What did Jimmy Buffett mean (to us)?
I woke up around 6:30 a.m. September 2, 2023, and turned up the computer as I usually did to catch up on what happened while I was asleep. The first thing I saw was a message from a friend telling me Jimmy Buffet had died the day before. You could have slapped me in the face and I would not have been any more shocked. Eyes watered immediately and I leaned back absorbing. Then as the day progressed and more and more announcements and stories about him filled my screen. I attempted posting a couple of things and sharing a few more but none of them really said what I was feeling
Toward evening and still reflecting and letting even more tributes come up, one incident leaped out of the past and spoke to me.
It happened like this, our usual bunch had gathered in our favorite bar, a place I called Key Largo as I had recently gone through another breakup with another woman I had loved and that song of the time had resonated. A wall of windows overlooked the harbor in Valdez, Alaska. In daylight we could see to the end of the bay where the Chugach Mountains rose to their white caps. Sometimes a sunset behind us would color them pink or purple. One time when they turned deep purple we made everyone in the bar stand up and sing that patriotic song with "purple mountains' majesty" in it. Commercial salmon fishermen sat next to some of us tour boar captains and charter fishermen along with several crew members, girlfriends and other hangers on, even a couple of ocean sailors, with a few tourists scattered at tables a cautious distance from us locals.
The usual din of conversations, shouts from game players, laughter, cursing to be sure, stories being told, just the general noise that fills any bar along with the occasional interlude for some favorite song coming out of the jukebox. In short it was a normal night at Key Largo.
Then the first notes came out of that box, familiar guitar chords and then a harmonica lament. By the time the first words emerged several of us were already singing, "Mother, mother ocean, I have heard your call, wanted to sail upon your waters since I was three feet tall…." By the end of that first phrase most other noise had ceased and the place had fallen almost into silence, almost or maybe in reverence as more people joined the song. We sang every word of that song to the ending verse:
"Mother, mother ocean, after all the
years I've found
My occupational hazard being my occupation's just not around
I feel like I've drowned, gonna head uptown
I feel like I've drowned, gonna head uptown."
As the last notes faded, so did our singing, into a funereal silence throughout the room as each of us relaxed into what might be described as a state of euphoria while we searched our own minds for meaning. That musician had been there, in one way or another done what we've done, and held the experience in high regard and was able to express our emotions about it for us, an unseen crew mate. We could feel the meaning but for my part anyway could not find the words to articulate it. Maybe it was the kinship all of us felt for each other, the singer and the ocean. The silence lasted for what seemed several minutes but was probably a few seconds. I recall catching the eye of a fisherman, recognizing each other as brothers despite our differences, as I whispered to my friend, "That was special," and then fell back into my reverie.
Soon the buzz of conversation rose and the room filled with the usual sounds and the moment passed. Passed for the time being, yes, but not gone as is evidenced here and to tell the truth every other time I hear that song.
Little had I expected ahead of time, part of my staying at their cabin was taking care of Sue’s small sled dog team.
When the my cabin was enclosed and habitable Sue was the first person to come over for dinner. I remember one night going to their place for dinner and taking one of those Jello no-bake pies rough-tough me feeling silly with my rifle over my shoulder and carrying a Coleman lantern being ever so careful trekking through the wilderness juggling my pie.
Over the years we watched our families grow and spent many pleasant times in those woods. I remember Johnny not even walking yet, left for a moment packed into a bulky snowsuit sitting on his mother’s snowmachine and as we watched, he keeled over backward.
There were long periods when one or the other of us didn’t make it out there, but we always stayed in touch and knew what each other was doing. My life changed and I didn’t get out there often through much of the 90s and in that time Sue’s life changed too and in time she landed in Idaho. But we did have a New Year’s Eve late in the 90’s. I had brought a woman friend out for the holiday and Sue came over for dinner. We had a drink or two and Sue, I later realized, recognized the situation, and demanded to go home despite me insisting she stay. I came back in 2012 and began spending winters out there for the next 9 years.
With the internet available then, we stayed in touch and I always made sure to go over and check out their cabin at least once a winter and let her know how it was doing.
In one of my last winters out there Sue came through and managed a rescue of me via that internet. I had gotten my snowmachine impossibly stuck trying to getup my hill. Sue let me know her new (now) son in law Keith and grandson James were staying at the cabin and relayed between us until they came over and got me out. Neighbors to the very end no matter where we lived.
One of our last interchanges was kind of funny. I took a lot of pictures of Denali from my cabin. Every one of them had a tall spruce tree in it, identifiable by a formation of branches at the top that resembled a seahorse’s head. One day a couple of years ago I noticed that tree wasn’t there anymore. A few days later I went over to her cabin to check on it and found the tree. It had fallen across the roof of their cabin. I immediately let her know. She kidded she was surprised I hadn’t cut it up for firewood. I told her if I had known I might have cut the tree down but I would have left the firewood for her.
Nancy Lethcoe (2022)
Ed "Crazy Horse" Gurtler" with Leslie Mead at Ed's Innoko River Lodge 1978
Photo by Raine Hall Rawlins in the book "Iditarod, The First Ten years."
Edward Gurtler Sr. was born on the North Fork of the Innoko River in 1933. He died in his home in Wasilla April 3, 2019. He spent his early years hunting, fishing and trapping helping his parents support the family. After graduating high school in Holy Cross Ed joined the Army in the early 1950s and attained the rank of sergeant. After military service he went to work as a heavy equipment mechanic and operator and helped to build much of the state's infrastructure including the distant early warning system (DEW line) and the Trans Alaska pipeline. Ed owned and operated a hunting lodge on the Innoko River for many years. An avid bush pilot he flew thousands of miles across the state in his Cessna 170. He also was an accomplished musician and singer, pilot, mechanic and big game guide. Ed "Crazy Horse" Gurtler's memorial service is planned for 3 p.m. Sunday, July 14 at VFW Post 9356, 301 W. Lake View Ave., Wasilla, Alaska
I knew this man for only about two weeks in 1979 but our time together was so intense it left me with memories lasting forty years.
The result
After a dinner of moose stew with Ernie Chase and his family we slept the night and headed upriver in the morning. We pressed on, stopped at Kaltag, then Unalakleet, then Shaktoolik and on to the Seward Peninsula where the weather took one last lick at us as we flew from Elim to Nome. As wind poured off the peninsula from the north it came smoothly off the flatter valley floors but off the bluffs it came blasting creating a turbulence that threw the 170 all over the sky. Crazy Horse fought the stick for at least an hour until we rounded Cape Nome and headed for town. Once we returned to earth, we piled out of the airplane and stood there shaking hands on the runway, knowing we had shared an adventure.
At that point I realized Crazy Horse had grown from simply the pilot ferrying the writer around into becoming a major element in the greater narrative. He belonged in the story, too.
We went our separate ways for a while, but the next day we met in the office of the Nome Nugget where I was staying. I confirmed with Ed that he had a place to stay and he told me he had to get back and how long did I intend to stay. I told him I needed to stay until the banquet but I could fly back commercial, so we said our goodbyes and my thank-yous there on Front Street in Nome and that was the last time I ever saw Crazy Horse.
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| Ed "Crazy Horse" Gurtler" with Leslie Mead at Ed's Innoko River Lodge 1978 Photo by Raine Hall Rawlins in the book "Iditarod, The First Ten years." |
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| The result |
At that point I realized Crazy Horse had grown from simply the pilot ferrying the writer around into becoming a major element in the greater narrative. He belonged in the story, too.
We went our separate ways for a while, but the next day we met in the office of the Nome Nugget where I was staying. I confirmed with Ed that he had a place to stay and he told me he had to get back and how long did I intend to stay. I told him I needed to stay until the banquet but I could fly back commercial, so we said our goodbyes and my thank-yous there on Front Street in Nome and that was the last time I ever saw Crazy Horse.
Another one reaches the end of the trail
March 27, 2018
Then again, if we hadn't heard of Dick Wilmarth, we might never have heard of the Iditarod.
The way the story goes, during that first race, a group of the leaders gathered in a tent on the Yukon River somewhere. The location changes with the telling. But most agree the leaders were talking about quitting. They did say, however, it had to be unanimous. That was about the time Dick stuck his head into the tent and asked what was going on. Someone explained it to him. His only response was, "Well, I'm going to Nome," and off he went, dragging the rest of them behind him to finish the race, proving it was possible and leaving them to get ready for next year.
Some of the people in that tent went on to run the race several more times. There was at least one future winner involved. But Dick never raced again.
He had won the money to buy his yellow machinery and for him that was what it was about. How many bush people do you know? Have you ever noticed if you ask them what they do for fun you get a blank stare? That's because in the Bush you always have to be on your toes, always aware and there is always something that needs doing. What others see as drudgery, the perimeter people find satisfying, even pleasurable, but it's never about having fun. Not too long ago I was talking with one of the winners from the old days. He was complaining that some guy in the Iditarod had scratched saying it just wasn't fun. This guy said it was never fun, it was diffiult. But, pleasureable, nonetheless? I asked. He smiled.
And that was my guess about how Dick Wilmarth viewed the Iditarod, a means to an end. Other people wanted to race. He wanted a bulldozer. That fit into his life better than an annual dog race.
So after the race he went back to his perimeter and the life he had chosen and lived for the next 45 years, much like the life of someone like him might have lived a hundred years earlier, only without television. We are left to imagine the hardships, the joys, the satisfaction and yes, maybe even the fun that life gave him.
Sadly he may have been one of the last true Alaska perimeter men and whether we knew him personally or not, it's like the mountains around us that most of us will never climb but we are glad they're there. So too do we like the idea it's still possible to live on the Alaska perimeter as evidenced by people like Dick Wilmarth. But last week we lost one of those mountains and he has left a hole in our lives if we are willing to admit it.
It wasn't just in the Iditarod that he led the way.
- Tim Jones
Another man done gone
I had sat on a couch next to Gareth and he asked me how things were going. I told him I was attempting to write a book about the Iditarod but the company I worked for had backed out of providing me with any support and after a year of research it had come to a halt because I couldn't afford to fly along wth the race.
A man I hadn't been introduced to leaned around from the other side of Gareth and asked, "You want to write a book about the Iditarod?"
I said, "Yes."
"How much do you need?"
The rest is history. In the next two weeks before the race Del Allison gave me a check for enough money to support me along the trail and hired a pilot and airplane.
Without that help there might never have been a "Last Great Race." It is as simple that.
Del ran the race that year and then he and some friends continued on with their dog teams to Barrow, another 500 miles or so to the north
The following winter when a place I had lined up to live while I wrote the book fell through, he found a 10x14 cabin on the banks of the Susitna River and loaned me five dogs and a sled to get back and forth. It was the perfect set up to write such an Alaska book.
Two years later when the book was published I was able to hand him the first one off the press to thank him for all he had done.
We remained friends through the next few years, had a couple of adventures, enjoyed some memorable New Years' Eves.
I had always admired an art print he had hanging in his house: Melissa and McGonigal, a collection of ink drawings illustrating how a nude ballerina taught a moose to dance, by Alaska artist Bill Berry. When he left Alaska he gave me that print in its barnwood frame and I still have it hanging in my living room. Now it will be a memorial.
This is what I am talking about when I say people who have had a profound effect on my life. Were it not for that chance meeting with Gareth Wright, I might never have been able to write that book. Think about that, it's a book the Associated Press class has called an Alaska classic. And, Del Allison made it happen.
I can never forget how my first book happened nor can I ever forget the man who gave this writer the lift it took to get it done.
Each time this happens Eugene O' Neill's quote becomes more firmly cemented into my mind
Fair winds, my friend
Something else I admired him for was the influence he had on generations of young people in Valdez. All of the kids who washed boats, shuffled supplies, served Russian tea to tourists and performed the myriad of chores it takes to run the business came away influenced positively by a role model of a type that's difficult to find anymore. Two generations of my family worked on those boats. We all owe him a debt for that and we should carry that influence forward.
Stan stood large in many people's lives, including my own for the better part of 25 years and he was a strong influence. We didn't always agree but we always respected each other and I held the highest esteem for him. We fought many battles together, saving Prince William Sound's killer whales from capture, dealing with an oil spill in our most beautiful place and later doing what we could to protect it from another such tragedy. Stan saw that the biggest danger was complacency and continued the fight long after it was popular.
Since hearing the news, I have been living with a great sense of loss and a mind full of memories of this and that from our relationship over the years, some of it uncomfortable, but mostly happy. I spent some the happiest years of my life on Stan Stephens' boats and in friendship with the man.
And as you will read in the Daily News shortly, he set a standard and a stage for the rest of us to continue on with the legacy he leaves us to also be keepers, of Prince William Sound, on a larger scale the world's oceans and, too, the love that holds families together.
I share your loss.
The Anchorage Daily News editorial
Keeper of Prince William Sound
News story
1 comment:
A most remarkable woman
– Laura Nyro
She was born March 27, 1946, in Chicago. After graduating from the University of Illinois she worked as a reporter at the Chicago Tribune in the late 1960s and early '70s. At the Tribune she was a member of a team that won a Pulitzer Prize for uncovering flagrant violations of voting procedures in the March 21, 1972, primary election. In 1973 she moved to Alaska where she had lived ever since.
Sally worked as a reporter at the Anchorage Daily News from 1973 until 1980 and in 1977 with her colleague Rosemary Shinohara won the prestigious Gerald Loeb Award for distinguished business and financial journalism for a series of articles the two wrote about construction problems with the trans-Alaska oil pipeline.
After 1980 she worked at the Alaska Journal of Commerce, hosted the Alaska Business segment on KENI News Radio and served as executive director of the Alaska High Tech Business Council. She also was publisher and managing editor of the Alaska Bar Association's newsletter "The Alaska Bar Rag" until her death.
After 2000 she began developing as a bead, metal and fiber artist, serving at one time as president of the Alaska Bead Society. She and her daughter Ariel sold their works at various shows and markets around Southcentral Alaska.
Sally and her husband Warren were married July 27, 1979.
She is survived by her husband Warren, daughter Ariel and husband David Phifer all of Anchorage; brother-in-law George and wife Linda and family of Anchorage and Seattle; brother-in-law John Suddock of Anchorage and family; a brother Robert Wagner and wife Anita of Syracuse, NY; sister-in-law Anka Wagner and Eric Neal of Philadelphia, PA; a nephew, James Wagner and wife Marika of Brooklyn, NY; the Dickows of Illinois and Wisconsin; David and Vivian Watts of Washington, D.C.; Ariel's father Tim Jones of Palmer; and dear friends throughout the world.
At Sally's request no service has been planned. She asked that in lieu of other memorials, donations be made to the Bird Treatment and Learning Center in Anchorage (Bird TLC).
Her first grandchild, William Phifer was born October 8, 2014.
Cancer takes a dear friend
As an editor at Alaska Magazine in the late 1970s, part of my job was to talk to people who brought stories in for our consideration. It's the kind of job that in time you almost dread seeing someone come through the doorway looking anxiously, their precious manuscripts gripped tightly in their hands. But it had its joys also. Among the stories about "me and the old lady drove the Alaska highway and thought you would like a story about it;" "I saw the northern lights last night and just had to write a poem about it;" and the literature proposed by young collegiate writers, once in awhile a gem showed up: a real sourdough's tale of life in the wild, often written in longhand on unlined paper; and even less frequently a beautifully written piece by a competent writer about a subject that Alaska magazine actually wanted.
Some of those conversations found their way onto this blog. These are the links:
Earthmaker judges the world
I like her poetry because it is often based in the spirituality found in nature. She has allowed me here to post one of the last poems in the book which will be titled "Sanctuary" from Irish publisher Salmon.
EARTHMAKER JUDGES THE WORLD
By Patricia Monaghan
Copyright © 2012, Patricia Monaghan
Near the top of a Wisconsin hill, a spring erupts
heights know these stories. And without such knowledge,
"I used to think getting old was about vanity—but actually it’s about losing people you love. Getting wrinkles is trivial." – Eugene O’Neill
Jim was born on Aug. 14, 1948, in Medford, Ore., to Alexander and Audrey (Galbraith) Macknicki.
After his parents divorced, his mother was severely injured in a car accident caused by a drunk driver. He and his siblings were separated and sent to live with relatives. Jim lucked out and found himself in a loving (and crowded) home with his uncle and aunt, Ray and Jean Galbraith, and their five kids, in Spokane, Wash.
He earned his money for college by working at Albertson's grocery store and in a jewelry shop. He graduated from Eastern Washington University with a bachelor's degree in journalism. He married Becky Johnson in 1970. In 1971, he and Becky welcomed their son, Larry, who was named for his long-time best friend, Larry Smith. Two years later they had a baby girl, April, who passed away in infancy of SIDS.
Jim worked variously as a reporter and copy editor at newspapers in Washington, Idaho and Montana, before accepting a position, in 1980, as copy desk chief at the Anchorage Daily News.
When special projects or an unusually heavy workload came down on the copy desk, he liked to tell his staff, "We have an opportunity!"
His friend and longtime ADN compatriot Frank Gerjevic wrote: "Copy editors groaned, but they knew Jim would shoulder his share of the opportunity and then some. He could be gruff and demanding on deadline, but tempered the professional newsman's no-nonsense work ethic with a lively sense of humor and a generous spirit. He was a hard-nosed editor, but quick to praise good work. Jim worked more than one holiday so others could take the day off. He was a good colleague and a good friend. The real opportunity was the chance to work with him."
Jim married Kathleen Oliver in 1986, and they were blessed with their beloved daughter, Jessie, that same year. He retired from the Daily News in 2011.
Jim is survived by his wife, Kathleen; his son and daughter-in-law, Larry and Christine Macknicki of Palmer, Alaska; daughter and son-in-law, Jessie and Adam Diehl of Albuquerque, N.M.; his brother, Alex; and sister, April; his uncle and aunt, Ray and Ruth Galbraith of Kent, Wash.; cousins (who were more like siblings to him), Donna Svenson and Mark and Eric Galbraith, all of Spokane, and Danny Galbraith of Florida; his longtime best bud, Larry Smith of Spokane; and his cherished grandkids, Aidan and Gwyneth Macknicki of Palmer and Brody and Ashlynn Diehl of Albuquerque.
He was preceded in death by his mother, Audrey; his father, Alexander; his daughter, April; his aunt, Jean Galbraith; and his cousin, Glenn Galbraith.
Memorial donations to Bean's Cafe are suggested.