The “Iowa Expeditionary Force” came to Alaska with the 97th Engineering Regiment. Forced by the shortage of troops to send the segregated 97th to build the Alaska Highway through Alaska, two reluctant generals planned to surround them with white civilian contractors. They found an Iowa management contractor, Lytle and Green; and Lytle and Green went back to Iowa and assembled subcontractors into the “Iowa Expeditionary Force.”
Over the next two weeks the Expeditionary Force loaded bulldozers, scoop shovels, graders and trucks, chained them down on railroad cars and shipped them north, some to the Port of Seattle, some to the Port of Prince Rupert, British Columbia. But at Seattle and Prince Rupert the equipment piled up behind a serious bottleneck. Equipment bound for Valdez had to negotiate the Gulf of Alaska and contractors struggled to find vessels to carry it. On June 7, fifty carloads of equipment waited in the yards at Prince Rupert.
Each sub-contractor employed a core of skilled and experienced men—catskinners, carpenters, mechanics, crane operators, foremen and superintendents. But to do the job in Alaska they needed more men than just these and they scrambled to recruit laborers “…from Cumberland to Independence, from Cedar Rapids to Hawarden and a dozen other Iowa communities.” Generous contracts let civilian contractors offer very high wages and they had little problem recruiting laborers. One officer in Valdez noted that “Truckers are getting $25 to $30 a ton for a 200-mile haul and drivers are getting from $400 to $700 a month…” And it wasn’t just truck drivers. “Café workers make more than Army officers.”
Privates in the 97th worked for twenty-one dollars a month.
In June the Expeditionary Force’s flood of civilian workers made their way north. Most travelled by rail to Edmonton, Alberta and then flew north to Big Delta, Fairbanks and Nabesna. The workers assembled in Iowa towns, said tearful goodbyes and boarded trains.
Don Garlock wrote of a special train to St. Paul, Minnesota and supper in a reserved dining room at Union Depot. North from St. Paul into Saskatchewan the railroad provided sleeper cars. Not everything went perfectly for the civilian travelers. Garlock recorded, “The result was catastrophic as there were only 113 berths for 191 men, so we slept two to a berth. Of course, there was little sleeping done. In fact, I dozed with the tingling of silver in my ears—poker game in the next berth.”
Army barracks housed the men at Edmonton. Max Smith “…had a bath last night and the first good sleep since I left home…” Max had breakfast at the Salvation Army Canteen, “Ham and eggs with toast, coffee, and pie for 40 cents.”