What next? After attacking Dutch Harbor and occupying two islands, where would the Japanese War machine turn up next? The men who went north to build the Alaska Highway in 1942, left the rolling catastrophe of War with Japan behind. struggled to keep up with news of the war. But everyone understood one thing. The …
Tag Archives: Alaska
Mortal Enemies
Mortal Enemies struggled with weather and confusion in the Aleutians in June. Task Force 1 had bombed Dutch Harbor, not once, but twice. But the Americans had yet to hear from Task force 2. Link to another story “Icy Fog Defended Dutch Harbor” Admiral Hosogaya’s task force still lurked somewhere west of Task Force 1 …
Petty Officer Koga
Petty Officer Koga looked desperately for a place to get his zero on the ground, and just a few miles from Dutch Harbor he found the island of Akutan. Ironically his landing on Akutan may have turned Dutch Harbor into a crucial American victory. Aerial Combat with Japan in 1942 meant fighting Japan’s premier warplane, …
Marauding Japanese Forces
Marauding Japanese hatched a plan that would do precisely what the men who ordered the Alaska Highway feared. They would attack North America through the Aleutians and Alaska. The simultaneous battle at Midway They dispatched two battle groups. Planes from the carrier group would assault the American naval base at Dutch Harbor. Soldiers from the …
Vivid Memories and Christmas on the Highway
Vivid memories of his time as a civilian surveyor on the Alaska Highway stayed with Joseph Hutlas for the rest of his life. Dances and a Christmas Eve service may have been the most vivid of all. Link to another story “Burwash Bounce” He told his stories to Donna Blazor Bernhardt and she included some …
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As the Crow Flies
As the crow flies, Lake Bennett lay just a few miles from Skagway. Theoretically Klondike gold rushers could travel those few miles from the Skagway dock to Lake Bennett, build or buy a boat and cruise down Lake Bennett to Carcross and the Yukon River. The Yukon could then float them downstream all the way …
Perpetual Motion in Dawson City
Perpetual motion obsessed Jan Welzl. Most people came to Dawson City to look for gold. Jan came to build a perpetual motion machine. He filled his three cabins with pipe and fittings, axles, counterweights, and even beer bottles. Whirling drive belts ran from the window of one cabin to the door of the next. His …
Disaster Loomed
Disaster loomed in the back of a 2 ½ ton truck parked at the Headquarters Company camp at Big Gerstle, Alaska. A young lieutenant proposed to haul ten soldiers, Sgt James Heard and his squad, 130 miles in the back of the unheated truck. The day’s extremely low temperature, combined with the wind chill effect …
Mutiny?
Link to another story “Send Food or Send Coffins” Mutiny, the Army’s most serious crime, visited the 97th at Big Gerstle, Alaska in March 1943. Or did it? The answer depends on your perspective and how you define mutiny. In March at Big Gerstle, Headquarters Company commander Lt. Dewitt Howell received a routine order to …
Wyatt Earp
Wyatt Earp. The name brings to mind Tombstone, Arizona and the gunfight at the OK Corral. In 1881, Wyatt, two of his brothers and Doc Holliday permanently ended the careers of five outlaws there. Few people know that Wyatt Earp had as much impact on Nome, Alaska as he did on Tombstone. Link to another …