Collected in the book
Wheels on Ice, Bicycling in Alaska 1898-1908
Edited by Terrence Cole
Alaska Northwest Publishing Company, Anchorage, 1985

We started early the next forenoon and reached the first roadhouse in a few hours, but decided that we would wait until morning to attempt the crossing of Thompson’s Pass. Hundreds of [dogsled] teams had beaten down the snow until we had a fine bicycle trail to the foot of the mountain, but after passing through Keystone Canyon our troubles began.

The trail started on a long slope from the base of the mountain, across its face, ever-ascending toward the narrow pass near the summit through which all traffic had to go.

. . . The terrific gales had blown the snow over the summit and lodged it on the breast of the mountain, where it piled up from twenty to a hundred feet in depth. Constant traffic had beaten down the snow until the trail itself was firm enough, but when you got off the trail into the loose snow it was like falling into an ocean of feathers. To make travel more interesting, a blizzard welcomed us as we started up the trail.

The steepness of the trail, and the freshly fallen and windblown snow made it impossible to attempt to ride the bicycles, so all we could do was to take them on our backs and start up in the face of the gale. It was interesting and exciting, especially when a dog team relaying freight or passengers came tearing down the trail for another load, or when a horse- or mule-driven rig came out of the blizzard and was upon you before you knew it. These rigs had the right of way theoretically, also practically, for the foot passenger who was rash enough to dispute it just possibly might be able to dig himself out of the soft snow by the following spring.

A man with a bicycle on his back was not only classed as a pedestrian, but as a fool. Before we reached the top, I was entirely satisfied that both classifications were absolutely accurate. What actually happened was that when we saw a rig coming we threw our wheels into the loose snow and then ourselves on top, hoping that we would not entirely disappear into the drift. By the time we had helped each other back onto the firm trail, another rig would be upon us and we would repeat the performance, as so on ad nauseam.

We became proficient as high divers but objected strenuously to the number of encores to which we were compelled to respond. That day was a nightmare and, as it was each man for himself, those of us who had been softened by office work found that a bicycle possesses the most remarkable faculty of taking on weight with increased elevation.

. . . A few minutes after I again started up the trail, a dog team came down from the summit, and the driver, after being sure of my identity, delivered to me a bag of doughnuts that my brother had sent back to me, he having reached the road house at the summit some time before I did.

To a Californian, a doughnut is recognized as the staff of life. That day, to a transplanted Californian, it was not only a staff but a pair of crutches. My lips were frozen, but that didn’t prevent me from eating those big, fat, greasy doughnuts. If I could have had my way about it, the Coat of Arms of Alaska could certainly have as a central figure a doughnut rampant with crossed can opener and corkscrew in the hole. Those three made Alaska great, and that day demonstrated the value of all three. By the aid of the doughnuts, I rolled triumphantly over the crest and stumbled into the road house near the top of that bleak mountain.

Never will I forget the tent road house at the summit of Thompson Pass as it appeared that day. . . . The top of the mountain was absolutely bare of all vegetation,, as it was high above timber line. Great out-croppings of rock, swept bare, were the only relief to the universal white of the snow, and even these were constantly obscured by clouds of snow driven before the wind howling around the peak.

As all the lumber [for the road house] had to be brought from Valdez, only a little was used, merely a floor of rough lumber and a few boards around the side extending up for a distance of about seven feet. Inside this wall, using the board floor as a base, a tent had been set up. The tent was about twelve by sixteen feet. It was securely anchored with ropes to the rocks, and when a stove was installed and a few dishes and a rough table secured, the place was fully equipped and ready for business. Provisions were hauled up when needed.
When the winter winds took up their accustomed duties, the snow was packed around the walls of the road house, and in a few days the proprietor commenced his regular winter sport of trying to keep open a tunnel to his door. When the snow had been packed down around his road house to the height of the walls, he laid a floor across the roof of his first dwelling, built a new wall and moved his tent up one story, preserving connection with the first story of his house by means of a small opening in one corner and a seven foot ladder. The day I reached the place he was living in the third story, and the prospects were excellent for moving up another story before the winter was over, for in that section they frequently have fifty feet or more of snow during the winter.

I entered the road house from the side away from the prevailing winds and found about twenty men seated around a long table extending down the full length of the room. A meal was on the table, and my traveling companions were doing their best to eat everything in sight.

The proprietor took one look at me, laid another plate, pulled up a box for a chair and told me to sit down. He placed before me a great deep tin bowl holding about a quart of red hot tomato soup. I needed no further instructions as to the proper road house etiquette under such circumstances. Frozen lips did not appear to affect my ability to wield an active and wicked spoon.

The next move of the proprietor was to take a pint tin cup, fill it half full of scalding coffee and cool it with an equal amount of well-seasoned Bourbon whiskey. Nectar, ambrosia, malted milk, ice cream sodas and all the other drinks of the ancients were as nothing compared with that drink.

. . . I felt ready to take another chance with the storm, and we started down the mountain through snow almost waist deep, in the face of a storm that was evidently violating all union rules as to the useless waste of energy. Bicycle riding under the circumstances did not appear to offer many advantages, so hoping to placate the wheels for the hard usage given them the day before, we decided to carry them on our backs.

. . . Road houses on that trail that year were much alike. They were built in a hurry to meet an emergency and were spaced from fifteen to twenty miles apart – too short generally for a one-day journey, and yet so far apart that for the ordinary horse-driven rig it was difficult to make two road houses in a day.

Meals at the Valdez end, that is, for the first hundred miles, were $1.50 and beds $1.50 to $2. “Beds” is a misnomer, for generally they were only bunks built against the wall, usually in tiers of two or four, depending on the height of the roof. The bunks were constructed of round spruce poles and the mattress and springs of the same material. Some of the road house keepers, having evidently been accustomed to luxuries before they came to Alaska, sprinkled a few spruce boughs over the poles, and some of them actually had a few blankets to spread over the boughs. After sleeping on one of them, I concluded that the blankets were for purposes of concealment. But after a day on the trail, even the presence of a few boulders, cannon balls, broken glass, and other trifles would not have been noticed.

. . . Above the stove, near the roof, and all around the pipe, was a rack made of small poles or sometimes wire, over which draped wet socks, soaked shoes, shoe pacs, moccasins, and wet et cetera. A “musher” or dog team driver would come in, find a box or log or whatever was used for chairs, sit down and remove his wet foot gear, hang it on the rack an after skirmishing around in his “war bag,” find dry foot gear, his pipe, matches, etc. When his pipe was started, he might then condescend to speak to whoever might be in the road house. I have seen hundreds of men come into road houses and follow our the above ritual before speaking a word, and while so engaged no one would speak to them. In face, each man’s business was his own particular business, and unless he chose to take others into his confidence he was let strictly alone.

. . . I recall one road house on the Gakona River, reached by us late at night after a very hard day, where there were only four bunks in a room no more than eight by ten in size. There were boughs on two of them, and by boughs I mean a few branches that did not even cover up the rough poles beneath. No blankets were in evidence to conceal in any manner the beautiful simplicity of the sleeping accommodations.

A freighter who was hauling apples, oranges, and eggs to Fairbanks had reached the place first and for the protection of his perishables had unloaded his freight, piling it up in the only open space between the bunks and the other wall. When we got there, our bicycling party entered the room by climbing over the freight, bumping our heads on the roof, and sliding down the other side into a small lean-to kitchen where we dined sumptuously, at $2 per, on a stew made of ptarmigan bones, water, and a little flour. Others had been there before us. In fact, a whiskey drummer had pre-empted the best bunk, and I am thoroughly convinced that he had also appropriated all the spruce boughs from the other beds. My belief is founded upon the fact that when he wasn’t looking I lifted a corner of his wolf robe and found an eight-inch mattress of boughs beneath. We didn’t question his ethics, for we knew that had we been the first to arrive, we would have done the same; besides, we had no bedding and desired to acquire a robe form him, as we knew he was traveling in style in a basket sleigh and must have other robes or blankets. After we had praised his whiskey and treated him to a cigar that one of us had, which in some manner had weathered successfully the various vicissitudes of the trail, he finally loaned us one blanket and one robe. Two of us in each bunk, poles and weather underneath, and a blanket or robe on top, served us for the night.

. . . The Signal Corps had established a great many stations along the Valdez Trail and was engaged in hauling their supplies for the summer. This was done on double-enders, and the motor poser for each was one transplanted Missouri mule. They had about twenty mules at work and had been relaying the freight for a couple of weeks. The mules, being methodical, stepped each time in the same place as before. As a result, for more than seventy miles, about every eighteen inches was a trench across the trail made by the mules’ feet. The trail being about two and one half feet wide and cut up with cross trenches made bicycling anything but a joy. It was like trying to ride a wheel along the ends of railroad ties. What we said about the Signal Corps, mules in general and those mules in particular, was sufficiently slanderous to have caused us to be imprisoned for several lifetimes. In fact, we had to walk and shove our wheels beside us for the full distance until we passed the last station to which supplies were being hauled.

. . . We could not go on, as we were tired out and the thermometer stood at about twenty below zero, and the next road house was distant more than twenty miles. We decided to stay. There was little difficulty about meals, for the proprietor had plenty of provisions. Besides, we were hungry after twelve or thirteen hours in the open, pedaling over different and indifferent trails. Ham and cold storage eggs, sourdough bread, Lubock potatoes, and canned butter, at $3 per meal, was living in luxury, and we kept clear of the kitchen part of the establishment as its reputation had reached us before we reached the road house. What we didn’t know would not hurt us.

. . . I didn’t lie awake to listen to the gentle and ungentle cursing of those who tried to sleep upon the hard floor, as it was apparent that their troubles were none of mine. The lamp was turned low and comparative quiet reigned until about midnight, when a stage loaded with passengers bound for the Interior pulled in.

There were six men and two women aboard, and they were anxious to enter and get warm and have a meal. They opened the door and stepped in. It was no longer quiet, as the sleeper in front of the door objected verbally to having his midsection used as a floor. The first man in weighted about three hundred pounds, and his weight was enough to waken the soundest sleeper. He hastily apologized and stepped one step forward, and then the disturbance was increased by exactly one hundred per cent as he stepped on another man’s face.

. . . We arose early and before daylight were on our wheels going away from there. Two of the six of us who essayed the trip by bicycle abandoned the wheels here and decided to do the rest of the traveling on foot. The trail was good and we made good time, as we were traveling over a great plateau.

. . . The first hundred miles of our journey had all been a consistent upgrade, and when we reached the plateau country we thought our troubles were over, for we were then on the downgrade toward the basin of the Copper River. Magnificent mountains were ahead and from one of them to the east, Mt. Wrangell, a great cloud of smoke was constantly issuing, as it was then and is now a live volcano.

The trail here, by reason of the great amount of travel, was in excellent condition, as there had been no snow for a couple of weeks and it was a perfect boulevard. When we started down the long slope, many times, for miles, all we needed was a good coaster brake. Frequently our brakes would become so hot that we would have to stop and throw the machine into the snow to let it cool off.

Just before reaching the Copper River valley, I chanced to be in the lead and was going at a decidedly fast clip down the trail when from around a bend came a dog team headed my way. I was going so fast that I could not stop, and to avoid a collision I turned out into the deep snow and went headlong into a drift, nothing but my feet showing above the surface. The passenger in the dog team got out, and he and the driver, each taking hold of one of my feet, managed to pull me out. I then rescued my bicycle, and after thanking them for upending me I mounted my wheel and went on down into the valley.

. . . Though we were doing the hardest kind of work, I gained twelve pounds in the twelve days we were on the trail.

When we reached Copper River, our trail was on the ice of the river for sixty miles or more, and it was like riding on the pavement. The road house keeper kept the trail scraped for about fifteen or twenty miles south of his place of business after each fall of fresh snow. As he had no snow scraper available, he used a dead horse for that purpose. Even though the horse was thoroughly frozen, it was pretty well worn out before spring.