Homesteading in Alaska

My dad, Roy A Farrar, not only cut the trees, but milled them, and built the little house from bottom up. Yes, and everything else, we had to bring by train.

In 1957, Dad moved us out to the homestead. It was a FREE LAND pkg from the state. If you could live on the land and make improvements, after five years the property became yours. It was bare ground. I cannot remember how many acres. Mom says it was 154 acres. The area was in Talkeetna Alaska. We caught the train in Anchorage. Talkeetna is almost half the way between Anchorage and Fairbanks.

Dad built a out house. Know what that is? It starts with a hole dug deep in the ground. Then you build this small square building on top, with a door and venting up above. A toilet seat is put on the hole, and old sears catalogs for toilet paper. Yes, sire. Catalogs not my idea of great toilet paper, but it breaks down in time, and works when you have nothing else but leaves.
In the winter, I can tell you, it was COLD in that out house! I would try to hold myself up off the seat to keep from getting frozen buns!!
This was set up a short distance from the house, but far enough away so that the smell in summer would not float into breakfast.

Water?
About 1/4 mile down the trail was a nice spring. My mother carried water for everything. Our baths, cooking etc. She never worried about exercise back then. Dad also found a good bank (dirt built up) to carve out a "root cellar". A root cellar is where you place things to keep them cool in summer and from freezing in winter. This was used for our potato harvest.

MOOSE ATTACK!
One spring, my mother had went to get water at the spring and Duke the Labrador dog had accompanied her. Now, let me tell you, Moose are NOT pets. And a new Mother Moose is not to be crossed! Mean and powerful if provoked. She was quite a distance away, but when she saw the dog she prob. thought "WOLF" and charged at mom. Mom just barely had time to get into the root cellar, to escape, but scratching at the door was Duke! He was not about to run, so mom had to let him in quick! That ole moose stood waiting for them for 45 minutes before mom could come out and get back home!

Photo shows my dad, Duke, my mom in the bandana, me on the far right, Don't know the other people. Visitors from other homesteads I suppose.

This shot shows us just arriving and all our stuff, just off the train. Ready to take it all to the homestead . Dad had the house built before we came out.

At first there were just ruts to follow. No roads, that came later, after dad got a bulldozer up there. The ruts were made by the jeeps going to the train or to other homesteads. It was cool, because you could just let the jeep go when the ruts were deep. Like a train car, the ruts kept you "on track"! Sometimes tho, the weather made it so you got stuck a lot. This is why all vehicles had winches on front. It was never ending chore to get yourself unstuck.
We kids would have to get out and find something to do, while the adults got the rigs out of the muck.

Again, I remember the rascally things we did as kids. My uncle Buck, had a passel of kids. Too many to remember I guess, as one day we had all loaded up to go to my grandparents homestead some 5 miles away. We where half way there when my aunt says, where is billy? No one knew. Oh my gosh, the littlest child had been left. We had to turn around, getting a scolding all the way for not noticing he was not there. Only to find running up behind us with dirty tears and screaming was one little boy. A very unhappy boy!

Tools? What Tools?
Dad asked me and my cousin chuck, (yes the one I got into trouble with all the time) if we wanted to go to grandpa's with him in the jeep. We did and we were quiet all the way. One of us, I don't remember who, found the tool box and all the way down the road, was throwing tools out to see them bounce on the road.
I don't know how my parents got anything done with us around!

My dad, was my hero, as is my mom. There was nothing my dad could not build. Wether from wood, or mechanical. He was a brilliant man. Hard worker, tough as nails. He taught himself to fly small airplanes, repaired heavy equipment, and even invented the first swamp tracks for equipment to roam over the tundra.

At the Homestead, he had a large bulldozer brought in to make roads between homesteads, and clear his own ground. Other people had some Mills brought in by train for cutting our own timber into wood planks.

I remember how much I enjoyed walking on the tracks waiting for the train. Dad would use a large white flag to stop the train if he needed to get on, but usually if they were bringing people or equipment, they knew to stop.

Funny how memories are. As a kid, the homestead was fun. I really had no hard things to do. I and my cousins got into a trouble a lot tho. One day, we found these cool cans of dark stuff, and decided it was Bear Protector goo. So we poked holes in them and poured them all around the homestead to keep bears out.
Darn, come to find out it was oil. Dad was NOT happy to say the least. I got into tons of trouble!
Then another time, I and this same cousin, found our way to the attic and found these cool boxes of small papers and stuff. We could not read, if we had we would have read, "save for taxes"
We had great fun throwing them out the window and watching paper float away all over the yard. Again, Dad was not a happy homesteader!!

Photo: The train with equipment arriving. my grandfather on the ground, and dad on the train with a train guy.

Winters were very hard. No stores with food, no money if their was one. This photo shows my dad and gram-pa going to find meat. Mom says one winter we almost did not make it through. We tried to put up potatoes, dried fish, canned fish, moose meat was dried or canned too. Sometimes, dad would get old army rations for cheap if he went to anchorage. Later, things were so tough, he had to go back into Anchorage to work part time for money. He had rebuilt a small airplane to fly back and forth by then.

I was so happy one trip when he came home. As, my dad had brought me a tiny little truck. A real toy! Not a carved wood one but a real toy. It was blue, with a towing pole on the back. I loved trucks more than dolls, I liked toy animals, and trucks!

We had a wood stove in our living room, with a pr of bunk beds for my sis and I to one side. A kitchen, and mom and dads room. That was it. A large metal tub used for live stock water, was our bathing tub. This mom would heat on the stove for our warm water.
The kitchen had a generator to run some things. But electric was limited, as you had to buy fuel for the generator. Most things had to be done with wood fuel. Candles, or oil lamps.

We used the hide of any animals for rugs or what not. Nothing was wasted.

I remember coloring tho, so must have had some crayons. And some clay.
Mom taught me first grade. Which I failed by the way. Had to take the course again. I had trouble speaking clearly. My first word for water was "gully gully".
We figure I was saying what I heard when people swallowed water. Later as a adult I found out I was dyslectic.

I grew up knowing far more about animals, life and nature than most people.

As for the winters, I do not remember much, i suppose I stayed in most the time with only quick trips out to the frozen out house.
*I do know that if your nose freezes shut when you breath in, it is TOO COLD.

*Never put your tongue on metal in the cold.
(yes I lost a part of my tongue>

*keep a scarf over your nose and mouth at all times in cold weather

*never wear tight boots, you need loose boots with felt liners 1 inch thick inside.
( I tried to be "fashionable when a teen and almost frost bit my feet)

*Never trust the ice in spring
I once saw a full moose under the ice in swimming form. Even he did not know the ice would break with him. Thus, he died under the ice. He was frozen solid like a statue, still swimming. Little bubbles still coming up from his nose. I was so sad to see him under the ice like that.

NOTE:
I have traveled the al can hwy. (road from Washington state through Canada to Alaska) over 15 times growing up.
On one such trip, the weather had dipped to a chill factor of -65 degrees. No kidding. The cars could not be turned off even at night, or they would not start again. As it was, when we stopped to rest, dad only rested a few hours, and the vehicle had to be moved to keep the wheels still turning. Harsh. We rode (my sister and I and dog) in the back seat, with piles of bedding below us and tons of blankets on top. That was just one of many times I have been in super dangerous cold weather.

Here he looks like he is pouring "heat" into the rig. Cold out, but dad could start, keep running any equipment. Nothing he could not fix. Nothing. He was a top rate welding too. And all with just a high school diploma.

People would find out how good he was and constantly track him down to help them. He never turned them down. He might complain about it, but he always helped them.

CUT TO THE BONE:

My dad told me not to play on the heavy equipment. But, I was a stubborn child. I got up on a newly welded trailer of some sort, and fell. As I started to fall I tried to catch myself by grabbing onto the newly welded post. The steel has sharp points and with the weight of my body falling slit my palm open.

Dad saw me falling and said, "are you hurt?". I did not want to be in trouble so said, NO, and skipped quickly into the house to mom holding my hand. As soon as I was in the house I started bawling. Blood was really coming. Mom had to call dad, and I could see they were worried. It had cut deep, really deep. No doctors up there. They wrapped it tight after rinsing in kerosene .(not sure if that is spelled correctly) it was the liquid to run lamps. Used by many homesteaders to fight germs and disinfect wounds.

To this day, I have a three inch long scar on my right palm. At least dad was not mad.

Roy: "I came out in '50' (from alaska), met Yolonda in Brownsville, Oregon, and we got married. the next year we went back to Alaska, where we stayed for a long stretch. For the first four years we lived in Anchorage and i worked as a mechanic in a garage. But then land came available to homestead, and I decided to file. We got 154 acres about a hundred and twenty miles north of Anchorage. There was absolutely nothing there, virgin ground. By then I had an airplane. I roughed out a landing strip and flew back and forth from Anchorage to the cabin, and Yolonda and the kids moved into it while I commuted to Anchorage and my job in the garage.

They punched through a railroad that came pretty near the property. Only one train ran, and that was at 11:30 at night. "

one day my mom had baked a batch of cookies. After taking them out of the oven she went outdoors while they cooled on a plate.
Each time she came into the house she thought the plate looked a little more empty, On the third time, she noticed not only were some cookies gone but in their place on the plate was some mushroom pieces. She could not figure out how those mushroom pieces got there!

Finally after sneaking to a hiding spot and waiting quietly, she found out the mystery. A squirrel came in from the window, carrying a mushroom piece, laid it on the plate and took a cookie!

He was sure a generous squirrel to not just steal those cookies, he would trade!

After the ground was tilled and little ruts were made, the tractor would pull a flat bed trailer with all of us on it to plant. We would drop potato starts into the ruts every so many feet. This way it was done pretty fast. Of course now a machine does it. But back then, this activity promoted united families, and cousins. All helping each other. This brought us all together. We needed each other to survive.

I learned a super valuable lesson one spring too.

One that Walt Disney also learned.

I had been to my cousins homestead, and was with my cousin of trouble when we decided to go fishing. We had found this HUGE salmon. But he was smart, he would not ever take the bait on a hook. Also, He purposed to drive all other smaller fish from our bait too. We saw him! He protected the others. But we were relentless. A few days later, we concocted a plan to catch him.

We snagged him with nets or something. Any way, we were so proud, and took him to the house to show our parents and have them prepare him to eat. But alas, he was too old to eat they said, and thus, he went to waste.

I was so sad. I never forgot, that I took a life for nothing. I would never do that again. I am not against taking animals for food needed. But I would never do it for sport. I learned to respect the land and the life there.

Walt Disney had learned this same lessons at about my age. I had read where he killed a owl once. With a sling shot. It was why he made the movies he did later in life. He felt so bad once he had taken this life for no reason.

Life lessons can be good if we learn something from it for the better!

People who grew up living off the land, know how to care for the land. Otherwise if they abused it, it would not produce for them! Same with wildlife. We all learned conservation before the term was made. Today, many so called nature groups who claim to be saving the animals or the planet have no clue what is really needed. They read books, or listen to others who know nothing and think they know it all. It was a frustration to my dad, mom and all who really knew. The indians knew too. But no one listens to us any more. We are just homesteaders. Back ward people, old people with no college education. No one listens to the old ranchers, and farmers.

We knew then and we know now how to survive, what is important and what is not. WE are a dying breed. But I have my memories still. A hard life but a positive life.

See my late gram pa with that huge cucumber! And in Alaska too. We used a lot of "hot " beds. or built up beds with some sort of covers to heat the ground, and get faster growth out of the time we had to grow things.

He also, grew a large field of oats, see it in the back ground? This too was shared with our family. He was up there in his homestead about a year after we moved to ours. My grand parents names were Zack and Delphia Brown. Both are dead now.

I will add more to this story over the coming days. As I find more pictures and remember more tales!

At least if they are mad at you. They are not bad like a rabid animal but they are not to be disrespected! Powerful, cunning and Fast!

Not to mention, BIG.

My dad, was a airplane enthusiast and for a time, found he could make some good money when people would cash their small planes in the wilderness. They would hire him to go in, patch up the planes and fly them out. Small planes like super cubs are really just a little light metal and lots of fabric. They are small, light and easy to fly in and out of small areas.

This one time, he flew into a area near the Kennicott mines. He and his brother would hike way up a mountain to get to a plane there. They had only a small gun, as I remember the story, and a their repair supplies, etc. At one point the trail was single file with a cliff down on the right and the cliff up on the left.

As it broke into a small clearing, Roy, (my dad) rounded the corner only to see a mother black bear a hundred yards ahead. She had cubs, and immediately decided Roy was a threat. She charged and was coming so fast he could not get a gun out, and his brother had just come off the rim himself. No time to run ... when Roy saw the most amazing thing.

A HUGE dark grizzly came out of nowhere, into the path between him and the charging black bear. The Grizzly had his back to Roy and only saw the black she bear charging. He rose on his back legs straight up and roared loud enough that Roy said the hairs on the back of his neck curled forever.

That black bear, did a u turn so fast and took off, Roy never did even see her disappear! The grizzly, just lumbered back to all fours and swayed after her in long easy lopes, never even looking back at Roy and his brother.

Now that my friends was a miracle clear as day to me.

Second BEAR story:
It was known among the homesteaders of a huge grizzly who hated men. For many years he was roaming and hassling men in camps, hunting trips etc. And even tho many said they shot him he was never killed. At least until one day just before we left the homestead.

Finally, some hunters found his body. I cannot remember if someone shot him or if he was just found. But the weird part was that in the skull of that bear were numerous bullets that never penetrated the brain. They say he had carried them for all those years. That was why he never died. People were trying to shoot him in the head, and his skull was too thick. If they had shot at this heart, or in the mouth maybe. But he was a tracker. Meaning he would smell humans and circle wide and come in from behind. He killed many men for a number of years. Died a old age too. This was in the 1950's. I will do some research for the figures of how old he was, etc. I have a article some where here.

LAST ONE:
I have this great friend in Alaska. Her name is Cora. She is only 5 foot tall and likes to hunt .

One time, she emailed me about how happy she was to get to go out hunting. I wrote back, You got to be kidding me, hiking for days in cold wet tundra, eating tons of mosquitoes, to hunt with a bow and arrow is not my idea of fun. Give me a day on a sunny beach any time!

She lived on Kodiak Island when she was young, and she told me of two grizzlies who once tried to invade her cabin. She had a baby at the time. As the two bears were trying to come through the windows, she circled around. One ran off I think, but one she took down. She gave me some of the claws to make into Jewelry. Picture is one of the claws. It is a small one. My grandmother put some gold nuggets into it and made me a necklace years ago. I wore out the necklace so will be remaking it.

So don't mess with Grizzlies or Alaskan Women!!

Our Food .. A movie that SHOCKED ME!
I grew up on farms and ranches. All our food, meat, vegetables were raised from the ground, and property.
Our chickens roamed the fields and then were locked up at night to keep predators from eating them.
Our beef, lamb and pigs also roamed the fields. The sheep and beef ate GRASS, with some oats in winter. The pigs ate what they rooted in the fields and table scraps.

We grew our own hay, corn, all manner of vegetables and fruit. And we did so without the pesticides used today. So I had this ignorance about where my food comes from today and how it is grown or raised. I rented this movie:
This movie, this documentary SHOCKED me! I knew a lot of things were changing but this?

EVERY PERSON IN AMERICA should watch this, seek out the truth, and change how we eat!!
Watch to the very end and make some changes or we are slaves to big company greed, and money!

Companies will make what we want to eat. You can choose what products you buy for the most part. But if you are poor, the documentary brings up some important things: like you can buy a fast food burger for 1 buck, but carrots cost twice that. A whole segment on being poor and the choices we are forced to make when we are unable to afford organic. But maybe we should eat less and eat organic anyways!

This disc shows graphic shots, just be forewarned. Living off the land you learn that animals are killed for food. However, we learned to treat our animals with respect and their needs were met.

Again, I was disgusted with what I saw in this movie. I know that all things need to be researched and take nothing for ab. truth until you do. But add this movie to what I already KNOW, and I believe it has a ton of truth in it.
This movie was dated 2008, just where do you think we will be in another 10 yrs?