In February, tasked to command the Alcan Project, Colonel Hoge raced from Washington to Dawson Creek and found Knox McCusker. As they drove the winter trail up from Fort St John, McCusker made his first major contribution to the project; warned the colonel that the trail he travelled would disappear in the March thaw. Clearly Hoge needed even more speed.
Colonel Robert Ingalls, commander of the 35th Combat Engineers, had accompanied Hoge to Canada, and now Hoge turned him around, sent him back to Fort Ord to collect his regiment, get it to Dawson Creek by rail and push his men and equipment on to Fort Nelson before the thaw. They would figure out what to do with them and how to feed and supply them when they got there.
Returning to Fort Ord, Ingalls wrote to his wife, “The regiment is going up there soon to construct some four hundred miles of a new road [their segment] through a trackless wilderness. . . It is going to be a huge job, with many hardships and adventures no doubt, but probably the chance of a lifetime.”
Meanwhile Hoge’s quartermaster, Lt. Colonel Mueller back in Dawson Creek found the local expert who had helped McCusker create the winter trail in the first place—E.J. Spinney.
Spinney had established “service stations” every 70 miles along the route; proposed that the 35th do the same. And Spinney and his friend McGinnis signed on to deliver fuel and supplies to the engineers around Fort Nelson. As many as a hundred Canadian truckers were ultimately hired to haul supplies and fuel.