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University Daily Kansan
Friday. Nov. 9, 1962
KU Student Hitchhikes Across Alaskan Tundra
By Philip G. Harrison As Told to Dennis Bowers
I looked out across the frozen tundra, scarcely comprehending the significance of the strange contrasts of the land stretched out before me. A land where forests stood almost flush against business district, a land yet to be conquered.
The forests extended northward a few hundred miles and then gave way to the land of permafrost.
I looked at the weather-beaten road sign. "Fairbanks . . . 610" Six hundred and ten miles to the next town. Quite a haul, especially hitch-hiking. Down the highway I saw a car approaching . . . the third one in an hour. I checked to see that my suitcase was keeping dry, sheltered on the leeward side of the road sign and stepped out on the road to make the universal hitch-hiking sign of the extended thumb.
THE CAR approached with some tourists. It was loaded to the hilt. The man peered out between strokes of the wipers and the kids looked out the fogged back window, their red noses pressed against the glass. They stuck their tongues out at me as the car swished on by the wet asphalt, and I knew my trip had begun.
The "new Alaska." Ketchikan, Juneau, Haines and Fairbanks share the characteristic "just built" appearance of many Alaskan cities. All these towns have, in the last 10 years, acquired the characteristics of civilization that we take for granted in the "lower 48," such as paved streets, and buildings of more than two stories. At the boat stops of Ketchikan, Juneau and Haines, I had an early glimpse of Alaskan prices. The high living cost is due not only to the cost of shipping almost all foods and manufactured goods into the area, but to the cost of labor. For although Alaska is the "last frontier" of America, many Alaskans believe labor unions have a stranglehold upon the economy and have forced the cost of labor to alarming heights, accelerating in that region the wage-price spiral.
Skagway is more of a reflection of the past than a promise of the future. It was developed and built during the great Klondike gold rush of 1898 and 1899. In the days of '98, when Skagway was the gateway to the Yukon, when gold prospectors by the thousands trooped over the White Pass in search of gold, and when Soapy Smith the notorious gambler and saloon-keeper, cheated them of their day-by-day findings, Skagway was a boom-town. The gold is gone now, and nearly one-third of the business buildings on the main street are vacant.
Whitehorse, from which I embarked on my tour of the northwest via good-natured drivers, is not unlike a small western Kansas town. It is the northern terminal of the Pass and Yukon railway.
**BUT FAIRBANKS** was the closest town . . . 610 miles away and there are none of what we would call highways between the two "cities."
That whole first day, I spent getting to the small town of Tok where I spent the night as guest of the truck driver who finally gave me a ride.
Getting a ride the next morning proved easy, as all cars proceeding up the Alaskan highway have to stop at the U.S. Customs and Immigration office at Tok. When someone would stop for customs inspection, I would step up and introduce myself. (I soon learned that the bitchhiker has much greater success when adding a wave and a smile to the usual gesture with the thumb.)
Fairbanks, the second largest city in Alaska, has only the business district streets paved, and those only recently. The city as a whole appears no larger than Ottawa, Kan.
I STAYED IN Fairbanks one "night" and was forced to take the Alaska railway to Anchorage via McKinley Park because the highway and a bridge had been washed out. The Alaska Railway is owned and operated at a loss by the Department of the Interior. Although it has all the equipment and characteristics of a larger railroad, it is operated
much on the same basis as an interurban trolley. One train goes each way every day. Many fishermen from Anchorage and Fairbanks take the train from the city to their favorite fishing holes, as it is the policy of the railroad to drop these sportsmen off and pick them up anywhere along the route.
As the dining car prices are very expensive, I carried a sack of groceries, as did most of the local people who took the train.
Like Fairbanks, Anchorage affords rich opportunities for the patrons of bars, with over 40 on the main street alone. While I was downtown taking in the sights, I met a truckdriver named John. We entered one of the lounges, and, after ordering, a lady, dressed in an evening gown and shoulder-length white gloves entered and sat down at the bar. John suggested that we move over and sit with her. As he was buying, I agreed. After a half hour's conversation between the two it became somewhat evident that she was slightly less than interested in the details of the eight flat tires that John had had since leaving Detroit. Shortly, a man in a suit approached her and asked her to dance. It was evident that John had lost the game, more evident when she left with the other gentleman.
ANCHORAGE is the most modern as well as the largest city in Alaska. It claims a population of 100,000, but if this is so, I find myself wondering where they all are. The business district is roughly the size of Lawrence, but because of the primeval surroundings, there is still the curious mixture of rural and urban.
A good example of this is Mike Baker. He caught my eye with his full, white beard, waxed mustaches, skullcap, and jolly expression. I did not, however, give him much thought until I encountered him the following evening at the soda fountain of a drug store. A slide rule, protruding from the bib pocket of his overalls first struck me as strange. Conversing with him, I was astounded at the incongruity of his speech and appearance. Although he appeared to be an old sourdough, his topics of conversation wandered from political philosophy to literature. I spent most of the next few days with Mike. He was hungry for discussion. We discussed every book I had read, and every course I had taken in prep school and at the University. There was nothing I had read that he had not, and nothing I could discourse upon with which he was not more well-versed than I. Mike had had no formal education beyond the eighth grade. His originality of thought and intellect were Newtonian. Mike, although 51, has the hope of earning enough money as a machinery operator to acquire higher education and become a farm machinery design consultant.
Hitchhiking out of Anchorage, I thought somewhat anprehensively of the 1,000-mile trip that lay before me to the next town of Haines. From the outskirts of Anchorage, I almost immediately got a ride for 20 miles with a construction worker.
The traffic the next day was scarce. I waited more than 8½ hours for a ride. With only three cars coming by in an hour, most of them tourists loaded to the brim. I was somewhat doubtful as to exactly when I was going to obtain a ride. After finishing a book I had started, I dug a hole by the roadside and erected a sign saying "Tok." which was my next destination. When I became hungry, I took a cardboard out of one of my laundered shirts and made a sign saying "food" and fastened it to my post. Shortly afterward, an army convoy of three fuel trucks stopped and gave me some ration. Finally a family from Ellison Air Force Base stopped and gave me a ride to Tok.
I have discovered that it is the duty of a hitchhiker to entertain the children if he is riding with a family. In some cases this is not unpleasant, but in the latter case, it was rather tedious. I traveled only 110 miles that day.
WE ARRIVED in Haines, Alaska,
on washboard pavement, as Alaska's roads are almost all gravel. Haines is a large commercial fishing port, and I spent many interesting hours, including one night on a small fishing boat owned and operated by a man named Edsel. I met Edsel when he was weaving together two sections of webbing, attaching corkline and leadline to make a new net. He referred to "the Scriptures" as the principal authority upon which he based his arguments. I had breakfast on Edsel's boat the next morning, and needless to say, we had smoked salmon.
During July and August the salmon come in from the sea to go up the fresh water streams to spawn. The streams are unbelievably full of them. One could almost reach out with his hand and catch one. I don't believe it would be possible to wade across a stream without stepping on one.
Just outside of Haines is Klukwan, the chief village of the Chikkat Indians. I hitched a ride out to the village on the mail delivery car and walked the length of the village. Everything about the village was in bad repair; few of the Indians spoke English, and the whole atmosphere seemed to be one of sedentary existence. The Indians were very secretive about their belongings, and the whereabouts of their dugout canoes was a secret, so I was unable to see them.
One Indian I got to know rather well was Paul Phillips, who had attended Haskell Institute for three years (1957-1959) and, simultaneously, had taken electrical engineering courses at KU night school. He also worked as projectionist for two years in the Granada and Varsity theaters.
IT IS NOT unusual for friends to go into a bar and roll dice for the cost of the drinks or for a customer to roll against the bartender. If the customer wins, the drink is free, but if the bartender wins, the cost is double.
On the afternoon of the 26th day of August, we went up an inlet to see a pair of glaciers that emptied into the sea. We blew short blasts on the whistle, causing large pieces of ice to break loose from the glaciers.
On board, I sat with an 86-year-old man by the name of Kenneth Bass. Bass was in the Klondike Gold Rush of '98 and had made the White Pass run several times. He told me how he foolishly gambled away all his money in Ketchikan and arrived in Skagway broke. He contracted to deliver U.S.
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