National Park After Dark - In Dog We Trust: Iditarod National Historic Trail

Episode Date: March 28, 2022

Bundle up it your warmest gear, because today we head to Alaska to discover the roots of the Iditarod National Historic Trail. Currently most infamous for “The Last Great Race on Earth” this trail was blazed by courageous people and our most loyal companions. The Iditarod is synonymous with sled dogs, but you may be surprised to learn the origin story you remember – isn’t entirely accurate. Come along as we uncover the true story of the Iditarod and celebrate its underdogs – both human and animal.  For the latest NPAD updates, group travel details, merch and more, follow us on npadpodcast.com and our socials at:Instagram: @‌nationalparkafterdarkTikTok: @‌nationalparkafterdarkSupport the show by becoming an Outsider and receive ad free listening, bonus content and more on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. Want to see our faces? Catch full episodes on our YouTube Page!Thank you to this week’s partners!Factor: Get $120 off when you use our link and code npad120Feals: Code NPAD for 50% off your first order with free shipping Peloton: Keep your workouts fresh with PelotonRedHanded: Subscribe to RedHanded wherever you listen to podcastsFor a full list of our sources, visit http://npadpodcast.com/episodes Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Limitless. Now open your eyes. Go to Monday.com. Start for free and finally. Breathe. Girl, winter is so last season. And now spring's got you looking at pictures of tank tops with hungry eyes. Your algorithm is feeding you cutoffs. You're thirsty for the sun on your shoulders.

That perfect hang on the patio sundress. Those sandals you can wear all day and all night. And you've had enough of shopping from your couch. Done hoping it looks anything like the picture when you tear up on that envelope? It's time for a little in-person spring treat. It's time for a trip to Ross. Work your magic. As children and young adults, the study of history seemed somewhat straightforward.

Open your textbook to Chapter 5, page 11, and turn your attention to paragraph 8. You can almost picture it now. Gazing down at that page, a page that contained all you needed to know about a particular event or period of time. You studied it, mastered it, and then moved on. All you needed to know was right there, right? The problem with history is, Although already played out and unchangeable, it can be interpreted in various ways, and thus altered. As we understand it, history is a record entirely dependent on pieces of information that were fortunate enough to get documented.

Some historic events were documented with accuracy. Others slipped away to time and were lost, while others were interpreted in numerous ways by an abundance of people, and therefore recorded with variation. Because of this, historic events can be tricky. As a result, the study of the past and our understanding of it is dynamic. In our walk with history, we must be prepared for changes. We must be open to shifting our understanding of our most coveted and beloved stories to make space for alteration. We have to make space for important yet forgotten figures to step forward from the shadows and into the forefront to receive the recognition they deserve, because every dog has its day.

Welcome to National Park After Dark. We're doing a dog episode. How did you know? The end sentence. I literally said dog one time. It's all I heard of the whole thing. I'm like a dog. Yes, we're doing a dog episode.

Well, yeah, it's pretty much all about dogs. I love that. It's time. When I was researching it, I really had no intention of it becoming kind of like, an amazing animals episode like you did a few months ago. But I guess it kind of is. I'm excited to tell it to you because I was shocked, shocked when I was talking to Ian about this and wanting to do this subject.

And of course, you've seen the title, it's about the Iditarod. And I said, you know, I think I'm going to do the Iditarod. It happens to be a national historic trail. And he goes, what's the Iditarod? Stop it. I almost fell off my chair. I'm not me kidding you. Excuse me. What? But I will say I was talking to Nitea about it and she also didn't know. I'm sorry if you guys feel offended by me like being so taken aback by the fact that these people that I know and love didn't know what the Iditarod was. If you don't know, you'll learn a lot about it today. But I grew up learning about it from Balto.

Yeah, that's like the little kid movie that you watch and the first time you learn about the Iditarod. But yeah, if you haven't learned about it, it. What an exciting time to do it right here on the podcast. Yeah. And when I heard that it was a, like I said, it was a historic trail. I was like, I'm all over it. So we're going to do that today. We're headed to Alaska. First, couple exciting things, though. Our moment is fast approaching just like a week or so out now. So if you haven't gotten tickets, definitely do that. It's going to be so fun. We are so prepared, ready to go. As this airs, we are going to be getting ready to go to Arkansas. So we're super excited and we have so much fun stuff planned. Make sure we have special merch that's going to be there exclusive to only the moment that we're doing.

And it's just going to be so much fun. We're really, really excited. And it's going to be on April 10th. If you can't make it that day, don't worry, it will be streaming for 72 hours after the fact. And it's all digital so you can watch it straight from your house. You don't have to go anywhere. You don't have to fly to Arkansas. We'll come to you April 10th.

Yes. And researching Arkansas, who would have known? There's so many things that we're discovering that we want to do while we're down there. Not to like sleep on Arkansas or anything, but I just didn't know. And now that we're like, all right, we'll just go. We'll do our moment. Maybe do one or two things and come home. It's like, should we extend our trip?

There's so many things going on. I'm going to drag Cassie underground. We're going to do an underground tour and maybe go to a cave. This is a second time she's done this by the. way. And it's not that I don't like caves. I think that they're really cool. I'm just a little bit claustrophobic and we did the jewel cave in South Dakota. And that was really cool. It was awesome. But the whole time I was like, all right, I can't see anything. There's rocks like enclosing me. I survived. So that was cool. I feel like that one was just more of like it wasn't big,

open cavernous rooms. It was more so tiny, squeeze yourself through these ladders. and hope you can breathe and there's a fat flying above you. Yeah. The Jewel Cave is actually really cool, though, if you do want to go. I recommend it if you like caves, but if you don't like caves, then the outside entrance of it is really cool, and you can just peer in. Okay, so anyways, get your tickets, Momenthouse.com slash NPAD, and you can find a link to that website either through our Instagram.

It's on our Facebook, Twitter, and our website. Okay, okay, before we go into your story, though, I really just want to mention, because a lot of people message us about the way I pronounced Yorkshire-Dales National Park last week. And I just want to say, I know it's Yorkshire, but I Googled it and Google told me that is Yorkshire. And Danielle and I had an entire conversation about it being like Yorkshire or Yorkshire. And I would say Yorkshire because like New Hampshire, you know. And then a bunch of people very, very nicely were laughing at us. So I just wanted to say, now we know for sure that it's Yorkshire. Sherdale's National Park. Well, I will say, like, you never give a second thought as to how you're

pronouncing something in casual conversation. But when all of a sudden it's being recorded, it's on a podcast, and then you really second guess every single thing that you ever say. You're like, I'm going to Google it real quick. I've been saying the word tree my whole life, but is it? Trey. You know, like, it's just, we really do try. And then Google lies to you and says it is Trey. And then you're like, did you see that Trey? over there and people are like, that's a tree. Yeah. Like, God, Google.

I know. Don't believe the internet. Yeah. But before we do go on also just keeping it back in the UK, because we're on like a theme, I guess we did the UK last week. We did it a few weeks before that. And now we're both binging a UK-based podcast that we just have to tell you all about. A couple people have mentioned it before, like, recommended it to us.

but now we're recommending it to everyone. If you're listening to us, obviously you enjoy two girls, just going back and forth talking about some unsettling things. Spooky, deadly, murders, graphic. Sometimes. For us. We're kind of babies about that, but these two are not. They do not shy away from keeping it real

and telling you all the dirty deeds of all of these crazy cases. And the podcast is called Red-Handed. I think we skipped over that. Red-handed. UK-based, they have beautiful English accents, British accents. So the cool thing about red-handed, other than, well, where do I start? But essentially, a lot of people, for us, biggest comment is, well, I binged all your episodes, and now I have to wait a week.

Well, switch over to red-handed. They have over 200 episodes. They focus really hard on researching everything, and they do these deep dives into cases you may have heard of before, but you're just didn't even know the side. Like for me, I listened to their part one, part two of the Casey Anthony case. And, you know, being from the U.S., I'm like, I know everything about this case. And I listened to those episodes and I was like, wow. Yeah.

I did not know a lot that I thought I knew. So I definitely recommend if you need a two-part episode to start off with, just go straight to that one. They have a lot of the two-parters, I noticed. One of the ones that I gravitated towards right away, just scrolling through all their episodes was the Columbine High School Massacre because just being obviously from the U.S., that's something that in our generation at least, you grew up knowing about. Reading books about, hearing about it. Like it's so big.

Yeah, that was one I went to very quickly too, just because I recognized it. But of course, they do UK episodes. They do stuff all over the place. And they dive deep into the nitty gritty stuff that we don't always touch on in these crazy, morbid, descriptive cases. So definitely go check them out. You can listen to all 200 and plus episodes of Red-H-H-H-H-H-H-H-A-N-E-D by searching for Red-H-H-H-H-H-A-N-D anywhere you listen to podcasts.

That's R-E-D-H-H-H-H-H-H-E-D-D-D-D, red-Handed, just one word, and you can listen to it anywhere that you listen to podcasts. Or you can find out more about the show by searching for Red-Handed The Pod on Twitter and Instagram or by heading to Red-Handed Podcast.com. Lots of love for them. love their stuff. Going into your story, let's hear where are we headed today. Okay, somewhere far,

far from the UK, we're headed to Alaska. I feel like we keep going back to Alaska over and over again, and I just love it there so much. So let's go back to Alaska. Like you said, you've been loving Alaska. We can't stay away from it. And I agree. Like I mentioned a couple minutes ago with the Iditarod and kind of like our first glimpse into the Iditarod, at least for us, was through the Disney movie. It came out in 1995, which just blows my mind. I was five years old. I was four. So with that movie, obviously, it was our first introduction to the Iditarod. And as we're recording this, the Iditarod, the annual race just ended. Because every March, ever since 1973, a thousand mile-long race is held in Alaska, and that is the Iditarod. And of course, we think we know maybe a little bit

about the race and the history of why the race is held every year because of that movie, but it's a children's Disney movie. So obviously, not everything is included and not everything is accurate. There are tons of people and animals that were not given proper acknowledgement in the movie that did huge things for the state of Alaska and the people of Alaska. So today we're going to talk about the Iditarod National Historic Trail. The Iditarod National Historic Trail wind through the state of Alaska stretching from Anchorage to Gnome. It is separated into five sections based on geographic locations, the Kenai Peninsula, Anchorage, Matsu Valley, southwest and northwest, and they all have correlating legs. This trail system is currently most famous for the Iditarod Trail sled dog race that uses two alternate routes, which are approximately,

a thousand miles each, which is about 1,600 kilometers. If you were to add those together, plus side and connecting trails, the total mileage for this trail comes in at 2,300 miles, which is about 3,700 kilometers. So it's very long. Wow, that is really long. And as it covers so much distance, it actually traverses through a ton of different types of landscapes, and some of them come with some pretty unique challenges. For example, there's a 500-mile stretch, which is about 804 kilometers, and it's full of boggy basins and swamps and different river and stream crossings. So take that and add in the summer months in Alaska, and you've got swarms and swarms of mosquitoes.

The mosquitoes in Alaska are really bad. I was there for a month during the summer in O. I mosquitoes don't even like me like I've never experienced mosquitoes liking me and in Alaska they ate me alive yeah I've heard they're just absolutely relentless and because of that due to the difficult terrain and the relentless insects this trail is primarily a winter one there are summer hiking opportunities on the I did a rod trail but they are limited and limited to certain sections of it that are easy to navigate and that don't have that huge issue with the insects, and they're usually around the mountains near Anchorage or on the coast near the Bering Sea. This route passes through different towns and villages, ghost towns, state parks, national forests, and national wildlife refuges, historical mines, historical parks, and museums. There are literally thousands of opportunities for outdoor experiences from recreation, exploration, wildlife viewing, and learning about Alaskan history. And depending on the

and where you are on the trail, you can easily run into moose, caribou, wolves, bison, porcupines, caribou, sheep, seals, musk ox, and so much more. The trail is popular in the winter, but as we are aware, Alaskan winters are no joke. Temperatures in the winter can drop as low as negative 60 degrees Fahrenheit, which is about negative 53 degrees Celsius on parts of this trail, but those who get out on it, either on snowmobile, skis, or on snow shoes, they'll be met with some of the most pristine wilderness on the entire planet while being blanketed in the northern lights. Today, the Iditarod is synonymous with sled dogs and the so-called last great race on earth. But that wasn't always the case. This trail was actually almost lost, reclaimed entirely

by the elements and forgotten. So let's take a step back, visit the trail throughout time, and meet the people and animals that made it what it is today. For centuries, the trail system was first utilized by Alaskan natives. Various groups of native Inupac and Athabaskan peoples used this route and series of trail systems to travel from village to village and to access various hunting grounds with dogs, who have always been a valued part of Alaskan history. They helped assist their subsistence lifestyles which consisted of hunting, fishing, and gathering food.

Native Alaskans utilize dog teams to help them carry their bounties, move from place to place, keep watch over villages, and they even assisted in tracking and hunting. Fast forward to the early 1900s and the gold rush hits. The discovery of gold on a tributary of the Iditarod River on Christmas Day of 1908 brought the last great American gold rush. The area of the discovery was actually so remote. It wasn't until the summer of 1910 that the rush of Stampeders came. But when they came, they certainly arrived. Thousands and thousands of people swarmed the gold fields of the Iditarod district.

And over the next eight years, over 65 tons of gold, equating to $2.5 billion today, were taken from the area and were mostly hauled out by different dog sled teams. In response to the demand for a clear and accessible route to take all of these things in and out, the Alaskan Road Commission stepped in to mark, clear, and formerly survey the trail that led from sewered to gnome. This period of time was the most prolific use of the trail, and gold was being hauled out, and food and supplies were brought in. Towns sprang up, some reaching over 2,000 citizens, and along the trail, roadhouses also popped up, constructed every about 20 or 30 miles or so, which was the average daily distance that a sled dog team could travel. These roadhouses and dog barns served as stops that allowed for travel in which mushers didn't have to carry weeks and weeks

worth of provisions and they could stay overnight somewhere warm and they wouldn't have to tent out on the tundra and camp. That makes sense. That would be a really hard journey for everyone. Be very harsh, yeah. There was nowhere to stop ever. So tons of these roadhouses were constructed along the trail. Okay. And this went on for decades, but the gold dried up. World War I also started to draw young men that were working in the gold fields away from them, and the advent of airplanes to carry different supplies and mail decreased the once high demand for sled dogs and the mushers. The world was moving forward, and preferred methods of transport, such as by train and by air, were replacing the once prevalent method of travel by dog. However, in January of 1925,

when modern-day modes of transport were thwarted by harsh weather, the fate of the residents of Nome were in the hands of musher's and their four-legged teams. Nome was experiencing a diphtheria outbreak. A serious bacterial infection that typically affects the mucus membranes of the nose and throat, it can lead to difficulty breathing, heart failure, paralysis, and death as the toxin produced by the bacteria can lead to a thick coating in the airways. In serious cases, the toxin progresses beyond the airways and into the bloodstream, which ultimately affects other organs leading to organ failure. The spread of the infection happens easily

and rapidly, and as with most diseases, the very young and the elderly are most at risk. At the time, no one in Nome was immunized for the disease, which left the entire population at a great risk. Given the high morbidity rate, this disease was actually one of the leading causes of death amongst children at this point in time, plus the way and the ease in which it was transmitted, this meant that gnome was in big trouble. And gnome's so far away from everything, too. It's very isolated. That was like the number one problem, essentially. No one could find help. Right. For such a serious thing, I mean, people's organs are shutting down. And it's affecting children. They're so at risk. And at the time, the town had a population of about 1,400, but there was actually a total of about 10,000 people.

if you're including the surrounding areas in the villages at the time of the outbreak. At this point in time, Noam was racially segregated and Alaskan natives were not allowed to live within the boundaries of town. So there's a lot more people than just 1,400. So is everyone outside of town, are they all native Alaskan people? Yes, primarily. There would be some smaller settlements of people non-Native Alaskans living outside in like frontier homes and things, not everyone's downtown, but primarily there are a lot of Alaskan native villages that the people just weren't allowed to live in town. Okay.

So there's all of these people, about 10,000 of them, but there's only one doctor. And his name was Dr. Curtis Welch. And he was becoming troubled at the end of 1924 because he noticed children getting sick. And some of them were starting to die. three children in just the fall in the winter, and then on Christmas Day, a fourth child passed away. And he had diagnosed all of them initially with tonsillitis, but his suspicions were rising that something more serious than tonsillitis was at hand. Well, yeah, if people are dying. Right.

Like, maybe this isn't tonsillus. Right. And I've had tonsillitis once, and it knocked me on my ass. It was so bad. But it's totally different than diphtheria. but initially the symptoms present the same. So I could understand kind of like why he maybe initially thought that. But as things were progressing, children were getting more ill and passing away. At first in my research, I read that him and his wife over like a couple of days,

they're like, something is going on here, but we don't want to cause panic yet if we don't know. But then he was called to one of those outside villages to examine an Alaskan native girl. she was about six years old, and it was then that he confirmed it was diphtheria. And that day was January 21st of 1925. Immediately after he examined her and those suspicions were confirmed that it's diphtheria, he called an emergency town meeting. Prominent officials of the town gathered in an office on Front Street and the doctor broke the news to everybody.

The town was facing a serious outbreak, and he called for an immediate quarantine. When asked about the treatment, the situation became more serious. because there was a cure, an antitoxin serum, which was a medication made of antibodies that is actually made from horse blood. And it was used in the treatment of the disease. But the supply at hand in town was only enough to treat a handful of the patients. And what was worse, the supply was over five years expired. So they had no idea if it was even going to work. Right. And he had ordered a new shipment, but it never got there on time. So this was the only medication he had on hand. So the quarantine goes to effect immediately, and by the next morning, every public institution was shut down. The library, school,

any public house of any kind was shut and boarded up. Residential homes shut and lock their doors, red flyers with the words quarantine notice were plastered throughout the entire town, and the mayor who also owned the town's only newspaper called the Noam Nugget, put the story on the front page of the newspaper, and the hospital was absolutely swarmed with people that were actually sick. And then others that now that they saw that there was a diphtheria outbreak, they're like, well, I kind of haven't been feeling well, so maybe I should go, you know, just like mass panic. Yeah. Totally flooded the hospital. So Dr. Welsh writes a plea to Washington, D.C., begging for assistance. It was his hope that a large shipment of the antitoxin could be redirected to Alaska. But this was

1925. There's obviously no Amazon Prime and things take time. And that was time that the children of Nome didn't have much of. On day five, Nome received word that there was a case of the antitoxin in Anchorage. It was a small amount, not nearly enough to supply the entire town, but it was enough to keep the disease at bay in time for a larger shipment to arrive from elsewhere. So it was kind of like a band-aid, but a necessary one. It's like, we need this, we can help some people and wait for more. Mm-hmm. Problem was, Anchorage is a thousand miles away from Nome. An idea was put forth to enlist the help of a male carrier plane based in Fairbanks to bring the serum from Anchorage to Nome.

But the idea was a very risky one. Planes at that time were some of the earliest of their kind. They were single-engine by-planes made from wood and stretched fabric with open cockpits. Plus, at this point, no one had ever flown the interior of Alaska. So bringing the serum by plane would save a lot of precious time, but that's only if it worked. I mean, if the plane goes down, they lose communication. They, you know, they're screwed. Yeah, they could lose the whole shipment.

The shipment could be destroyed in the crash. Like, that's a huge risk. Yeah. And you said the cockpit was open, and this is wintertime. It's negative whatever outside. I couldn't even imagine that the pilot could survive that. Exactly. Those same concerns were the concerns of the governor of Alaska, who also served as the point of contact for the federal public health service.

And he was the one that had the one that had the government. the final say of what they were going to do. So as this plane was being dragged out of storage and prepared for takeoff, he made a decision to go with the most reliable mode of transport that they had. So he decided to bet on the dogs. He faced a lot of criticism. A typical mail run by a sled dog team for that distance averaged about 30 days. A publisher from Fairbanks, who happened to be the same guy that was offering the use of the plane,

he lashed out in the media and he started stirring panic. He was writing headlines and articles that shamed the decision to use dogs instead of his plane. And he even wrote that, you know, while the children and adults of gnome are dying horrible deaths, he'll be waiting by his nice warm fire if and when anyone decides to use his help. So he's just, he's bitter. Angry. And angry. Yeah.

I get it because, I mean, if you think about it a plane, if it worked, it would happen so fast, they could get there so quickly. but at the same time it's like there's so much risk here if it doesn't get to them at all these people are going to die anyway exactly so the governor was aware of that but he had a plan and this plan would greatly reduce the average of that 30 day transport time this episode is brought to you by prime obsession is in session and this summer prime originals have everything you want steamy romances irresistible love stories and the book to screen favorites you've already read twice. Off campus, L, every year after, the love hypothesis, Sterling Point, and more. Slow burns, second chances, chemistry you can feel through the screen. Your next obsession is waiting. Watch only on Prime. This was the plan. Trains would transport the serum as far north as possible from Anchorage to a town named Nanana. I've been there. You've been there? Yeah, and I've seen the, it's a Nidirad stop. I actually stayed there.

when I visit Denali. So I've definitely been in that town. I've stayed in a cute little cabin in that area. That's lovely. Yeah, that's so cool. Once the train pulled into Nanana, one dog sled team would depart from Nome, and one other dog sled team would depart from Nannana,

and then they'd meet halfway in a town called Nulalto. Leonard Sepula, a resident of Nome and an immigrant from Norway, worked as a musher for a local gold company in Nome. He was quickly chosen for this route. the Gnome to New Lato route, and it's about 630 miles, which is about 1,014 kilometers. And that is round trip from Gnome to New Laltow and back. He had a track record for being an award-winning musher, despite using Siberian huskies instead of the preferred Malamute for his dog sled teams.

He had won the All-Alaska Sweepstakes, which was an annual dog sled race. He had won that three times, and he had made this particular route in record-breaking time before. He traveled it in less than four days. So he was kind of the easy choice and everyone pointed to him. There was kind of no other person that they could think of to do this. And he knew exactly the dog that he wanted to use as his lead. And his name was not Balto. I was just going to say balto. No, no, not Balto. Sepula chose Togo as his lead for his team. Togo was Sepa is clear choice. He was 12 years old at the time, so pretty old, like geriatric. 12 is old. 12 is old. But he was very experienced. He had impeccable leadership qualities,

and he was his top dog. But he wasn't always. He had quite the journey over his lifetime to get to that spot. Togo was actually really sick when he was a puppy, and it was a surprise to everyone that he pulled through. But he did, thanks to Constance, who was Sepulah's wife, who cared for him and nursed him back to health. As he grew, he became very mischievous, difficult, and was dubbed a canine delinquent. He constantly broke out and dug out of any kennel or any type of containment that Sepulah tried to put him in. He broke loose of tethers, and he even jumped through a closed glass window. He's a free spirit. That is a great way of describing him. And all of these breakouts were all attempts to join Sepola and his dog team while they were out doing practice runs or out on actual runs.

Like either training or doing actual runs. Aw. Because he was not part of the dog sled team at all initially because Sepula didn't think Togo had what it took to be on the team. He's like the water boy of the football team that like really wants to prove themselves. And prove himself he did. He actually was given away twice by Sepulah. So on two different occasions, he tried to get rid of him entirely by giving him to other people, but he made his way back each time.

And he proved himself to Sepulah as not only a dog to be put on the team, but one to lead it. By eight months old, he was leading teams, and he proved himself to be a natural-born leader. Over the years, he led Sepala and his team over thousands of miles worth of runs and saved their lives on more than one occasion when they found themselves in tricky situations. He rose from runt to Sepulah's most treasured dog. So a relay of dog teams was assembled to carry this valuable package of serum

as quickly as possible from Anchorage to Nome. The serum was placed in glass vials and wrapped in quilts and furs for both insulation and for protection because if they broke or if they froze, they were unusable. The task of keeping serum safe was daunting, given the conditions. Temperatures across the Alaskan interior were at 20-year lows,

reaching negative 64 degrees Fahrenheit, which is negative 53 Celsius, with wind gusts of 25 miles an hour or more, so 40 kilometers an hour or more, and snow drifts of up to 10 feet or 3 meters. Wow. It's harsh. It's rough. That is harsh. Yeah, harsh isn't good term. So the route from where the train stopped in Nanana up to Nome was 674 miles, 1,085 kilometers, and crossed the Alaskan interior, followed the Tanana and Yukon Rivers, the Norton Sound, and Seward Peninsula. On the evening of January 27th, the train pulled into Nanana, and the Sierra was handed off to the first musher and his dog team. Wild Bill Shannon and his team took off into the negative 50-degree night where the relay commenced.

The serum was on its way to Nome, but the story had made it across the entire country. More and more people were being diagnosed with the disease every single day in Nome, and the death toll was rising. The papers were spreading the story like wildfire, and this was the beginning of the tabloid era. So headlines splashed across papers from Alaska all the way to New York were full of embellishments and panic-inducing propaganda. Various proposals to use planes were brought forth in response to, this panic, but even the most experienced pilots rejected them because there was a storm system that had just moved into Alaska and it was just too dangerous to fly. But the pressure was on, nonetheless. Not only were lives at stake, but now the entire country was all eyes on the situation

that was unfolding in Nome. It was decided that instead of planes, they weren't considering planes and no one would fly them. So it was decided that instead of the two mushers that would just meet halfway, they would add more. That way, multiple musher's and their teams could continuously travel without having to rest overnight, making the delivery of the serum faster. Only problem was Cepela was already on the trail by the time that this decision was made and he was unaware that there were any added teams. So a musher was going to have to catch him out on the trail to tell him. And there's about a million different ways that they could have missed each other and especially with the weather out there, they were experiencing whiteouts.

There were times that mushers couldn't even see their own team in front of them. The conditions were so bad. So to just happen to catch a person randomly at the right time, it was just, it was very risky because there was a musher that was coming to meet him. But if Sepa didn't know that and he just kept going, he was going to miss it entirely. Yeah, I mean, if it's a total whiteout, you could be like 30 feet from each other just passing by and you might never even know. Exactly. At this point, Sepulah and his team had already traveled 91 miles, 146 kilometers, from Nome through nearly impossible conditions. Temperatures plummeted and gale force winds caused a chill of negative 85, negative 65 Celsius.

Oh, my. No, thank you. By sheer luck or fate, whatever you want to call it, Sepulah ended up passing by Henry Ivanov, who was one of the relay mushers, who happened to stop and was untangling. his team that got caught up when they crashed into a reindeer. Hold on. They crashed into a reindeer? Yeah. They got tangled up with a reindeer. Because of the whiteout, they just like ran straight into them. They just ran straight into them.

And all the dogs and their harnesses and gear got all tangled up. So he had stopped and he was getting his team straight. Yeah. And that's when Sepulah ran into him. And he was surprised because he had no idea to even expect another team out there, let alone a team that actually had the series. for him. So thank God that happened. They exchanged the serum and Sepulah just takes it and turns right back around and starts heading back. Togo led him through whiteouts. More Gale Force winds across the

cracking sea ice of the Norton Sound and up and down the 1,200 foot 370 meter little McKinley Mountain. On February 1st, Sepula handed off the serum to another team. Meanwhile, cases of diphtheria and gnome rose to 28. The serum was handed team to team. team until it reached Gunner Kaysen and his team lead led by Balto. Balto was actually one of Sepulah's dogs and Kaysen was Sepulah's assistant. No one quite really ever understood why Kaysen chose Balto that day. He was never chosen for any of Sepulah's racing teams before because he was deemed a strong dog, but one that lacked the intelligence and leadership skills of a frontrunner.

So he was never chosen to be a front runner ever. So people were kind of like, why him? Why now during this important? Very important, like the most important run. Very risky. So despite all of that, on February 2nd, 1926, at 5.30 a.m., Kaysen and his dogs reached Front Street. Not a single vial of serum was damaged and the antitoxin was used to successfully combat the outbreak of diphtheria in Nome until later shipments of antitoxins arrived.

There was actually a separate second relay of a larger shipment of serum that was originally planned to be divided between an airplane and a dog sled, and the dog sleds took off. Meanwhile, the planes for like two days couldn't get off the ground. Many of the same mushers and dog teams from the first run participated in this one, and on February 16th, the teams arrived with more serum. Six days later, Dr. Welsh lifted the quarantine orders. It had been about a month since the first diphtheria diagnosis, and according to official records kept by the doctor, five people passed away. However, Native Alaskan deaths were not accurately recorded and the death toll is likely much higher. In all, the teams covered 674 miles, 1,085 kilometers, and under 128 hours in extreme sub-zero temperatures through hurricane force winds and blizzard conditions.

Teams experienced white out conditions, some so bad, like I mentioned before, the mushers couldn't see their dogs in front of them. and some had to have water poured over their hands to have them removed from their sled because they were frozen on. Many of them had severe frostbite and at least four dogs lost their lives during the process. 20 drivers and more than 150 dogs participated in this relay, but it was Balto who gained international recognition as the hero that saved Nome in what was deemed the Great Race of Mercy, despite leading the team side by side with another, dog named Fox. And just a quick side note, it's very interesting. Why he was the only dog that

kind of got this spotlight at the end is because the reporter who initially went out and they're like, who's your dogs? Like, who are these that, you know, you pulled in and saved the day, who are your lead dogs? And he said, Fox and Balto. And the reporter thought that it would be confusing for people to read the name Fox because they would think it's like an actual fox. Oh, so he just like opted out of that information entirely. Exactly. So he just wrote Balto's name. Balto and Kaysen were thrust into the limelight. Within weeks, a Hollywood movie contract was signed, and they were to star in the film called Balto's Race to Nome, which is about a half an hour short film that was a recreation of the race, and they actually filmed it outside of Seattle, which is a fun fact. Balto toured the country for nearly a year,

doing all these events and meet and greets and all of this. It was like a press circuit. and he was actually present at the unveiling of his statue in Central Park. On average, each team, including Baltos, traveled 31 miles, but there was one that traveled over 260, and that was Sepulah, Togo, and their team. They traveled the longest stretch through the most arduous conditions of the entire relay, but for most of history, they have been overshadowed by the tale of Balto. Togo and Sepa did draw some crowds,

and they even went on a small tour of their own, was only like down the west coast to, you know, California and back up to Alaska. But it was nothing in compared to Balto. Togo was 12 at the time of his serum run, like we said. And that 263-mile run was one of his last. And he was sent to Maine to live out his golden years where he was bred and he sired pups that eventually became the foundation of the Sepula Siberian sled dog line. Elizabeth Ricker, who cared for Togo in Maine, Poland's spring, Maine, by the way. went on to publish a book called Togo's Fireside Reflections in 1988, and some of the copies even have his paw print on the front page.

Aw. Sepala visited Togo in Maine several times and was there the day that he crossed the rainbow bridge on December 5th, 1929. He said of his beloved dog, I never had a better dog than Togo. His stamina, loyalty, and intelligence could not be improved upon. Togo was the best dog that ever traveled the Alaska Trail. Togo's body was put on display in Shelburne, Vermont, but today can be found at the Iditarod Trail Headquarters Museum in Wasilla, while his skeleton resides at the Peabody Museum of Natural History at Yale University. He was also named the most heroic animal of all time by Time Magazine in 2011.

Balto, although regaled and given the lion's share of attention for his part in the Sierra Run, had a different and somewhat sadder ending. After his tour circuit with the sled team, Casson returned home to Alaska, and his entire dog sled team was sold. The dogs ended up outside of L.A. and were put on display at an oddity museum as an attraction until a man named George Kimball discovered them and was absolutely horrified by the conditions that they were living in and how poorly they were being treated. He worked in conjunction with the city of Cleveland to raise the funds to rescue all of them, and he was successful. So in March of 1927, Balto and his whole team were given a hero's welcome by the city. They were taken to what is now the Cleveland Zoo,

where they lived out the rest of their days. Balto died in 1933 at the age of 14, and his remains can be viewed at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History. Located north of Central Park Zoo, near the intersection of East Drive and 67th Street, is a bronze statue. It's a statue of Balto, the poster child of the serum run of 1925. The statue was created in Balto's likeness, and it does bear his name, But if you lean in close and read the plaque, it says, dedicated to the indomitable spirit of the sled dogs that relayed antitoxin 600 miles over rough ice across treacherous waters through Arctic blizzards from Nanana to the relief of stricken gnome in the winter of 1925, endurance, fidelity, intelligence.

Unveiled much later, sculpted in 2001, but without a commemorative plaque until 2020, is a bronze statue of Togo. It was unveiled in New York in kind of the same area, but it is smaller and way less known. So the next time that you watch Balto, read about the serum run, or happen upon that bronze statue, please just don't think of Balto and Kasin. Think of Togo, Prince, Fox, Fritz, and Blackie. Think of Joseph Sepula, Edgar Callant, Johnny Folger, Tommy Patsy, and Jack Nikolai. Make sure to remember that there were more members of the relay that deserve the same admiration

as Kaysen and Balto, who traveled the same journey and gave just as much for the people of Noem. Wow. That's so much information that I never knew. And I was thinking about it as you were telling it, what amazing people to go out onto this feat to get to Noam for a town that they don't know. And like they're so far away and they're going through negative temperatures, freezing, white out conditions to deliver this, not knowing probably anyone up there and risking their lives, their dog's lives. And then I didn't know anything about Togo, but one thing that I thought of while you were talking is Baltho's life was really tragic after that being sold. And if that had happened to Togo at 12 years old, it just, it feels like Togo should

have gotten more recognition, but it's kind of good that he didn't because he got to live his life out with like a family in Maine while Balto ended up on display and then at a zoo. Yeah. And I think maybe a contributing factor, I do agree that his fame probably launched him into that situation. But one thing that is to know is Togo was an intact male and went on to be bred. Balto was neutered at a young age. So he had no kind of like worth in that in that circuit. So I don't know if that would have been different, if things would have been different for him. I mean, it did say that when he was at the zoo, they took great care of him and the rest of the dogs. It was when they were at that Audity Museum that, like, they were, there's pictures of them there.

So they're, like, hooked up on, like, a musher's line or whatever the term is. It's like a weird little attraction. It's not like they're in kennels and you walk by them. They're, like, hooked up. Like they're about to go on a run. Right. They're in L.A. So they're used to Arctic. They're a northern breed dog. They're used to Arctic conditions. They're in L.A. And it did say they were pretty emaciated. Their fur was super matted. And they were just not taken care of at all.

That's horrid. That's, I just don't understand people who can do that. If you buy these dogs for your own money, like you're trying to make money off of them. I just don't understand how you could treat them like this. And it's so odd because Balto was held at such a high. level of fame and importance and then he gets sent over to this area where he's neglected. It's just very odd. Things did turn around for him like the whole city of Cleveland. There's footage of it. There's pictures of it. They're celebrated when they're brought to Cleveland. So it did kind of turn around for him, but it is a weird kind of sad little clip.

I'm so happy that people did that for him because that's awful. So I have a little bit more because you would think that after all of that, that the Iditarod National Historic Trail was established to honor this serum run. But you'd be very wrong. Okay. So within a decade of the serum run, the trail fell into disuse. Air transport replaced sled dog teams. And with the gold rush completely over, most of those roadhouses closed up. And the mining towns became ghost towns.

So there was not a need for this trail anymore. And nature started reclaiming it for almost 50 years. Around this time, Iron Dogs, which is a nickname for snow machines, were replacing dog sled teams throughout the entirety of Alaska, and mushing was becoming something of the past. In 1964, a committee was looking into different historical events that took place in Alaska throughout time to honor the state's upcoming 100th anniversary. And the chairman of this committee was named Dorothy Page, and she was the one to come up with the idea to hold a sled dog race over the historically significant trail.

Her first supporter was a man named Joe Reddington Sr. Joe was an experienced musher and hunter and guide. He had purchased a claim along the Iditarod Trail and started kennels, where he learned the history of dog mushing from local elders and people of the area. He was actually born originally in Kansas, so he wasn't from the area originally, but he became enthralled in the culture. And he and his wife, Violet, worked along the trail and cleared portions of it and began lobbying for its protection. Joe's interest was in preserving and revitalizing interest in sled dog culture. He was really sad because he saw the loss of mushing fade before his eyes. He once said, quote, when I visited interior villages in the 1950s,

50s, every household had at least five or six dogs. They were the only transportation, but by the late 1960s, village dogs were almost entirely gone. When Joe met Dorothy and heard of her plan to sponsor a dog sled race, he was all for it. This is exactly the ticket to get what he was hoping for kind of brought to the forefront. So together, they raised about $20,000 worth of prize money for what they were hoping would become the biggest dog race. in Alaska. Portions of the trail were cleared and restored, and in February of 1967, mushers competed along a 25-mile 40-kilometer stretch of the old Iditarod Trail in what was named the Iditarod Trail Sepulah Memorial Race. It was a success, and attention was brought to the

trail and to the race, but after a few years, the interest in the race was totally lost. But Joe didn't give up. Years later, in 1973, with the help of two fellow mushers, Joe, So conceived the idea for the first long-distance race. The first annual Iditarod race took place that year with the support of the Nome Kennel Club. The U.S. Army helped clear more of the trail, but early Iditarod mushers still had to break a lot of the trail on their own. Dick Wilmarth was the first winner, taking almost three weeks to reach Nome. Like I said earlier, as we record this, the 2022 annual race just concluded.

named after the abandoned town. These days, the Iditarod begins with a ceremonial start on 4th Avenue at D Street in Anchorage, and then actually has an official start in the town of Willow, which is about 75 miles to the north on the following day. So the first ceremonial kickoff is kind of just a traditional, like, start. Yeah. It doesn't count for the race. And on average, the race takes nine days with the fastest winning time coming in at eight days, three hours, 40 minutes, and 13 seconds. Alaskan natives, non-natives, men, and women have all won the race over the years.

After nearly 20 years of relentless lobbying by Joe and his circle, the Iditarod was named a National Historic Trail in 1978, is one of only 19 national historic trails in the country, is the only one of its kind in the state of Alaska, and is the only winter trail in the entire national historic trail system. dubbed the father of the Iditarod, Joe Reddington Sr. competed in the race he brought to life several times. He never won, but he placed, I think, like, fifth a few times. And he also aided participants in their own competitions, and he even led the first dog team expedition to the summit of Denali. He died at the age of 82 in 1999 after a battle with cancer and was buried in his favorite dog sled in Wasilla, Alaska. And his memorial can be seen at the Iditarod Trail Committee, headquarters. We owe a lot to the mother of the Iditarod, Dorothy Page. It was her idea to hold a spectacular dog race to wake Alaskans up to what mushers and their dogs had done for Alaska. Although she never participated in the race herself, her love for the culture and the dogs made the Iditarod what it is today. She was named an honorary musher during the 1997 race, and an award

named after her is given to the first musher to reach the midpoint of the race every year. For years, edited and published the Iditarod's annual race program and edited the race's news magazine, which was called the Iditarod Runner. She served in local politics for years before she passed away in 1989, and she was inducted into the Alaska Women's Hall of Fame in May of 2018. To conclude, if you are ever in Alaska on the Iditarod National Historic Trail, in a New York park strolling by a bronze statue, or gazing upon an exhibit in one of the many museums that honors the legacy of sled dogs, take a moment to remember all that they have done for people throughout time. Whether in the role of protector, leader, or worker, dogs have always served as our most loyal and trusted companions,

and we certainly are internally indebted to them. And that's it. That's the Iditarod National Historic Trail. I loved it. And I will say a couple things. Actually, I said that was it. but I have a couple of things to say. There's actually two things.

First thing, just because I just have a feeling that this may get brought up and brought to our attention. And I just wanted to make everyone aware that I am aware of it. There have been animal activists that have stepped forward with concerns regarding the treatment and the safety of dogs involved in dog sledding and in the Ididirod race in particular. and I wanted the primary focus of this episode to be on the history of the trail system and the historic significance of dog sledding in Alaska. So I didn't really want to get into that topic, but I did want to make mention that the concern does exist. I'm aware of it. And there are a lot of resources out there that do attest to the care and training of dogs involved in the race and in sled dog culture.

But there's also documentaries regarding, you know, the other side of the coin. when it comes to that. I just encourage anyone who wants to know more about that to look into it and investigate both sides before you make a judgment or anything like that. And I'll leave it at that. I just wanted to bring it up. I'm aware of it. And there are two sides to the coin when it comes to that. And I feel like with things like that, there's different types of people who act this way. You like there might be some really bad cases of things. But then on the other side of it, there's people who really love and care for their dogs as well. Exactly. And. And, There's actually, God, I forget his name now, I should have written it down, but there's a YouTube

series I kind of watched a lot. One of the winners of the Iditarod who had won several times, he has his own kennels in Alaska, and he has like a YouTube series that does a lot of questions and answers about, you know, just like his training, what he does, how he's won so many races, and a lot of questions about the dogs and things like that. And he goes over, like, a lot of the requirements that mushers have to meet when in regards to their dogs, like there's actually a veterinarian at every point, and they have to fill out an entire veterinary health card for each dog at every single point. So through the actual race, I think that the standards are pretty high.

But in regards to how they're kept at kennels throughout the country, I have no idea. So it's just there are documentaries out there and information about there on every aspect of it. So if you want to look into it, that's fine. And then a couple of other things. We talked about Balto and how it kind of like started the whole. That's how we got introduced to the serum run and things like that. I mean, there's a lot of inaccuracies in Balto.

Like, I can't even start to name them other than first thing. Remember, he was like half wolf? Like he was a hybrid. Yeah. It's like, what in the world? Yeah. So obviously that was not true. It's not true. Disney actually kind of like made up for that.

And they proved. produced a film called Togo in 2019, and it has William Defoe in it, and it's all about Togo. Balto is mentioned in it, like, for two seconds at the very end. So it's all about Togo, and it's great. I mean, it just came out a couple of years ago. I watched it on Disney Plus. I was just going to say, is it on Disney Plus? Okay. I just want everyone to know right now. If you are feeling sad, if you are feeling emotionally fragile, do not watch this. movie. I thought I was okay. I was not okay. I was hyperventilating crying. It's not even sad. I mean, you just learned the story of Togo. It's not like there's any tragic. It's a Disney movie.

Like it's kind of like a feel good. But anything that has to do with like a, just like a really nice story about a person and their dog and a love for their dog, I just, I can't deal with it. It touches you in a different way. Oh my God. I was a mess. Like the type of mess that, you know, when you're crying so hard one night and you wake up the next day and your head is just like you feel like you're hungover. And your eyes are still swollen. Yeah. Togo fucked me up. So just like, so everyone knows proceed with caution.

It is a good movie, though. And a lot of the details in that movie are historically accurate with like that's cool. Very few exceptions. Another thing, there is a book. Of course, there's always a book. It's called Trail Breakers Pioneering Alaska's Iditarod Volume 1. I'll put it on the website. And then lastly, if you love the serum run and you want to learn more, YouTube has a BBC program.

It's about an hour long. And it's called The Greatest Dog Story Ever Told. And I'll link that as well because I watched that as well. But yeah, that's the Iditarod National Historic Trail. If you've ever been on it or portions of it or if you're a dog musher or participate in dog sledding, please send pictures tell us about it share your story i loved researching this one especially because it had a dog aspect i mean we we don't deserve dogs and we know that and a lot of our listeners i'm sure feel the same way everyone's like holding their dogs really tightly right now and just like cry

oh my god i like i'm telling you i was like really emotionally upset for a while after this but it's just amazing what dogs can do especially togo he was 12 years old when he did this That blows my mind. I mean, now we see 12-year-olds, especially bigger dogs, and they all have arthritis. You know, like, it's just like you just know what a 12-year-old bigger dog looks like. And I'm sure he was in great shape, and that's why he was able to do it. But I just think of it as a normal 12-year-old dog. They're slowing down, you know?

They're starting to get joint issues. They're kind of just like the happy couch potato, slow walk kind of. I mean, not all of them. I mean, there's some high energy 12-year-olds, but that's just kind of, you just want to baby them so hard. And then you have Togo who's running hundreds of miles and carrying people. And the people that were involved too. I mean, one thing that you said earlier when you're like so many of these people that were involved had no connection to Nome. A lot of them also, now that I'm thinking about it, a majority of them were Alaskan natives that participated as mushrooms.

in the relay. And if you're reflecting back to in the city of Nome that's racially segregated, and they're not even allowed to live in town. And yet they're putting their lives on the line for the children of them. Yeah. It's just, it's a testament to their character. And I just, I thought that was really interesting too. And there's a lot of, um, Alaska natives that still do participate in the Iditarod. But I just, I think it's just such a cool story. And I've, it's just so far removed from anything that I've ever experienced, you know? And I've done dog sledding once in northern New Hampshire, or Vermont was it, when I was in high school?

Oh, really? And I had a really good experience with it. Yeah. I saw it when I was up in Banff, they had some dog sledding tours that you could go on. And I saw it and it looked really cool. I didn't end up doing it. But I did see that you could do stuff like that up there. And I also love, I'm like, yeah, that's it.

Actually, one more thing. Actually, 30 minutes later. I just really also think that the whole reasoning behind wanting the Iditarod National Historic Trail to become a nationally historic recognized trail, the whole reason for Joe Reddington was the culture. He wanted to keep it alive and he didn't want to see something that had such significance in the history of the people of Alaska and of the state. date to just kind of fall by the wayside. He wanted to keep people's interest alive in it and to keep it

going for further generations. And we don't see a lot of that, you know. And I know I said that, you know, this has nothing to do with the gnome serum run. But I wanted to cover it because it's a common misconception. And it's probably one of the, I mean, you think of the Iditarod. I think of Balto, you know. And I just wanted people to know about Togo and his story and all of that. So that's it. That's really it. I never knew about it. And even though you forewarned me against Togo, I'm definitely going to go watch it and maybe

cry too. I feel like if you go and prepared and you know the story, I think you might be a little more emotionally ready. Ready. Yeah. You've prepared us all then. Yeah. It's kind of like if you have any inkling that you're like going to cry maybe within the next

week or so, you know you feel it building. You're like, I'm due for a cry soon. Don't do it. Unless you really need to get it out, then here's your jam. Yeah, there you go. It's like putting on a sad song, you know. That's going to just mess you up. Yeah.

This is it. Okay, well, thank you everyone so much for hanging in with us, learning about the Iditarod and learning about Togo and all the, and Sepulah and all the amazing people and animals that contributed to the Iditarod, making it what it is today. Get your tickets to the Crescent Hotel on a totally different, wildly different topic. We are super stoked. Yeah, we're really excited. We'll see you all there. You go to momenthouse.com slash NPAD. We have exclusive merch. We're going to talk about some ghostly encounters, maybe.

I'm most excited to talk to you about the history. Oh, so I guess maybe we can tell them a little bit, now that we're really close about it, like how it's going to be set up. So Cassie and I are obviously doing the Crescent Hotel together, but we divided it up in a way that we're researching different portions of the Crescent Hotel. And I'm excited to tell you about the history of the building itself. Yeah. And we're going to talk about the paranormal aspects of it. And we're going to talk about the history of what happened there. And it's some really crazy, pretty messed up stuff, actually. So we're going to take a deep dive into the Crescent Hotel and we have some wild stuff to tell you about. And you can join us, Momenthouse.com slash NPAD. And we'll have the link.

in our show notes. You can go straight there from where you're listening. All right, everyone. Well, we'll see you next week. In the meantime, enjoy the view. But watch you're back. And hug your dog. Yeah. That's it. Bye. Thank you for joining us again this week. If you have a trail tale you'd like to share, send us an email at NPAD Stories at gmail.com. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook at National Park After Dark and on Twitter at NPAD podcast. Become an outsider by joining our Patreon where you'll gain access to monthly bonus stories and exclusive content. And remember, when you support our partners, you're supporting our show.

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