Twenty-something Mary moved to Alaska and never looked back. That doesn’t mean everything went smoothly.
Legendary Alaskan, Mary Hanson
In the early 1930’s Mary got pregnant; had a miscarriage; took herself to Nenana for medical treatment. Not by any means the Mayo clinic, whatever medical facilities Nenana had to offer did the trick. Twenty-something Mary lived to fight another day.
But, if life in Alaska suited her, life with her husband apparently didn’t. In Nenana Mary took the opportunity to get a divorce.
Mary had been helping neighbors tend their sled dogs, had accumulated dogs of her own. Now she and her team moved to Fairbanks where Mary took a job as a waitress and met chef Bert Hansen. Bert and Mary tied the knot in 1935.
In 1936 Mary became the first woman to race the men in what is now the North American Dog Sled Classic. She raced in 1936, 1937 and 1938. She placed third in at least one of those races.
In 1939 Bert and Mary filed on 149 acres on the Richardson Highway near Big Delta and opened Bert and Mary Hansen’s Roadhouse—a permanent fixture at Big Delta offering food, a bed, accommodations for dogs, horses or whatever.
In those days the Richardson Highway closed for the winter. So in the winter of 1940 a very pregnant Mary mushed on her dogsled to the doctor who delivered her daughter.