I am thankful we survived this flight

Until I began traveling around Alaska in small airplanes I was afraid of flying. One event I experienced during the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race changed that. A pilot everyone addressed as Crazy Horse flew me over what is called the Farewell Burn, an area of more than 300,000 acres that had been cleared by wildfire.

We spotted a dog team making way across the open snow and Crazy Horse asked if I wanted to make a picture. I said sure and he immediately put the Cessna 172 into a precipitous dive toward the musher. I snapped the picture, dropped the camera and grabbed the hand-hold overhead and held on for dear life. It was in that moment I realized I was clinging for safety to the very thing that was going to kill me and that if we were going to crash there was nothing I could do about it. Over the course of almost two weeks flying along with the race, Crazy Horse and I had several more adventures but from that day forward I had taken a fatalistic attitude toward flying and it never bothered me again. It didn't even bother me (much) during another serious flight along the Seward Peninsula a couple of years later.

At the time I was spending the winter in Nome and had flown to Shishmaref farther north on the coast of the Bering Sea to interview famed dog musher Herbie Nayokpuk. I spent a couple of days with him and his family working on a story about his preparations for the Iditarod. After that I boarded a Munz airplane for the trip back to Nome in clear, calm weather. On the way we landed for a quick exchange in Teller, about halfway. After Teller we flew out south over Port Clarence and then east along the Norton Sound coast. A short time out the weather changed.

We flew through what looked like a dark curtain into what amounted to a whiteout only dark. The pilot was new to the air service on a check ride with a senior Munz pilot and I could often hear the senior pilot talking to the man at the controls, guiding and advising passing on advice gained in years of flying along that coast. When we flew into that cloud, I heard an exchange between the two but only picked out the word "beach."

Our course changed but since there was no landscape to observe the only way you could tell was by the adjustment to the airplane's attitude and altitude. We dropped and headed north until just a vague outline and a few drift logs identified the Seward Peninsula shoreline. These were our guiding landmarks leading us home. As we flew along occasionally the airplane would rise a few feet or drift off to the south and the landmarks disappeared. At one point the senior pilot had to elbow the one at the controls to make him aware he was drifting away from land again.

Except for that driftwood on the ground all around was a blank shroud of gray. The pilots were in touch with someone on the ground and at one point after an obvious conversation with ground control, I heard the senior pilot say out loud, "I don't care what they say, I think it's safer to go on than to go back."

At that point I pulled my tightly packed sleeping bag off the deck and hugged it in front of me. I had been told at one time or other this would cushion me in a crash and perhaps save my life. We pushed on in the gray void following that beach and gradually making our way east for what seemed an eternity, the sense of it being without landmarks I had no idea how fast we were going or whether we were making any progress. Then a couple of buildings appeared followed by a row of utility poles and this I knew. They led the way to a runway at Nome's airport.

Wind buffeted the airplane at that point and I heard the pilots talking about the advisory from the ground that there was six inches of slushy snow on that runway. With the airplane taking gusts from the side and dropping in altitude even more they aimed at the end of the runway. During the descent the runway looked through the windshield like it was rolling from side to side. Finally, the senior pilot, I recall his name was Victor, took the controls. As if magically the airplane steadied as he brought it closer to the runway.

Then in an instant, he set the airplane down, not like from a gradual flight path into a decelerating roll down the runway, but like a helicopter, straight down, bang, ground, stop. I don't think we rolled ten feet. Sheepishly I pushed the sleeping bag off my lap and back onto the deck. As we left the airplane I happened to bump into Victor and we looked into each other's eyes for an instant. I said the word, "nice." That was all that passed between us, but we understood each other at that moment. Then we had to push the airplane through the slush to move it to safety off the runway.

More adventures with Crazy Horse can be found here

A long-time Alaska journalist dies

As posted on facebook by Kitty Delorey Fleischman.


       Many knew Nancy as the editor of the Nome Nugget but I wonder if anyone knew she was a scientific innovator as well. She introduced one of her innovations around Christmas 1980 when a bunch of us gathered at her apartment for a party. She began her demonstration by pouring popcorn kernels into a brown paper bag. She had just gotten one of those new-fangled microwave ovens and wanted to demonstrate its advantages. She placed the bag in the oven and started it up. In time the popping stopped and she pulled it out, a huge smile of accomplishment on her face. That changed to horror a moment later when the bag burst into flames and she had to dump it into her sink and flood it with water. End of demonstration, but not the laughter.

I couldn't have said this better myself

Posted by Brandon Weber on facebook: Brandon Weber

8 hrs ·

This. Absolutely this.

Yet another underprivileged minority begins to emerge

Privilege came up in a conversation with a friend a couple of years ago. The friend did not accept

that I did not recognize being privileged. At the time I had not picked up on the modern concept of privilege. Not too long after that I realized what caused our difference of opinion.

She was speaking to the comparison between white people and minorities in which generally white people enjoy advantages that most minorities do not. My concept at the time, and I realize it now, was narrower and involved privilege among white people and I certainly do not enjoy the same advantages as the wealthy do. In fact it is that lack of privilege that has forced a new minority of which I am probably a charter member or about to become one. But because of our conversation, I now understand the broader view of privilege, the concept that simply because I am white I enjoy a certain level of privilege within a diverse community of minorities.

It goes like this: The recent election was devastating in so many ways but the next morning the sun rose, so there's that. And there's still snow in the forecast. Big fat moon coming up in the sky if we can see it. Cleared up some nagging chores throughout the day and it appeared the Earth was still spinning. So what's to worry about? This isn't the first president I didn't vote for.

Why is it that now we are supposed to unite and support our elected president in an atmosphere of cooperation and patriotism after eight years of our current president facing the worst obstruction of any in history.

The Republicans want us to come together to support the new president. After eight years of Republicans doing just the opposite to one of the finest presidents the country has ever had, that is not going to happen. A racist, misogynistic egotistical uninformed bully has been elected president largely from votes by people who will suffer more under this new administration. And the dangers he presents to the country far outweigh any desire to "just get along."

The idiocy of people voting against their own interests is described no better than in the attached meme. Wave the confederate flag and then tell people they lost the election and to get over it. Right.

On the same day that meme appeared this president-elect told a 60 Minutes interviewer he was going to get rid of Roe v. Wade but not same-sex marriage because that issue has been settled by the Supreme Court. That is the level of ignorance we are going to face for the next four years.

And those same voters who bought the presidential candidate's mantra of cleaning out Washington and taking back the country managed to increase majorities in both houses of Congress, the very people who caused what needs to be changed.

You have to laugh at those people who wanted to kick out the beltway insiders to get a fresh start and then voted for most of the incumbents in Congress, the very people who have caused the problems bothering people. With the presidency and majorities in both the House and Senate and the philosophies they espouse, the very core of our democracy is threatened and the people most likely to suffer most are those who voted for them.

For example, a large voting block of elderly people supposedly voted to maintain those majorities. Talk about voting against your own interests, this new power structure has vowed to cut or eliminate Social Security and Medicare, two programs that benefit the elderly and which many of us might not survive without.

The president-elect says he objects to Social Security on moral grounds. Moral grounds? I have been paying into Social Security since 1958. This was my retirement and I paid for it. As a matter of fact I am still paying for it as even my Social Security payment is subject to taxes and the FICA withholding, plus I pay a premium for Medicare as well. What is moral about taking it away from all the people who have contributed over the years? And in an era of skyrocketing drug prices and other health commodities, what is moral about removing the Medicare safety net?

Cutting or removing those programs will create a whole new minority, a whole new group of people without privilege –  old white guys who depend on Social Security and Medicare.

So, to my mind with this threat over our heads along with so many others, I see no reason to shake hands, no honeymoon period, no "get behind the new president to make things work." It is time to obstruct the obstructionists at every opportunity. A true patriot is obligated to fight to save the country, not shake hands and move on with the folks who would destroy the fabric or our very foundations. I have no intention to be part of "one-united-people." A man who consistently spouts divisive policies is not a uniting factor and in fact is creating new minorities to crush all the time.

Regarding Social Security and other stuff

Synchronized swimming just for the fun of it

That time we built an official 'historic site'

It's somewhere on this map and, no, I am not going to say where.

There are two places where some of the world's greatest adventures are formed: around a barroom
table late in the night and around a campfire way off the pavement somewhere.

This one comes from the latter. It occurred on a remote beach in Alaska's Prince William Sound and led to quite a different result than any of us could have expected.

Sitting around a campfire in front of a teepee my friends used as a headquarters for kayak trips they guided in the sound we hatched the plan to build a sauna for our use over the course of a summer. It came up as a whim but as the line goes in Stan Rogers' song "Mary Ellen Carter" "with every jar that hit the bar" the idea became more of a mission.

A ready supply of lumber in the form of weathered cedar planks lay just across the bay at an abandoned cannery. We all had tools and a quick call on a radio to another friend coming out the next day produced a supply of nails and some hinges and we were on our way. A stove and pipe would have to come out later.

The next day while a couple of friends and I made several trips across the bay in my 19-foot boat hauling lumber, others drew up a design, found a level spot and cleared it in preparation for the construction

Along with the weathered cedar the old cannery produced other treasures: some metal roofing in good enough shape to cover our building and a box of the old-time square nails which we thought would give our steambath some character. Little did we know it might give it too much character.

With half a dozen people working over the course of the next day we had the structure on a solid foundation and built all the way to the roof. The next day we built a fancy door and fashioned a handle from gnarled driftwood. At that point I had to leave to go back to work and it fell to others to complete the structure.

That summer proved so busy I never did get back to see the finished project, but when I came back the following spring a bunch of us went out there and had a fine party on that beach to kick off the summer. After that, the boat work became hectic and it wasn't until August the chance arose to go back.

At the time I was carrying four Bureau of Land Management surveyors who were documenting historic sites chosen by Natives in the area under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act. We visited several bays and coves over ten days until one day we pulled into that very bay where we'd built the sauna. As was my custom I asked the surveyor what was in this bay.

He was kind of excited. He said the Natives had claimed a spot in the bay were there was a foundation for an old cabin and a steambath that was still in use. He expected to have a sauna while we were there. I became immediately suspicious. He showed me a photograph and sure enough it was our sauna. I started laughing while the others looked at me curiously until one asked what was so funny.

I looked at them very seriously and said, I built that goddamed historic steambath. Yup, the Natives  had come along and claimed our sauna as their own and indeed one of historic significance. The only thing historic about that building was the imprint of my skinny white ass on a bench inside. But what can you do? If we went too far into the legalities we probably had built an illegal structure to begin with; we had no legitimate claim to it. I don't know what happened to that sauna though a fellow in another port on the opposite side of the sound told me one day he had found a sauna and described the island. A welder, he worked up a fancy stove for it, but then he disappeared too.

Whether it is still there or not I have no idea and most of the people who knew about it either have died or dispersed across the globe. But sometimes I like to think of future tourists tracing the history of Prince William Sound staring into a roped-off area that protects that building which was my contribution to the Native history of the sound.

The sweet music

I spent most of the Eighties living on boats in the summer, running first small charters and eventually moving up to larger tourist boats. I was divorced at the time and my daughter would come in the summers and spend several weeks with me living on the boat and getting a taste of that world. In time she thrived, but at first, at the age of 6 and the first time she had left familiar surroundings for any length of time, she was unsure of herself and it took her some time to adjust. And, of course I needed some adjustment too.

I tried to make her as comfortable as possible but in the first days she had trouble falling asleep on the boat. She could never tell me why and I tried everything I could to help but nothing seemed to work until one night I hit on something we hadn't tried.

The last time I had gone into a town I had brought back a few 8-tracks because that's what kind of player was wired into the boat. One of those albums was Willie Nelson's "Stardust." One of those early nights when she had trouble falling asleep, I put that album on and played it low volume. The next time I looked in on her she was sound asleep. After that every night at bed time it was "play the sweet music, Daddy." And sweet music became the go-to bed time music through most of our years on the boats.

A few years later when she was old enough to be buying her own music she told me "Stardust" was one of the first CDs she bought. As technology changed, I have bought it in the 8-track as I said, but also in a cassette and then a CD.

Attached here are a couple of examples, the title track and "Unchained Melody;" Willie Nelson like you have never heard him before or since. Sweet music, indeed.

Baseball over the years in Valdez, Alaska

University of Alaska Fairbanks 1909 baseball game in Valdez, Alaska. '"Fort Liscum vs. Valdez, June 22, 1909." Photo by Phinney. S. Hunt. From the Mary Whalen Photograph Collection in the University of Alaska Fairbanks Rasmuson Library Alaska & Polar Regions Collection (UAF-1975-84-533).
I think Valdez Little League is still playing on the same field.

That's my son in the second picture playing second base for the Valdez Senior team in 2003.

Sure enough it looks like the games were played on the same field and the photos taken from the same position. A good look at the mountain in the two pictures makes it pretty clear that it is the same mountain. Note the ridgeline coming down from the center of the mountain and angling off to the left toward the bottom. And, in the upper right edge of the mountain, that seems to be the same curve of the slope.

A lot has changed over the years. Mostly that the field was almost in town in 1909, but the earthquake in 1964 took care of that. The field apparently didn't move, but the town did, a few miles to the west where it now stands on more solid ground. All those houses beyond the outfield fence are new since the earthquake.

The election is about more than the personalities

Despite best efforts twice in the past week I've been drawn into political arguments online. In one someone I respected came out on Twitter stating he was proud to be voting for Donald Trump. This guy is intelligent enough to have written a fairly credible book and when I saw that at first thought I had somehow misinterpreted what he was saying. Nope. So I questioned it and offered a couple of reasons to change that vote.Then I discovered the problem. He's out of his element.

His book was about a serious environmental issue so I suggested he look up Trump on environmental issues. In his next tweet he asked any of his followers if they could direct him to any articles on Trump's environmental views.  In other words he didn't have a clue and hadn't really looked into his candidate. And then this happened.

When I questioned him about that he blocked me.  Ha, a first. blocked like I was trying to send him naked pictures or something. You know what? No loss. It is a common result to write a book and immediately feel like you are among the infallible literary elite. You aren't. Everything you do is questionable. Ask any writer who was full of himself after the publication of his first book. Guilty.

The second one was more complicated but at least there was no blockage. A friend whom I have known for almost 40 years wrote a comment about how he views this year's election campaign in general. Mostly we agree, the main point being how dangerous a Trump presidency would be to the republic. I added a comment agreeing with him but questioning his evaluation of Hillary Clinton – the old  distrust factor. My thought on that has always been that any negatives about her are the result of the constant propaganda assault on her and her husband from Republicans. Although no wrongdoing has ever been proven, the barrage has had its effect in at least raising questions in peoples' minds about her qualifications.  My friend disagreed and as far as I was concerned that was the end of it. Then a whole bunch of people agreed with me. To be fair quite a few agreed with him too. Call it a tossup, whether you absolutely agree or disagree, the one thing we did agree on is she is a better choice than Trump by far.

I do not have the qualms he does. I was for her from the beginning though I did go with Bernie Sanders for a while. When she won the nomination, I was all in. I think she is possibly the most qualified person in terms of experience who has ever run for president of the United States.

For people who might be wavering or unhappy about voting for the "lesser of two evils," I have attached a meme that came out nearly a year ago. Besides the personalities, it shows what is really at stake in this election and it makes a compelling statement to vote  for one of the candidates.