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Chickens have forever had a place in our hearts and
on our tables. Why is that? Well … why not?
And so I’d like you to come with me back to the summer of 1970, ‘way
up north of Fairbanks, Alaska, to what was once the thriving gold
mining village of Chicken, Alaska. I was on my way, hitchhiking with
a canoe, to paddle down a stretch of the Yukon River and to see the
cabin where Jack London spent the winter once upon a time.
Just as an aside here, hitchhiking with a canoe, or with a sled and
10 dogs, would make a lengthy how-to book all by themselves. It
doesn’t sound easy, does it? It isn’t.
So what I would do on these “adventures” of mine, (my boss, Larry
Fanning, referred to them as Slim’s tin-cup trips because of all the
scrounging I did) is go neat places and interview great people, and
write stuff. My column in the Anchorage Daily News … brace yourself
… was called “Slim’s Column.”
Truth in advertising.
So I arrived in Chicken, Alaska, only to find I’d nearly doubled the
local population. In the far-distant past, Chicken was an actual
town. When the gold gave out, so did Chicken.
So what was left was “the business” consisting of a gas pump, a
coffee pot, some postage stamps and a couple of nice folks. But
there was something else, too.
[to top of second
column] |
There was not only an outhouse
there, but it was electrically lighted. So where should I write my
column? In an electrically lighted outhouse in Chicken, Alaska.
Naturally.
The raising of poultry this far north is uncommon, too many local
varmints, including any resident sled dogs, eat them. So how did
this gold camp get its name? Ahh … the reason for that column on the
wooden “desk” beneath that 20-watt bulb.
Chicken, Alaska, got its name because none of the miners there knew
how to spell ptarmigan.
[Text from file received from
Slim Randles]
I’m Slim Randles,
author of the book Packing the Backyard Horse, enabling you and your
own Ol’ Snort to have some camping fun in the back country. Packing
the Backyard Horse, available on Amazon.com.
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