Whitehorse, Yukon Territory headquartered most of the Alaska Highway Project throughout 1942. Decisions coming out of the little city shaped the lives of the men on the highway. More important, the organization that controlled everything their lives depended on—from food and supplies to equipment and medical care—centered there. Whitehorse Yukon 1942 In a contemporary newspaper …
Category Archives: Alaska Highway
Communicable Disease and Canadian Natives
Communicable diseases swept the native population of Northern Canada in 1942. And, when illnesses began to appear, the army and civilian physicians who came with the Corps offered their services. At first Canadian bureaucracy made that difficult. Territorial authorities, protecting existing private medical practices, required Canadian licensure for physicians treating Canadian citizens. Sickness from Outsiders …
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Sickness from Outsiders
Indians, First Nations, In the North Country Sickness from outsiders, nothing new to the people of the Great Subarctic North. Outsiders who came to the North Country always brought sickness. The first Nations suffered infectious diseases brought by white missionaries and trappers throughout the 19th century. Myriad bugs and germs rode north in the bodies …
Opening Ceremony, the Publicity Machine Launched
Two bulldozers met in the woods and the publicity machine launched. Colonels and generals had got bulldozers from the 97th and the 18th in the same place, therefore they had completed the Alaska Highway. End of story. On to a dramatic opening ceremony. Two Bulldozers in the Same Place Secretary of War Henry Stimson …
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Two Bulldozers in the Same Place
Getting two bulldozers in the same place, in front of a reporter’s camera, became the overriding goal for commanders on the Alaska Highway project in October 1942. The 97th Engineers working south from Alaska and the 18th Engineers working north through Yukon Territory had to cross 55 miles of permafrost to meet and complete the …
Publicity
Publicity took over the project when, in British Columbia two regiments, the 35th and the 340th, met, in September at Contact Creek; opened the Alaska Highway from Dawson Creek to Whitehorse. Heath Twichell explained. “Many miles of filling and grading in both directions from Contact Creek remained to be done, but the Army knew a …
The Race to the International Border
The international border, the border between Canada and Alaska, had everybody’s attention at the end of the summer of 1942. The soldiers of the 18th and those of the 97th would meet there and complete the Alaska Highway. The 18th Combat Engineers–more on the champs Just as the race to the border heated up, permafrost …
What Extreme Cold Does to Equipment—and Beer
Extreme cold does things to equipment that the soldiers of the 97th and 18th Engineers never imagined. As the last two regiments working on the Alaska Highway, in October and November 1942, working in northernmost Yukon Territory, they became experts on the subject. The 18th Combat Engineers Young Black Soldiers of the 97th Even in …
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“Top Kick” Sergeant Honesty
“Top Kick” Ashel Honesty left his mark on the far north country. In 1942 the Army dispatched him with the 93rd Engineers to Yukon Territory and the Alaska Highway Project. From the Highway he went with the 93rd to the Aleutians. “Top Kick” Honesty was the man in Company A of the 93rd. Enlisted soldiers …
Line on the Map
The line on the map that the Corps of Engineers would turn into the rough draft of the Alaska Highway in 1942, started at Dawson Creek, British Columbia and ended at Delta, Alaska. The Corps had no idea what lay in front of them. The land of the Midnight Sun could offer a traveler …