Last Letters from Attu. Mary Breu

small-paned house windows look festive. In summer, the yards would be full of flowers. Her walk took her past “Tower House,” the town’s hotel, which had a tower on it, hence the name. There were gaps in the old board sidewalk, so Marie had to be careful with her footing. The schoolbuilding was a one-room, low-roofed log cabin, heated with a wood stove.

       IN OCTOBER THE LITTLE CREEKS and streams began to pour small pieces of ice into the river, gradually filling it with slushy ice. Then larger pieces appeared, the current slowed up, sometimes stopping for a few hours, then moving on again. The final stoppage came early in November, and it was a topic of general interest because the river could not be crossed while ice was still running. Perhaps a friend would telephone, saying “Ice has stopped,” and someone would be sure to mark it down. Mail delivery stopped until the ice was strong enough to be crossed.

      Tanana Public School, 1920s. PHOTO BY J.O. SHERLOCK. NATIONAL PARK SERVICE, ALASKA.

      Next door to the school was the Arctic Brotherhood Hall, which was the meeting place for all community gatherings. It had a hardwood maple floor that was kept polished by the soft moose-hide moccasins that everyone wore. All winter, leather shoes were not worn because it was too cold. Feet froze in leather. Tales were told of “cheechakos” who refused to listen to advice about footwear and who suffered amputation of feet as a result of ski trips in fifty-below weather wearing leather shoes. It was in the Arctic Brotherhood Hall where dances were held which everybody attended. The slightest occasion made the excuse for a dance—some strangers in town, a holiday, or just plain Saturday night. Everybody danced. We had rollicking times. I remember one dance when Foster had been out on a trip, and his friends thought he would not be back for the dance. Yet, he was there, and danced as much as anyone, but in an unguarded moment, he admitted he had almost not made it. He had snowshoed twenty-eight miles that day just so he could make it. He did not consider that unusual, snowshoeing twenty-eight miles and then dancing half the night.

      This hall was also the scene of many soul-satisfying Christmas celebrations in which everyone participated. The schoolteacher practiced with the children to provide entertainment. Committees were appointed to collect money and donations from stores and others. Another committee bought presents for everyone. Young men brought in a huge spruce tree, and women worked together to decorate it with trimmings belonging to the community. Those decorations were carefully put away from year to year. Gifts exchanged by the whole town were usually put under the community tree. There was a Santa, sometimes with his reindeer. No one was forgotten. Miners, woodcutters, and trappers came in for the celebrations. It was a happy, happy time. We were amazed that first year at the extent of this giving, and overwhelmed by what we received. Nowhere have I seen a truer demonstration of the Christmas spirit. After the entertainment and distribution of gifts, a dance, and such a dance!

      Drinking water was obtained in winter from the river. Ice was as thick as eighteen inches. Some people stacked cakes of this ice on platforms in their yards, bringing a cake into the house as needed, allowing it to melt in the drinking water tank. “Stacking drinking water in the yard” was a standing joke.

      As the days grew shorter, artificial light was needed later in the morning and sooner at night until on the shortest day, December 22, when the sun barely made a showing above the horizon, first peeping out at about eleven and disappearing again at one. We looked forward to Saint Patrick’s Day, because on that day, a six o’clock dinner could be eaten without a lamp. In midwinter, school children trooped by the house in the dark on their way to school, and often they could be seen finding their way home by moonlight, or, if there was no moon, with flashlights.

      Early that first spring, we went on a hunting and trapping trip to Fish Lake, about twenty-five miles from Tanana, leaving while there was still snow to travel by dogsled, and the lakes were still frozen. It took two days, stopping one night at a roadhouse about ten miles from Tanana. At the Fish Lake Roadhouse, we found that the owner was away because he was sick, but everything was open, so in we walked and took possession. We sent word by the first traveler that we were there. The lake was full of muskrats, and as the ice gradually melted and disappeared, while Foster hunted “rats,” I wandered over the countryside, gathering the early flowers. It was a lonesome place. The few magazines it boasted were years old and well read. The old-fashioned phonograph fascinated us. It used old cylindrical records. I remember there were some made by Ada Jones, as far back as that.

       Yukon River ice breakup, Tanana, with big ice chunks piling up on the shore, 1923.

      The breaking up of the ice on the Tanana River was the big event of the year for all persons living along its banks. Many, in all parts of the territory, participated in the Nenana Ice Classic. They bet on the exact date, hour, and minute the ice would break up in Nenana, paying a dollar for each bet. There were over $100,000 in this pool, one person occasionally winning it all, but more often it was divided among several. “Breakup” came most often in May when the days were long. We sometimes wandered along the bank of the Yukon most of the night, which was daylight at this time of year, watching for this spectacular sight. It was worth watching, the ice buckling and being thrown many feet into the air. Noise from the grinding, huge cakes of ice was deafening, and the danger of flood from the damming of these cakes was very real and kept everyone on tenterhooks until the water was running smoothly. We stood on the bank and watched this huge pageant pass by. We saw caribou marooned on the floating cakes, perhaps too exhausted to try for the shore. Discarded articles from villages and towns hundreds of miles upriver went sailing jauntily by. All houses and yards were cleaned of refuse and put on the ice to be taken out.

      After the ice was entirely gone, we loaded camping gear, food, and ourselves into a long poling boat and prepared to leave the village and drift on the Yukon River. In rowing through choppy water, an oar was lost, and there was no extra. It put severe strain on the ingenuity of the man of the party to keep that overloaded boat upright. With the use of a paddle, I tried to steer. Finally, with a sigh of relief, we entered the comparative quiet of a small stream that led to the river. We camped in the woods and slept under the sky. I can see and hear yet the swishing and bending of the tall birches as they thrashed in the wind high above us. The next day, the boat was reloaded, a makeshift oar was put into use, and we started again on the turbulent Yukon River with its dangerous submerged sandbars. The wind increased, bringing rain. It became necessary to camp again on a sandbar. By this time, the wind was roaring, too strong to put up a tent. The boat was turned on its side, and we crouched behind it as best we could. We could not build a fire, and what food we had was filled with sand. In fact, we were almost buried in sand. Then, to add to our miseries, the rain began. Finally, late in the day, the wind abated enough to allow us to make the return trip, and we arrived home in a drenching downpour, fur clothing soaked. The keenest memory that remains with me of that homecoming is the steady drip, drip of rain from the roof as it poured into the rain barrel at the door.

       Foster (left) pushes a poling boat into the Tanana River with the help of an unidentified person, 1923.

      Etta and Marie lived in a territory that was the size of 425 Rhode Islands, with wide-open spaces as far as the eye could see. A hundred thousand glaciers, some larger than entire states, had sculpted mountains, carved out valleys, and continued to flow and shape the landscape. Mountain ranges were higher, more rugged, and larger than any combined ranges in the Lower 48. Majestic Mount McKinley, the highest peak in North America at 23,320 feet, was in their back yard. Three thousand rivers, many gray in color because of glacial silt, rolled for hundreds of miles, passing through a vast wilderness. The river shoreline was punctuated by isolated villages, accessible only by boat or plane. In summer, wildflowers covered the endless valleys. Sightings of bald eagles, grizzly bears, moose, caribou, and wolves were commonplace. They had experienced temperatures that were so extreme they couldn’t be registered, had taken dogsled rides and boat trips.