There to meet the Corps of Engineers in 1942, Harold and Anna Engelson had made Ft. Nelson their home in 1939. I promise you will love this video. Click to see the video the story and more photos. Click Link to video The link will take you to an utterly fantastic video their son Monte …
Category Archives: Fort Nelson
Ft Nelson, BC
Ft. Nelson, at the end of the incredible journey, Lt. Col Twitchell, assistant in command of the 35th, wrote home, “Now we are safely encamped on top of a hill…overlooking the [Muskwa] river, in a clearing carved out of the woods. I traveled over 3,000 miles in two weeks, with only a few hours’ sleep …
Marl Brown, At the Heart of the Alaska Highway
In 1957 the Canadian Army stationed Marl Brown on the Alaska Highway; put him to work fixing its new vehicles. But Marl fell in love with the old vehicles scattered along the road, rusted hulks with trees growing through them. The waste bothered him, so he devoted his life to rescuing them. Sixty odd …
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Major Problem
Major problem number one, confronting Chester Russell and his fellows in the 35th, as they tried to build road away from Ft. Nelson? Their leaders ordered them to build road but couldn’t tell them where to build it. Young Lieutenants in Chester’s Memory General Hoge had tasked the 35th to build Highway north over the …
Speaking of Chester Russel
Speaking of Chester Russel a few episodes back, I told you about his unique background. Then I told you how he stumbled into “Catskinning” (operating a bulldozer) by accident. Private Russel at Ft. Nelson In his interview with Earl Brown and Hank Bridgeman Chester remembered details that no book of Alaska Highway history includes. And …
Pvt Russel and His Fellow Soldiers Didn’t Come Alone in March
Pvt Russel and the other soldiers of the 35th didn’t come alone to the Southern Sector in early March. Private Russel at Ft. Nelson On March 8, Captain Alfred M. Eschbach’s Company A of the 648th Topographic Engineers fell out into an overcast spring morning at Camp Claiborne, Louisiana—to be issued arctic uniforms. That night …
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Private Russel at Ft. Nelson
Private Russel and his fellows at Ft. Nelson not only struggled to find food to eat, they also struggled to fix the trucks and tractors that their winter road trip up from Fort St. John had all but destroyed. Ft. Nelson, Chester Russell’s Passage The army rushed mechanics from Union Tractor Company in from Edmonton …
Ft. Nelson, Chester Russell’s Passage
Ft. Nelson, General Hoge’s goal for Chester’s 35th lay another 230 miles north of Fort St. John on a trail resting on ice—ice rapidly turning to water. The 35th moved over the trail in an endless stream of men, trucks, dozers and other equipment—for three weeks in March while the trail behind them effectively disappeared. …
The Most Colorful Soldier
The most colorful soldier on the Alaska Highway Project, Chester Russel, came with the 35th Engineers to Dawson Creek in March 1942. Colonel William Hoge had come to Dawson Creek, in February. His country, suddenly at war with the Empire of Japan, its Alaska outpost in dire danger, needed a land route from the railhead …
Heavy Trucks on a Road
Heavy trucks on a road could carry enough men and weapons across Canada to Alaska to defend North America from a Japanese assault. But in 1939 no such road existed, and airplanes could at least carry some material. Between 1939 and 1941, desperate Canadians built a string of airfields across British Columbia and Yukon Territory. …