May 26 DAY 4 Mile 0 RV Park, Dawson Creek, BC
We dodged raindrops as we journeyed to the Visitors Centre, located just a few yards from the coach. It's a substation, but the clerk had a map of the town and answers to all our questions. We went to the Mile 0 marker (beginning of Alaskan Highway), where we happened on the Canadian National Women's Ice Hockey team, who are training here for the upcoming Olympics. What a nice group of ladies! They took our picture for us. I hope the finals at the Olympics aren't between the U. S. and Canada, because I would have divided loyalties.
Then we went to the art gallery at the Grain Elevator, where we bought an inukshuk, which is an Inuit word meaning "Man of Stone that points the way". The Arctic has so much permafrost and few natural landmarks, so they would put Inukshuks along their path to help them find their way home safely.
The gallery is located next door to the main visitor center, which has free working wifi. We stopped to post Day 3 before heading to the Alaska Highway House, a "Must See".
The Alaskan Highway House is dedicated to telling the history of the building of the Alcan Highway and those who built it through a PBS documentary film, well-signed exhibits, and personal accounts. I have a new appreciation for the men who built the highway, especially the African-Americans. I learned (Dean already knew) that Japan attacked the Aleutian Islands in 1942, killed 100 Americans, and seized 2 islands. We had 20,000 troops stationed along the Alaska coast, and they didn't think they would be able to hold off the Japanese without a supply route. They expected an attack because they were only 750 miles from a Japanese base.
Blacks were not allowed to be stationed in cold climates because army leadership didn't think they could tolerate low temperatures, since many of them were from the South. But, they really needed manpower, so they stationed 3-5 regiments there (different signs said different numbers). The supervising officers had been trained in OCS that "Negroes are careless, shiftless, and irresponsible", and they were expected to do poorly. They were considered "not sufficiently intelligent to operate complicated mechanical equipment", had little or no training in operating bulldozers, got "insufficient equipment and clothing, had long tours of duty, and got very little recognition by their white officers", and were assigned to the toughest jobs. Yet, they hung in there, and they built 1/3 of the Alcan. They believed that by doing this, when they returned home, they would have proven their competence and they and their families would be treated well. It's really hard for me to fathom how prejudice ever made sense to anyone and why it was tolerated for so long.
I do admire all the men who built the highway, though. Frozen wetlands thawed and acted like big sponges, sometimes swallowing up tractors and bulldozers. Temperatures ranged from -70 F degrees to 90 F degrees. They had no fresh food and ate Spam, Vienna sausages, and WWI rations in a tin can. Everyone worked hard 16-20 hour days, 7 days a week, had to move their tent to a new location every day, felt they were 'slave labor", and hated it. I will think of them when we hit what we consider "rough road".
We then went out to a wildlife preserve, McQueen's Slough (about 10 minutes away) to see the ducks and birds. It started raining harder, and we decided to not go out to the boardwalk. I would like to explore it on a nicer day.
Thanks for the encouraging comments. We are now off to eat at Mr. Mike's (one of the Brewer's recommendations).
Wildlife Count: 0
Weather: High of 61° F, drizzles to pounding rain
Miles Driven: 0
