will Steger International North Pole Expedition". She arrived at the North Pole together with five other team members after 56 days using dogsleds. This made Bancroft the first woman to reach the North Pole on foot and by sled.

She was also the first woman to cross both polar ice caps to reach the North and South Poles, as well as the first woman to ski across Greenland. In 1993 Bancroft led a four-woman expedition to the South Pole on skis; this expedition was the first all-female expedition to cross the ice to the South Pole. In 2001, Ann and Norwegian adventurer Liv Arnesen became the first women to ski across Antarctica.

Liv Ragnheim Arnesen (born June 1, 1953) is a Norwegian cross-country skier, adventurer, guide, and motivational speaker. Arnesen led the first unsupported women’s crossing of the Greenland Ice Cap in 1992. In 1994, she made international headlines becoming the first woman in the world to ski solo and unsupported to the South pole. – a 50-day expedition of 745 miles (1,200 km).

Arnesen grew up in Bærum, Norway on the outskirts of Oslo where at an early age, her parents immersed her in their passions: cross-country skiing and polar history. At an early age, Arnesen acquired her taste for the great wide open spaces while spending winters and Easter holidays in the Norwegian mountains ]. Her love of athletics and the outdoors eventually led Arnesen to compete in orienteering and cross-country skiing, as well as to coach high school students in advanced-level cross-country skiing. At the age of 9, Liv read about Roald Amundsen’s expedition to the South Pole [].

In 1992, Liv took part in a team which became the first all-woman team to make an unsupported crossing of the Greenland icecap.