To buid a fire (with an apology to Jack London)

For every mile of the Iditaord trail and from everyone who ever traveled it behind a dog team there is a story, told and retold. Joe May is one of the best at it. This one is no exception. Note that Joe went on to win the Iditarod race that year.

 By JOE MAY

On the 1980 Iditarod it was at least -50° between Kaltag and Old Woman on the way to Unalakleet, I left Kaltag an hour behind Ernie Baumgartner and shortly came upon him shivering in his sleeping bag, in his sled, a few miles out, seriously cold. I was cold, it was cold. We discussed the situation and I went on a bit to the first dead spruce beside the trail and built a fire. The tree had offered itself up exactly when and where we needed it. Ernie arrived shortly and hustled more wood. Soon Herbie Nayukpuk caught up with us, anchored his team, and added another tree to the fire. Herbie said he'd never been that cold (that from an Eskimo). We stayed several hours until good to travel before moving on. By then the fire pit was 8 ft. wide, 6 ft deep, and had inadvertently crept out into the trail.

The next team to arrive, much later and in the dark, unaware, drove his whole outfit headlong into the (by then) cold fire pit...dogs on the bottom, sled on top, and musher up to his ass in squirming dogs and ashes.

Other teams that night faithfully following preceding tracks, as is the custom, drove into the pit with the same result. (Most mushers back then when on uncomplicated trail ran without a headlight to conserve batteries)

The cursing and yelling (well, almost) reverberated through the trees all the way to Nome.

Herbie's gone now...to where good Esqimos go, Ernie never admitted to the fire, and I'm too old to lie.

(I'm really, really sorry, Dewey).

COPYRIGHT © JOE MAY 2019

When this was going on, I was living in a 10x14 cabin on the banks of the  Susitna River writing The Last Great Race. I caught updates about the race on the radio. After Joe left Old Woman he beat everyone to the next  checkpoint at Unalakleet. There a radio reporter cornered him and I heard Joe on the radio telling the unsuspecting reporter his dogs were just about to give it up. He said they were tired, some didn't want to go any more, some were looking sick. He said he was going to try for one more checkpoint and if they didn't improve he was going to drop out. I laughed so loud it got the dogs I was living with to barking. I knew what the reporter didn't. Joe wasn't talking to him, he was talking to any competitors behind him who might hear the broadcast. Joe never saw another musher after that and he cruised into Nome for the win unchallenged. (With those dogs who were ready to quit.) Joe later told me while he was resting and feeding his dogs in Shaktoolik, the next checkpoint to the north, the race marshal flew in and demanded to look at the dogs that were in such tough shape.