WEBVTT - Ep. 395: When Things Go South Up North 0:00:08.920 --> 0:00:12.760 This is me eat your podcast coming at you shirtless, 0:00:12.800 --> 0:00:18.319 severely bug bitten in my case, underwear listening uncast. You 0:00:18.360 --> 0:00:24.080 can't predict anything presented by first, like creating proven versatile 0:00:24.120 --> 0:00:28.040 hunting apparel from Marino bass layers to technical outerwear for 0:00:28.160 --> 0:00:35.320 every hunt. First like go farther, stay longer. All right, 0:00:35.360 --> 0:00:39.800 everybody's the return of the author. Buddy Levy. He's the author. 0:00:40.280 --> 0:00:43.840 He was he was previously way back episode one ninety seven. 0:00:44.080 --> 0:00:45.680 Was it that long ago? Yeah? I was just thinking 0:00:45.720 --> 0:00:48.080 the same thing sitting here a couple of minutes ago, 0:00:49.080 --> 0:00:52.160 the episode Eating Folks in the Arctic. That's a good 0:00:52.159 --> 0:00:56.280 title to tell about the books you came because you 0:00:56.280 --> 0:00:58.880 came in and we talked about Crockett, you bet yeah. 0:00:59.320 --> 0:01:01.920 And wrote a book called American Legend about the life 0:01:01.920 --> 0:01:07.120 of David Crockett. And uh then laborath of Ice was 0:01:07.200 --> 0:01:09.640 a book that I wrote about the Greeley expedition, which 0:01:09.760 --> 0:01:14.039 ended up with some cannibalism involved and you know, grim 0:01:14.040 --> 0:01:17.080 experience just like to It's like, I don't know how 0:01:17.120 --> 0:01:19.560 you can write this stuff. You know, it's funny. I 0:01:19.840 --> 0:01:22.119 got asked by one of my professors a while ago. 0:01:22.160 --> 0:01:24.679 He was like, do you ever write books in which 0:01:24.760 --> 0:01:28.720 no one dies, And I'm like, no, I haven't yet. 0:01:28.880 --> 0:01:32.440 It's just everybody's like their feet falling off, take their 0:01:32.440 --> 0:01:34.759 mittens off in their hands, stuck in their mitten. It's 0:01:34.800 --> 0:01:38.320 just like, oh, man, I could believe you went and 0:01:38.319 --> 0:01:42.520 now you your new books out Empire, Stone and Ice, 0:01:42.959 --> 0:01:44.960 and it's like a bunch more people freezing to death 0:01:45.000 --> 0:01:47.960 and dying, And yeah, I like it. I like to 0:01:47.960 --> 0:01:52.240 see people at up against it, you know, when they 0:01:52.280 --> 0:01:57.160 are um in the elements, having to use their wits 0:01:57.280 --> 0:02:01.240 to survive, you know. And a lot of times, you know, 0:02:01.320 --> 0:02:05.280 the expeditions start out with lofty goals and they're they're 0:02:05.960 --> 0:02:08.480 you know, they're trying for new lands or to reach 0:02:08.560 --> 0:02:10.640 the North Pole or but I always go into them 0:02:10.639 --> 0:02:15.080 knowing this, um the only reason I'm thinking as soon 0:02:15.080 --> 0:02:17.160 as I start the book, I'm like, the only reason 0:02:17.200 --> 0:02:18.840 someone wrote the book, because I can tell this must 0:02:18.880 --> 0:02:21.200 all go to ship. It's not gonna be a big 0:02:21.200 --> 0:02:24.520 book about how it went great well. Endurance though, I 0:02:24.560 --> 0:02:26.240 will say that people who always say, like, you know, 0:02:26.360 --> 0:02:30.440 is this like endurance? You know, um Shackleton's and Arctic Expedition, 0:02:30.440 --> 0:02:33.079 And I go, yeah, it's really like endurance, except in 0:02:33.200 --> 0:02:37.160 endurance everyone lives. In my books, most people die, um, 0:02:37.200 --> 0:02:39.800 which isn't not necessarily true, like maybe half, you know, 0:02:40.080 --> 0:02:43.160 and there's a little bit of a happy ending component. Yeah, 0:02:43.440 --> 0:02:45.680 but if you're willing to get there. It's like a 0:02:45.720 --> 0:02:49.920 half glass full half glass crew half half. He's a 0:02:50.000 --> 0:02:54.680 crew half full crew half. Also, I'm always like, I 0:02:54.680 --> 0:02:57.440 don't want to give spoilers, you know, even though, um, 0:02:57.480 --> 0:03:00.440 when you look at the cover, that's not gonna go 0:03:02.200 --> 0:03:08.639 disastrous and heroic voyage yeah, glass half half the disasters. 0:03:08.960 --> 0:03:10.520 It's an image of a ship that doesn't look like 0:03:10.520 --> 0:03:16.160 it's going anywhere anytime soon. The disasters and heroic right. Yeah, 0:03:16.320 --> 0:03:20.600 so you know it's UM. I really do like stories 0:03:20.680 --> 0:03:25.919 that have um, you know, protagonists and antagonists, and also 0:03:26.280 --> 0:03:30.799 where once things have gone really poorly, then there has 0:03:30.840 --> 0:03:34.440 to be some kind of industrious nous and people who 0:03:35.480 --> 0:03:39.480 figure out, whether it's navigation or whether it's like you know, 0:03:39.800 --> 0:03:43.360 woods craft and how to how to mcgeiver their way 0:03:43.600 --> 0:03:48.240 out of these really dire situations. I just love um. 0:03:48.520 --> 0:03:50.920 And also I guess I'm sort of drawn to the cold. 0:03:51.320 --> 0:03:54.040 You know. This is a second book I've written about 0:03:54.040 --> 0:03:56.200 the Arctic, and I have a third one under contract. 0:03:56.240 --> 0:04:00.360 That's about the going to the North Pole indirigibles. We'll 0:04:00.480 --> 0:04:05.200 get to that later. And well try semi rigid dirigibles 0:04:05.240 --> 0:04:09.360 a k A. Blimp. But yeah, so they tried. Yeah, 0:04:10.120 --> 0:04:13.040 they tried to fly blimps to the North Pole. Um, 0:04:13.480 --> 0:04:19.360 they'll each it didn't end. Well, let's that. Yeah, crashing 0:04:19.360 --> 0:04:21.719 a blimp a couple hundred miles from the North Pole 0:04:21.839 --> 0:04:24.120 is uh not you know, it's not on the usually 0:04:24.160 --> 0:04:28.000 on the flight plan. But yeah, I mean, I just 0:04:28.120 --> 0:04:31.880 there's something about, um, you know, the far North. For 0:04:31.960 --> 0:04:35.520 one thing. Um, I grew up with a dad who 0:04:35.600 --> 0:04:39.159 was a Nordic skier and ski racer, and he used 0:04:39.160 --> 0:04:41.440 to take us out in southern Idaho and you know, 0:04:41.560 --> 0:04:43.760 I would go duck hunting on Silver Creek and it 0:04:43.800 --> 0:04:46.920 would be like below sometimes when I was a little kid, 0:04:47.240 --> 0:04:50.200 you know, and so um, and I guess just being 0:04:50.400 --> 0:04:54.440 in cold places has always kind of um intrigued me. 0:04:55.160 --> 0:04:59.800 The idea of like especially historical um stories where you know, 0:05:00.440 --> 0:05:03.240 they did not necessarily have the kind of gear that 0:05:03.400 --> 0:05:07.080 we have now. In some cases, though, the the Inuit 0:05:07.200 --> 0:05:10.760 Arctic clothing is probably better than what we have um. 0:05:10.800 --> 0:05:15.160 But yeah, I just I'm really drawn to um expeditions 0:05:15.600 --> 0:05:19.360 gone awry and then how are they going to get 0:05:19.400 --> 0:05:21.360 out of this? Yeah. One of the things that uh, 0:05:21.839 --> 0:05:23.400 I want to get into with you when we get 0:05:23.400 --> 0:05:26.320 going on it is Um, I've always been a big 0:05:26.360 --> 0:05:31.320 fan of Stephenson, okay, and I always knew that he 0:05:31.400 --> 0:05:33.520 had like a little bit of a fall from grace, 0:05:34.960 --> 0:05:37.479 But I didn't fully understand the fall from grace. And 0:05:37.520 --> 0:05:39.279 I don't know, like you paint him out to be 0:05:39.279 --> 0:05:43.200 a real um. He's the villain of the book, but 0:05:43.240 --> 0:05:45.559 it doesn't like what he does is villain as doesn't 0:05:45.640 --> 0:05:50.279 undo why I why I'm interested in them really. So, 0:05:50.480 --> 0:05:56.200 I'm interested because like his his observations and the things 0:05:56.240 --> 0:06:00.800 that he recorded about the Esca Mo Hunters that he 0:06:00.880 --> 0:06:05.240 spent time with. I mean, he had observations and and 0:06:05.240 --> 0:06:11.039 and um things about life ways and cultural practices that 0:06:11.560 --> 0:06:13.520 I haven't counted anywhere else. I mean, he might have 0:06:13.560 --> 0:06:17.200 been a total like what's in it for me? I'm 0:06:17.240 --> 0:06:20.320 out of here? Uh Yeah, and I'll let you guys 0:06:20.400 --> 0:06:23.680 kind of die. Um. He might be that kind of guy, 0:06:23.680 --> 0:06:26.960 but it doesn't undo some of the insane stuff he did. Yeah, 0:06:27.000 --> 0:06:28.960 that's true, and I mean, I'm glad you brought it 0:06:29.040 --> 0:06:33.120 up because, um, Villa mur Stephenson's just funny. He had 0:06:33.320 --> 0:06:35.920 he was born William and then he changed his name 0:06:35.960 --> 0:06:41.440 back to the Icelandic sounding. Yeah, another score against the guy. Yeah, 0:06:42.360 --> 0:06:44.760 I was Bill Jalmer. So how would you have said 0:06:44.800 --> 0:06:48.280 it villelm Willelmer. He was born William. He was born 0:06:48.360 --> 0:06:52.400 William named Willie. That would annoy the out of Like 0:06:52.600 --> 0:06:54.960 he didn't want to sound American. He wanted to sound 0:06:54.960 --> 0:07:00.000 more authentic for being an ex you know and explore 0:07:00.080 --> 0:07:04.240 or would be uh, you know, Arctic legend having a 0:07:04.400 --> 0:07:08.320 name like Amondson or Nonsen or freach Off you know, um, 0:07:08.360 --> 0:07:10.960 which is but yeah, he it was funny because he 0:07:11.000 --> 0:07:13.960 was born William. He changed his name back to the 0:07:14.720 --> 0:07:19.800 Icelandic spelling um and uh. But his he was his 0:07:20.120 --> 0:07:22.560 people called him staff. You know, it was easier than 0:07:22.560 --> 0:07:26.720 pronouncing Villemer. You know. But the guy I used to 0:07:26.760 --> 0:07:29.480 hang out with, the guy Matt peel logs for log 0:07:29.560 --> 0:07:32.520 Homes and another log Peeler. He's like I would always 0:07:32.520 --> 0:07:34.640 tell you about his name is bear Paw. I'm like, 0:07:34.680 --> 0:07:39.920 I don't think that it probably is no but yeah, 0:07:39.960 --> 0:07:43.600 you're right. I mean the guy is what he's really complex. Um. 0:07:43.960 --> 0:07:48.680 And you know because the this book Empire at weiss 0:07:48.720 --> 0:07:53.720 Stone deals mostly with the period that just has to 0:07:53.800 --> 0:07:59.160 do with the Canadian Arctic Expedition. Um. You know, his 0:07:59.360 --> 0:08:03.760 action in and around this particular expedition are the ones 0:08:03.840 --> 0:08:08.120 that I primarily deal with treat But you are a 0:08:08.720 --> 0:08:11.480 strange behavior man. Yeah, I mean he would. You were 0:08:11.480 --> 0:08:14.920 absolutely right that if you've taken in totality the bulk 0:08:14.960 --> 0:08:19.040 of this guy's work, you know, Um, he was very 0:08:19.080 --> 0:08:24.400 influential in in understanding how one how it was possible 0:08:24.520 --> 0:08:29.840 in really small teams to live in the Inuit or 0:08:29.840 --> 0:08:33.440 a new Piet way. Um. The problem I think he 0:08:33.559 --> 0:08:36.400 ends up having is that he's trying to do an 0:08:36.400 --> 0:08:40.719 expedition that is of a much bigger scale, uh, involving 0:08:40.760 --> 0:08:46.320 you know, multiple ships, fifteen scientists, and so it sort 0:08:46.360 --> 0:08:50.600 of went against his core principle, which is like if 0:08:50.600 --> 0:08:53.480 you if you were in a small team on skis 0:08:53.640 --> 0:08:58.120 or snow shoes, and you know, with sledges, self contained, 0:08:58.800 --> 0:09:03.880 you're going eating just what you encounter and living essentially 0:09:03.920 --> 0:09:06.600 off the land, You're going to be able to do 0:09:06.679 --> 0:09:10.640 better than if you're trying to take you know, whole 0:09:10.679 --> 0:09:12.840 bunches of people who may or may not have a 0:09:12.880 --> 0:09:16.679 lot of experience, uh, in ships, you know, in very 0:09:16.760 --> 0:09:21.880 uncertain waters. And then that's when things go wrong, you know. 0:09:22.480 --> 0:09:26.360 Um and so, yeah, I think, um, he's a really 0:09:26.360 --> 0:09:29.719 complicated figure, and I struggled a lot with you know, 0:09:30.040 --> 0:09:34.440 how much to villainize him. I have to say, Um, 0:09:34.480 --> 0:09:37.520 so in the in the scope of just what happens 0:09:37.520 --> 0:09:40.960 in this book. You know, some of his actions I 0:09:41.000 --> 0:09:45.959 think were, um, you know, you can't really square it 0:09:46.040 --> 0:09:48.480 with like the what he should have done. It was 0:09:48.520 --> 0:09:51.480 self seeking. We'll cover. Yeah. I got a quiz question 0:09:51.520 --> 0:09:58.079 for you. Okay, what was Stephenson's favorite wild game? Um, 0:09:58.120 --> 0:10:04.040 I'm gonna go with ru or bearded seal. Wolf. Wolf 0:10:04.280 --> 0:10:09.360 really like more than anything else. Wolf my favorite. One 0:10:09.360 --> 0:10:13.280 of my favorite Stephens and meals. He talks about in 0:10:13.280 --> 0:10:15.560 My Life with the Eskimo as they find a whale, 0:10:16.080 --> 0:10:19.080 beat a beached whale and its tongue is dried out 0:10:19.559 --> 0:10:22.760 but it still looks good. They cut its tongue out. 0:10:22.800 --> 0:10:24.440 He talks about how they had to boil it and 0:10:24.559 --> 0:10:26.800 change the water multiple times to get all the salt 0:10:26.840 --> 0:10:30.200 out of it, and they later learned from the Eskimo that, um, 0:10:30.240 --> 0:10:33.960 that whale has been laying there five years, so it's 0:10:34.040 --> 0:10:37.640 fermented and tempered. Oh man, we should get we gotta 0:10:37.640 --> 0:10:39.120 cover a couple of things real quickly. We should get 0:10:39.120 --> 0:10:42.240 a terminology right. Let me tell you a story. I 0:10:42.320 --> 0:10:49.240 was on now Nevak Island, Okay with the chupa Eskimo, 0:10:49.360 --> 0:10:51.880 and I said to a chupick Eskimo, I said, hey, uh, 0:10:53.440 --> 0:10:59.680 I noticed you guys say chupick eskimo. Uh what like 0:10:59.720 --> 0:11:02.320 what you like a white guy like me to call you? 0:11:03.200 --> 0:11:06.160 And he goes, well, if I'm if I'm not an eskimo, 0:11:06.240 --> 0:11:09.679 what am I? I just I said, I'm just checking, man, 0:11:09.720 --> 0:11:11.520 because there's a lot of confusion about the whole in 0:11:11.600 --> 0:11:14.400 New Eskimo thing. And he's like, I've never heard anybody 0:11:14.400 --> 0:11:19.760 call me a chupick into it. He hadn't know what 0:11:19.840 --> 0:11:23.440 did he call himself chupick eskimo, big eskimo. So there's 0:11:23.480 --> 0:11:25.079 a there's this kind of thing. I think that like, 0:11:25.320 --> 0:11:27.480 there's a lot of confusion around the terms. And now 0:11:27.559 --> 0:11:31.680 it's anytime. It's just one of those situations where um, 0:11:31.920 --> 0:11:34.480 maybe I'm like, okay, maybe he can. He'll say it, 0:11:34.600 --> 0:11:36.280 but it's not cool for me to say it. He's like, 0:11:36.280 --> 0:11:37.520 if you're not gonna call me that, I don't know 0:11:37.520 --> 0:11:40.040 what you're gonna call me. It's like that. We had 0:11:40.040 --> 0:11:44.199 the Native American guests and we asked him, is it 0:11:44.280 --> 0:11:47.160 Indian cool? And he's like, yeah, but for some it's not, 0:11:47.559 --> 0:11:50.599 you know, so maybe it's Yeah. I noticed that in 0:11:51.080 --> 0:11:54.120 the in the beginning of your book, You're like, I'm 0:11:54.200 --> 0:11:58.319 using Eskimo because all the journals that was like that 0:11:58.400 --> 0:12:03.120 was at the time, like when we're talking, and that's 0:12:03.120 --> 0:12:05.160 what that's. So that's the term I'm gonna stick with 0:12:05.320 --> 0:12:10.120 in my book though, Right, these are like people of 0:12:10.240 --> 0:12:13.560 different tribes and many of them now go by into it. Right. Yeah, 0:12:13.960 --> 0:12:16.160 that's a really good point. And you know, so I 0:12:16.720 --> 0:12:19.719 actually have that disclaimer in the in the open on 0:12:19.720 --> 0:12:24.280 one of the first pages because um, but so the um, 0:12:25.480 --> 0:12:28.120 you know, the term for most of the people that 0:12:28.160 --> 0:12:35.480 were on this expedition would be um Inuit or you know, Inupiat, 0:12:35.800 --> 0:12:38.760 and so it depends a bit on where they're from, 0:12:38.840 --> 0:12:43.240 you know, and and so I think it's important to distinguish. 0:12:43.679 --> 0:12:47.120 But it got a little bit clunky. UM too. That's 0:12:47.120 --> 0:12:49.959 why I wanted to just use the word eskimo, because 0:12:49.960 --> 0:12:54.280 they were using using it. Yeah, though, you know, it's 0:12:54.280 --> 0:12:57.240 it is important to be sensitive to what people actually 0:12:57.360 --> 0:13:00.520 like to be called. That's why I'm outline for you 0:13:00.600 --> 0:13:03.640 that I just asked a person rather than guess right 0:13:04.200 --> 0:13:07.320 it was it was an unexpected reply on his part. Yeah, yeah, 0:13:07.440 --> 0:13:11.960 I think. Um, and so you know, for the most part, 0:13:12.160 --> 0:13:15.360 the people that we're dealing with that went on the 0:13:15.400 --> 0:13:20.000 expedition who came with the family, who came with Stephenson 0:13:20.240 --> 0:13:23.800 and he picked up near Barrow, they were yeah, yeah, 0:13:23.960 --> 0:13:28.120 and so um they and there were there were four 0:13:28.600 --> 0:13:31.240 mainly and then this other were five who originally went 0:13:31.280 --> 0:13:37.599 on the expedition, right, what they there's a point we 0:13:37.679 --> 0:13:40.560 gotta okay, this is the last thing we're gonna do. Okay, 0:13:40.600 --> 0:13:42.839 and then we're gonna start from the beginning. This last 0:13:42.880 --> 0:13:46.720 thing we're gonna do. Though. Uh, once you crossed the 0:13:46.720 --> 0:13:49.240 Baring Strait, okay, so in places its what fifty seven 0:13:49.240 --> 0:13:52.280 miles and all of a sudden you're in Siberia. Um 0:13:52.640 --> 0:13:56.520 was that a completely different sort of like tribal like 0:13:56.520 --> 0:13:59.560 like once you cross the straight would you would you 0:13:59.600 --> 0:14:01.520 find are people who were a new piat or is 0:14:01.520 --> 0:14:05.720 it a different who totally different tribal history and different groups. Yeah, 0:14:05.720 --> 0:14:07.760 that's a really interesting question and a good one. So yeah, 0:14:07.800 --> 0:14:09.320 you know, if you're going up, they are looking at 0:14:09.320 --> 0:14:12.400 the map to the left, you know, Russian Siberia, um 0:14:12.559 --> 0:14:16.600 like church Key people and chochooch Key and then you 0:14:16.640 --> 0:14:20.960 know to the right Alaska and in Um Canada you 0:14:21.240 --> 0:14:25.520 know um Inuit a new piat um and so like, 0:14:25.600 --> 0:14:28.160 and that was it's really interesting because there were some 0:14:28.240 --> 0:14:31.640 of the um Native members of the expedition were like 0:14:32.200 --> 0:14:35.360 freaking out when they realized they were gonna be landing 0:14:35.600 --> 0:14:40.000 on the Siberian shores. They're like, you know, my people 0:14:40.000 --> 0:14:42.800 have told me you land there, like you don't come back, 0:14:42.840 --> 0:14:45.680 they will kill us. And you know, they just had 0:14:45.720 --> 0:14:49.000 some of it was just lower that they had heard um. 0:14:49.040 --> 0:14:51.440 But in the in they end up being treated very 0:14:51.480 --> 0:14:55.960 well by the indigenous people of of the Siberian side. UM. 0:14:56.000 --> 0:14:59.960 But yeah, it's it's uh, it's an interesting question, you know. 0:15:00.160 --> 0:15:05.040 H And Barry Lopez's Arctic Dreams. He's out hunting. He's 0:15:05.080 --> 0:15:08.440 out hunting with Askima hunters and they're off Alaska and 0:15:08.440 --> 0:15:10.680 they're hunting wal wrists, and he says for a while, 0:15:10.720 --> 0:15:16.440 he goes, they were technically in Russia. Yeah, a little 0:15:16.440 --> 0:15:19.560 bit of fluidity about, you know, to the to them, 0:15:19.600 --> 0:15:21.720 I doubt they were talking about that being one continent 0:15:21.760 --> 0:15:23.800 and its being another continent, right, I mean you can 0:15:23.840 --> 0:15:27.040 be on a floating berg and all of the sudden, 0:15:27.040 --> 0:15:29.600 which which the people in this book end up on, 0:15:29.720 --> 0:15:33.080 you know, and like a mile square chunk of ice floating, 0:15:33.440 --> 0:15:36.440 and you know at some point you like are crossing 0:15:36.480 --> 0:15:40.000 into other character you know of Russia now, and all 0:15:40.000 --> 0:15:41.920 of a sudden it's like, oh, these people are different, 0:15:42.160 --> 0:15:46.840 while we're on a new continent. Yeah, trying to not die, alright. 0:15:46.840 --> 0:15:48.600 Some backup was because I got I got to talk 0:15:48.640 --> 0:15:52.840 about a funny story. Um, the guy wrote in as 0:15:52.880 --> 0:15:56.600 they do, so this, this guy writes into the letter, 0:15:56.800 --> 0:15:59.520 UM says nothing to do with the Arctic exploration. He's 0:15:59.560 --> 0:16:02.440 got a broad their name Murray. It's a good name 0:16:02.480 --> 0:16:05.400 for a story. It's a good way to start a story. 0:16:05.560 --> 0:16:08.840 His brother Murray. He's just like, yeah, I don't know, man. 0:16:11.960 --> 0:16:14.120 His brother Murray is driving through the night on the 0:16:14.280 --> 0:16:17.320 Archery deer hunt when his truck ran out of gas. 0:16:17.360 --> 0:16:21.680 His truck and his gas can were old okay. The 0:16:21.720 --> 0:16:23.760 truck's phil spout had the flap on it, and his 0:16:23.840 --> 0:16:26.120 gas can spot was made for regular gas, so the 0:16:26.160 --> 0:16:29.040 spout diameter prevented him from filling the tank directly from 0:16:29.040 --> 0:16:32.520 the can. You can picture this, right, I keep I'm 0:16:32.520 --> 0:16:34.440 gonna point out with the listeners in my truck, I 0:16:34.520 --> 0:16:38.280 keep a little funnel that's well adapted to my A 0:16:38.280 --> 0:16:40.960 little male. Yeah, like a little funnel well adapted to 0:16:41.000 --> 0:16:44.960 my truck's intake. He took an arrow out of his 0:16:45.080 --> 0:16:50.000 quiver to prop open the flap and was gonna spill 0:16:50.200 --> 0:16:54.240 gas from the can into the opening. Totally makes sense. 0:16:55.360 --> 0:16:57.760 With the arrow holding the flap open, he reached for 0:16:57.760 --> 0:16:59.640 the can from the bed of his truck and promptly 0:16:59.640 --> 0:17:04.639 pushed the arrow's knock into his eye. He pulled the 0:17:04.760 --> 0:17:09.639 arrow out, filled the tank, felt okay, proceeded on his trip. 0:17:11.160 --> 0:17:13.720 The next morning, his eye was swollen shot, so he 0:17:13.760 --> 0:17:16.159 had it for the hospital. He was examined by the 0:17:16.200 --> 0:17:19.440 doctor who took X rays and determined that no permanent 0:17:19.520 --> 0:17:23.879 damage was done. Over the next year, Murray had recurring 0:17:24.040 --> 0:17:28.600 sinus infections, which you never had before. He'd take the 0:17:28.640 --> 0:17:32.360 prescribed antibiotics, get better, only to have the infections returned. 0:17:33.520 --> 0:17:35.240 Now here's what this story takes. You can probably see 0:17:35.240 --> 0:17:37.440 where this is going. But I need to I always 0:17:37.520 --> 0:17:41.240 want to call our resident doctor Adam Alan. Yeah, we 0:17:41.240 --> 0:17:43.120 haven't talked to him. We haven't had reason to talk 0:17:43.119 --> 0:17:48.080 to him. Like one day, I'll came go on with 0:17:48.160 --> 0:17:52.680 Murray here. One day, a while at work, Murray had 0:17:52.760 --> 0:17:57.480 something caught in his throat, began to cough. He coughed 0:17:57.560 --> 0:18:01.240 up a pocket of mucus that had something hard encased. 0:18:01.760 --> 0:18:05.119 When he wiped the object clean, he found the knock 0:18:05.200 --> 0:18:12.359 of the arrow, which had come loose, got into his 0:18:12.440 --> 0:18:17.359 eye socket, worked its way through his sinus cavity, and 0:18:17.400 --> 0:18:19.760 then out the back of his throat. In a year's time, 0:18:21.080 --> 0:18:24.359 I got a lot of questions. Didn't show up on 0:18:24.359 --> 0:18:27.080 the X ray. Like I, I wear contacts, So I 0:18:27.200 --> 0:18:31.680 just don't know how. But you hear about those dudes 0:18:31.680 --> 0:18:35.040 and get shot by nailguns, don't know it? Sure? Yeah, 0:18:35.400 --> 0:18:37.520 it's and that doctor that broke that file off up 0:18:37.520 --> 0:18:39.840 in my mouth. My My other question is how did 0:18:39.920 --> 0:18:42.240 he not notice the knock was missing from the arrow? 0:18:43.359 --> 0:18:45.360 I can totally see how you would not toss hitting 0:18:45.400 --> 0:18:46.920 the bed of the truck, or you think that it 0:18:47.040 --> 0:18:50.840 like you'd think that it whatever in all the fos 0:18:53.119 --> 0:18:55.960 m hmm. I wonder if he kept it first to 0:18:55.960 --> 0:19:00.000 write a book about that. It's a mystery. Yeah, good 0:19:00.040 --> 0:19:04.479 but for you man, But yeah, no plastic showed up 0:19:04.520 --> 0:19:07.360 on the X ray. I don't know, man, I give 0:19:07.359 --> 0:19:10.800 it a fifty fifty. Phil's not buying I'm not buying it. 0:19:10.880 --> 0:19:16.240 You're not this guy, Phil saying, this guy's bald faced liar. 0:19:16.640 --> 0:19:19.040 I think this guy might come down to beat Phil's ass. 0:19:19.080 --> 0:19:21.560 He's risking that for sure. We gotta talk to Allen. 0:19:21.760 --> 0:19:24.640 You call me a liar. Bill, FIL's gonna know when 0:19:24.640 --> 0:19:26.880 he hears that from across the park. When he hears 0:19:26.920 --> 0:19:28.560 that from across the parking is gonna know that his 0:19:28.680 --> 0:19:32.040 theater days or through right, and it's a better outcome 0:19:32.040 --> 0:19:34.760 than and if the other end went in with the 0:19:34.760 --> 0:19:39.200 broad hand. You know that. You cough that up. Here's 0:19:39.240 --> 0:19:40.920 here's a correction that came in that this guy is 0:19:40.920 --> 0:19:45.760 no listen. I'm gonna read the correction. During episode three 0:19:46.400 --> 0:19:50.639 with Cole Wetzel, Steve makes an error when discussing the 0:19:50.680 --> 0:19:57.560 capitalization of wildlife species common names. Quoting here, Steve was 0:19:57.600 --> 0:20:00.520 correct when he states that black bear would not be 0:20:00.600 --> 0:20:05.240 capitalized when using a sentence okay, and also that proper 0:20:05.280 --> 0:20:08.520 nouns such as English would be capitalized when used like 0:20:08.560 --> 0:20:11.960 an English sparrow. I was talking about how I need 0:20:12.000 --> 0:20:14.280 to do a seminar for my colleagues because I will 0:20:14.320 --> 0:20:18.320 oftentimes have to go through something incorrect where someone capitalizes 0:20:18.400 --> 0:20:23.880 black bear. Okay. However, he is incorrect that sparrow would 0:20:23.920 --> 0:20:27.879 not be capitalized when using when utilizing a species official 0:20:28.000 --> 0:20:34.680 names such as English sparrow. Still quoting the American Ornithological 0:20:34.720 --> 0:20:37.600 Society states on their website, English names of birds are 0:20:37.640 --> 0:20:43.359 capitalized in keeping with standard or ornithological practice as such unquote. 0:20:43.560 --> 0:20:46.800 As such, the official common names of all birds species 0:20:47.160 --> 0:20:51.600 such as whooping crane or red cocketed woodpecker would be 0:20:51.680 --> 0:20:57.159 capitalized when written. If using more generic descriptors such as 0:20:57.160 --> 0:21:00.600 woodpeckers or eagles. When describing groups of words, the lower 0:21:00.640 --> 0:21:04.440 case version should be employed. He goes on to say, 0:21:04.600 --> 0:21:07.199 I know Steve prides himself I'm being correct, as evidence 0:21:07.240 --> 0:21:09.760 by every time he argues about a miss trivia question. 0:21:09.840 --> 0:21:11.600 So I just wanted to provide a helping hand. I 0:21:11.640 --> 0:21:21.760 have one word for this person. Oh yeah. First off, yeah, 0:21:22.080 --> 0:21:26.840 first off, the American Ornithological Society doesn't get to decide 0:21:27.520 --> 0:21:31.760 what's proper English. He could have like, listen, it makes 0:21:31.760 --> 0:21:33.199 no sense to me that he he agrees with you 0:21:33.240 --> 0:21:36.080 that black bear would not be capitalized either word, but 0:21:36.200 --> 0:21:41.040 English sparrow both would be capitalized. Red cockaded woodpecker would 0:21:41.040 --> 0:21:44.919 be capitalized, which is just like black bear. Yeah, how 0:21:44.960 --> 0:21:48.080 about like like, don't get your don't get your grammar 0:21:48.119 --> 0:21:50.399 from wherever you got it. Also, there's a phenomena And 0:21:50.440 --> 0:21:53.959 I love this guy. Thanks for listening. I'm not hacking 0:21:53.960 --> 0:21:55.720 on him. I love It's great that he wrote in 0:21:55.880 --> 0:21:57.840 not hacking on him. I'd rather he wrote in that didn't. 0:21:57.920 --> 0:22:01.840 But you're just wrong, buddy. The out point out is, um, So, 0:22:02.000 --> 0:22:04.280 I know some people that when they're telling me stuff, 0:22:04.320 --> 0:22:07.639 I'm always like, how could they have gotten that information? 0:22:08.480 --> 0:22:12.200 And I think that some people proceed all their Internet 0:22:12.240 --> 0:22:15.919 searches with the truth about We've known a couple of 0:22:15.920 --> 0:22:19.879 people like that, Like like, if you're in the search 0:22:20.680 --> 0:22:22.240 like a picture that you're like, I'm gonna do a 0:22:22.280 --> 0:22:25.359 little research on Hillary Clinton. Okay, are you type in 0:22:25.440 --> 0:22:28.720 Hillary Clinton and you could read that stuff. Are you 0:22:28.880 --> 0:22:31.919 type in the truth about Hillary Clinton and read that stuff? 0:22:32.400 --> 0:22:34.800 It's like because you're sort of like, there's there's two, 0:22:34.840 --> 0:22:37.919 you know, versions out there. So I think maybe he 0:22:37.960 --> 0:22:46.399 wrote in the truth about capitalizing bird. Um, here's another 0:22:46.440 --> 0:22:48.480 half correction there. They were back with you, buddy, So 0:22:48.560 --> 0:22:51.600 hang tight there. But as a writer, you're probably interested 0:22:51.640 --> 0:22:56.520 in that very much though that kind of fluid. Uh yeah, 0:22:56.560 --> 0:23:00.040 I mean, I think language changes over time, and you 0:23:00.040 --> 0:23:05.600 know it, rules are not static, but you know, there 0:23:05.600 --> 0:23:07.480 are certain things where you would want to use a 0:23:07.560 --> 0:23:11.360 Latin word for something and you know, um, but yeah, 0:23:11.400 --> 0:23:13.360 you can get in the weeds on this stuff. Yeah. 0:23:13.400 --> 0:23:15.159 You ever read Lewis and Clark journals? How that was 0:23:15.280 --> 0:23:20.399 randomly capitalized for whatever reason something different, Like in the 0:23:20.440 --> 0:23:23.439 same paragraph it'll be spelled to day. I just decided 0:23:23.480 --> 0:23:25.800 to capitalize beyond all of a sudden the middle of 0:23:27.240 --> 0:23:29.960 Uh okay, here's the guy. This is this is one 0:23:30.080 --> 0:23:32.400 helfle Finger is not here. This is one for helfl Finger. 0:23:33.520 --> 0:23:36.240 Here's a wrinkle that crossed my mind, and the ongoing 0:23:36.400 --> 0:23:39.000 I added the word ongoing. I misquoted him. He's saying 0:23:39.000 --> 0:23:40.960 here's a wrinkle that crossed my mind and the white 0:23:40.960 --> 0:23:45.560 tail white tailed deer debate. I'm adding that's an ongoing 0:23:45.720 --> 0:23:50.320 debate with our buddy helfle Finger. He asked, has anyone 0:23:50.359 --> 0:23:56.919 brought up how big horn sheet big horn sheet is 0:23:56.960 --> 0:24:01.680 the accepted name. It looks to me like it's grammatically 0:24:01.720 --> 0:24:05.880 the same as white tail deer, but no one insists 0:24:05.880 --> 0:24:10.439 that you call them either big horned sheep or just 0:24:10.560 --> 0:24:14.560 big horns one what halfle finger thinks about that big 0:24:14.600 --> 0:24:17.879 horns is pretty common. I feel like, yeah, but I 0:24:17.920 --> 0:24:21.000 get what he's saying about the comparison to white tailed 0:24:21.040 --> 0:24:23.159 and big horn I bet if you went back in 0:24:23.280 --> 0:24:27.080 time you would find that they probably once upon a time, 0:24:27.119 --> 0:24:31.600 helpful finger, I'll have some smartass know what all things 0:24:31.680 --> 0:24:33.680 to say about this, But I bet if you went 0:24:33.760 --> 0:24:37.919 back in time it was like big you'd see an 0:24:37.960 --> 0:24:41.680 example of big hyphen horned. It was before it was 0:24:41.720 --> 0:24:44.160 officially named. Would just described these animals as that deer 0:24:44.200 --> 0:24:46.919 is white tailed, that sheep is big horned. But now 0:24:46.960 --> 0:24:49.040 and then it just becomes like buddy was ting becomes 0:24:49.080 --> 0:24:51.680 something entirely on its own after a while, So you'd 0:24:51.720 --> 0:24:57.680 have to look at what um, yeah, to take about 0:24:57.720 --> 0:25:00.840 three seconds to go look like, what is it's show name? 0:25:01.040 --> 0:25:03.840 I think it's official name is Big Horn Sheep. But 0:25:03.920 --> 0:25:10.240 this guy is not wrong like the last guy. When 0:25:10.240 --> 0:25:12.760 you were a kid, did you watch Happy Days reruns? 0:25:12.800 --> 0:25:16.840 You everyone Fonzie I had to apologize but he uh yeah, 0:25:16.840 --> 0:25:23.960 he couldn't. He couldn't pronounced like I was, alright, buddy, 0:25:24.000 --> 0:25:26.399 how do we begin? Um? Let me set the scene. 0:25:27.720 --> 0:25:29.480 One of the things I like most about this book 0:25:29.760 --> 0:25:32.800 is it you're gonna take off after this? Is that? Um? 0:25:33.800 --> 0:25:36.080 When when I give at at times, i'll give a 0:25:36.119 --> 0:25:38.800 list of like ten ten my ten favorite books, Ten 0:25:38.840 --> 0:25:42.520 greatest books for outdoor enthusiasts. My Life with the Eskimo 0:25:42.600 --> 0:25:46.439 is always on there. It's amazing and me get like 0:25:46.840 --> 0:25:50.800 Arctic Dreams, it's like coming into the Country by John McPhee, 0:25:51.280 --> 0:25:53.960 like the greatest greatest book for outdoorsmans. Okay, be like 0:25:54.000 --> 0:25:56.480 coming into the Country for John McPhee. My Life with 0:25:56.520 --> 0:26:01.840 the Eskimo by Stephenson, Arctic Dreams by very Low pez Um. 0:26:02.000 --> 0:26:10.399 Journals of Lewis and Clark explain why I don't want 0:26:10.400 --> 0:26:13.120 to get into it. Um, But it's always on there. 0:26:13.920 --> 0:26:16.960 I I love it that this book begins and Stephenson 0:26:17.080 --> 0:26:21.760 is like literally finishing his manuscript of My Life with 0:26:21.800 --> 0:26:27.080 the Eskimo. Right, Yeah, it's amazing because and by the way, 0:26:27.119 --> 0:26:30.600 I think that contributes to some of the problems that 0:26:30.680 --> 0:26:33.679 end up occurring. Um. But we can get into that. 0:26:33.800 --> 0:26:36.680 So give us the year and why, like worth's going 0:26:36.680 --> 0:26:40.800 on in America and right so you know, it's night 0:26:41.240 --> 0:26:46.320 this story Empire of Isostone begins around nineteen thirteen. Is 0:26:46.359 --> 0:26:49.919 the expedition in nineteen thirteen to nineteen eighteen ultimately, but 0:26:50.200 --> 0:26:55.280 Stephenson has just come back from being in the Arctic 0:26:55.320 --> 0:26:59.040 for like four years, right, um, and he had been 0:26:59.080 --> 0:27:02.400 on the nine five He did an expedition in in Iceland, 0:27:02.440 --> 0:27:04.680 and then he was on the north coast of Alaska 0:27:04.720 --> 0:27:07.520 and the Mackenzie River area, and he was really interested 0:27:07.600 --> 0:27:11.920 in the ethnology and studying, um, the native people's there, 0:27:12.200 --> 0:27:15.359 and also you know, My Life with the Eskimo pretty 0:27:15.440 --> 0:27:20.080 much suggests that, Um. His theory was that a small 0:27:20.160 --> 0:27:24.800 group of people, um, of white people with you know, 0:27:25.119 --> 0:27:29.800 native assistance and adopting native life ways could survive for 0:27:29.840 --> 0:27:32.960 an indefinite amount of time in the Arctic north and 0:27:33.000 --> 0:27:36.760 even on the ice right and and moving between land 0:27:36.800 --> 0:27:40.639 masses and and out on the Polar Sea as hunting, 0:27:41.160 --> 0:27:44.280 hunting and eating seals primarily and walrus and you know, 0:27:44.359 --> 0:27:47.560 back on land caribou and Arctic fox and stuff. And 0:27:47.600 --> 0:27:49.800 he wasn't like what's cool about him two is he 0:27:49.880 --> 0:27:52.440 wasn't sort of chasing the North Pole. He was just 0:27:52.480 --> 0:27:55.280 trying to find uncontacted peoples and hang out with them, right. 0:27:55.359 --> 0:27:58.080 He he was a different, uh, you know, a different 0:27:58.160 --> 0:28:02.200 kind of explorer, more of you know, a scientist explorer 0:28:02.520 --> 0:28:06.640 rather than trying to be the first at something. Though, um, 0:28:07.119 --> 0:28:09.800 we can get into this a little bit later. Um, 0:28:09.840 --> 0:28:12.920 you know, he he was eyeballing the idea that this 0:28:12.960 --> 0:28:16.600 place Crocker Land that Perry had said, Robert Perry had 0:28:16.600 --> 0:28:20.000 said he'd seen from the east coast or the west 0:28:20.040 --> 0:28:24.600 coast of Greenland that there was a landmass above Alaska 0:28:25.000 --> 0:28:27.320 that was undiscovered. So that was kind of in the 0:28:27.320 --> 0:28:30.440 back pocket, right, was this happening at kind of the 0:28:30.480 --> 0:28:35.800 tail end of Arctic exploration like started in saying the 0:28:35.840 --> 0:28:40.680 mid eighteen hundreds with search for the Northwest West passage, right, 0:28:40.760 --> 0:28:43.760 and so, but also at the very tail end of 0:28:43.840 --> 0:28:47.480 I mean Peery in nineteen o nine had claimed cook 0:28:47.520 --> 0:28:49.920 and oh eight in period nineteen o nine had had 0:28:49.960 --> 0:28:52.719 claimed to the North Pole. So that was sort of 0:28:52.800 --> 0:28:55.320 other even though it was contested, that was sort of 0:28:55.320 --> 0:28:58.320 off the you know, off the bucket list for people. 0:28:58.320 --> 0:29:01.120 They're like that one the North Pole's you know, been bagged. 0:29:01.640 --> 0:29:06.160 Now that ultimately becomes contested played out, Yeah, we don't 0:29:06.160 --> 0:29:08.800 need to go there, um, but there you know. So 0:29:09.760 --> 0:29:14.200 Villa Almer's will Helmer Stephenson was a very serious scientist, right, 0:29:14.240 --> 0:29:17.560 and so he was wanted to um prove in a 0:29:17.600 --> 0:29:20.160 way that you could live, that that small groups of 0:29:20.200 --> 0:29:24.680 people um could live off the ice and land um 0:29:24.840 --> 0:29:28.680 for an indefinite period of time. Now, make all your clothes, 0:29:29.240 --> 0:29:32.480 everything you need and and you know, if you're smart, 0:29:32.840 --> 0:29:38.200 bring along uh Inuit people a seamstress and hunters um, 0:29:38.280 --> 0:29:42.960 because their skills in these things was unparalleled. Right. Um. 0:29:43.120 --> 0:29:47.160 So you know, in nineteen o Sevenson had been he 0:29:47.200 --> 0:29:49.400 had just come back from like four years in the Arctic, 0:29:50.080 --> 0:29:53.800 and he he kind of he did something really interesting. 0:29:54.240 --> 0:30:00.200 So there was this notion and he perpetuated it of 0:30:00.240 --> 0:30:04.320 the blonde Eskimo. So he came back in and claims 0:30:04.760 --> 0:30:07.920 that he's contacted while he was out there for four years, 0:30:07.920 --> 0:30:12.720 that he's contacted these descendants of Laife Ericsson who are 0:30:12.800 --> 0:30:18.840 blonde haired, blue eyed Eskimos or Inuit people's and you know, 0:30:19.640 --> 0:30:21.360 because there was a mystery of what happened to the 0:30:21.720 --> 0:30:24.320 to Laife Ericson like up in Greenland, right right, And 0:30:24.400 --> 0:30:27.320 so then the idea was that like descendants of laf 0:30:27.440 --> 0:30:31.600 Ericsson had um made their way to the west and 0:30:31.840 --> 0:30:35.840 over to the islands north of Alaska and the Yukon 0:30:36.440 --> 0:30:40.640 Coronation Goal Victorial Islands, and that they were living, that 0:30:40.720 --> 0:30:43.600 these were descendants of laf Ericson. Now this made headlines 0:30:43.760 --> 0:30:48.600 right New York Times, National News, and Stephenson um kind 0:30:48.640 --> 0:30:51.200 of went with it like he just rolled with it. 0:30:51.240 --> 0:30:54.120 He didn't. He said he had encountered these people and 0:30:54.120 --> 0:30:56.120 that he wanted to go back and study them more. 0:30:56.640 --> 0:31:00.400 And so part of it is that not true? Well, 0:31:00.440 --> 0:31:02.800 it's it's not true. He was trying to milk the 0:31:02.880 --> 0:31:06.120 idea that they were descendants of Laife Ericson. What what 0:31:06.360 --> 0:31:10.600 is more probable, and Ahmondson talks about this later, is 0:31:10.640 --> 0:31:16.760 that you know that more much more recent European um 0:31:16.760 --> 0:31:21.800 explorers intermingled with the native people there. But Stephenson was 0:31:21.880 --> 0:31:24.600 kind of rolling with this myth that these were descendants 0:31:24.600 --> 0:31:26.880 of Laife Ericson and they were called blonde Deskot. The 0:31:27.000 --> 0:31:30.560 had died out, they had just integrated into yeah, into 0:31:30.880 --> 0:31:34.600 a culture, and so he used that as a marketing tool. Right. 0:31:34.640 --> 0:31:36.640 So he gets back after four years in the Arctic 0:31:36.680 --> 0:31:40.080 and he put this trip together, the Canadian Arctic Expedition, 0:31:40.480 --> 0:31:44.000 which is my book is about. He he whips this 0:31:44.040 --> 0:31:46.600 thing together in a matter of months. You know, sometimes 0:31:46.640 --> 0:31:50.840 expeditions of this magnitude, with multiple ships and twenty scientists, 0:31:50.880 --> 0:31:54.120 you know, they take years to put together. Right. So 0:31:54.440 --> 0:32:00.080 Stephenson rolls up to Seattle in n perpetuating this on 0:32:00.280 --> 0:32:05.160 Eskimo story. The headlines eat it up. He flies over 0:32:05.720 --> 0:32:08.640 or sails over to Europe and goes to like an 0:32:08.640 --> 0:32:12.280 international polar conference that starts talking up like this new expedition. 0:32:12.320 --> 0:32:15.800 He's going to go try to find these blonde Eskimos 0:32:16.040 --> 0:32:19.440 and um right about them. And also that there's there 0:32:19.520 --> 0:32:23.320 was a theory that there that Perry had seen this 0:32:23.400 --> 0:32:29.040 place called Crocker Land, which was a land mass above Alaska. 0:32:29.400 --> 0:32:32.680 It was undiscovered, right, So those two things were kind 0:32:32.680 --> 0:32:36.560 of the impetus for UM getting this expedition put together. 0:32:45.560 --> 0:32:49.280 So Stephenson goes over to Europe, makes a couple of presentations. 0:32:49.600 --> 0:32:52.680 All the while he's talking to the Canadian government. He's 0:32:52.680 --> 0:32:55.800 trying to get financing from the American Museum of Natural 0:32:55.840 --> 0:32:59.640 History the Canadian government, and within like three or four 0:32:59.720 --> 0:33:04.280 months he cobbles together this UM expedition that's going to 0:33:04.360 --> 0:33:07.880 have the most scientists. I mean, this is arguable, some 0:33:07.960 --> 0:33:09.840 will argue it, but the most scientists that have ever 0:33:09.880 --> 0:33:15.080 been on a polar single polar voyage UM three ships, UM, 0:33:15.200 --> 0:33:18.600 one of the greatest ice navigators in history. This guy, 0:33:18.720 --> 0:33:24.480 Robert Bartlett from Newfoundland, suit total badass. And then you 0:33:24.520 --> 0:33:27.520 know he's cobbling this thing together. The thing that I 0:33:27.520 --> 0:33:31.360 found really amusing is that while so they take off, 0:33:31.400 --> 0:33:33.800 they he gets all these scientists together, he gets the 0:33:33.840 --> 0:33:37.560 money together from UM, the Canadian government, he agrees to 0:33:37.600 --> 0:33:41.280 become uh you know, he was he was an Icelandic 0:33:41.360 --> 0:33:44.440 American because he was he was born in Manitoba, and 0:33:44.440 --> 0:33:46.360 then they moved to North Dakota when he was like 0:33:46.840 --> 0:33:49.120 three after a couple of his family members died in 0:33:49.160 --> 0:33:51.680 the flood, and then the family moved to Nodak and 0:33:51.720 --> 0:33:55.440 then so the Canadian government is like, well, we'll pay 0:33:55.640 --> 0:33:57.840 if you become a Canadian citizen. So he was just 0:33:57.920 --> 0:34:00.640 totally flexible. He's like, I'll do whatever. You what man 0:34:01.040 --> 0:34:04.000 signing the papers, it becomes a Canadian. So he's in 0:34:04.080 --> 0:34:08.600 icelandic American, Canadian, you know. And uh so he cobbles 0:34:08.640 --> 0:34:12.560 this thing together. They take the Carlak, the ship that's 0:34:12.600 --> 0:34:15.319 like unsuited really for the task at hand, like a 0:34:15.320 --> 0:34:18.359 whaling whaling boat. I mean it was a you know, 0:34:18.400 --> 0:34:21.920 and it was Carlaca is the allusion word for fish, 0:34:22.080 --> 0:34:24.640 and they it was used in Seattle in the in 0:34:24.719 --> 0:34:27.480 the salmon industry, and it was a whaling vessel. Was 0:34:29.120 --> 0:34:32.719 the boats about a hundred and twenty nine feet and 0:34:32.880 --> 0:34:36.960 uh so ship. Yeah, but I mean, what what's so 0:34:37.160 --> 0:34:39.120 bizarre about this is? And I love it in a 0:34:39.120 --> 0:34:43.960 way about Stephenson, he's so badass. He's like Bartlett. He 0:34:44.040 --> 0:34:46.560 ends up in listing this guy Bob Bartlett, who's who 0:34:46.640 --> 0:34:50.160 had been The backstory on Bartlett is that he had 0:34:50.360 --> 0:34:53.840 been on two attempts to the North Pole with Peery 0:34:54.000 --> 0:34:56.920 as the captain of the S. S. Roosevelt. Like Per's 0:34:57.320 --> 0:35:02.839 iron clad super badass ice breaking expedition vessel right, and 0:35:02.880 --> 0:35:06.640 so Bartlett had gone almost in the North Pole. He 0:35:06.719 --> 0:35:11.360 got sent back because UH Perry took Matthew Henson instead 0:35:11.360 --> 0:35:14.320 for the final hundred and fifty miles. But he was 0:35:14.480 --> 0:35:18.320 already a known um explorer and had one like the 0:35:18.400 --> 0:35:21.759 Hubbard medal. He was a big deal. But Stephenson ends 0:35:21.840 --> 0:35:25.319 up like, Okay, I'm gonna use this guy, UM, and 0:35:25.360 --> 0:35:28.600 I'll meet you in the car look um up in 0:35:28.600 --> 0:35:33.200 in Nome. So but Stephenson takes like a cruise pleasure ship, 0:35:33.280 --> 0:35:36.520 the s S. Victoria, and he's on the ship heading 0:35:36.840 --> 0:35:40.040 toward or they're all gonna meet in Nome UH, and 0:35:40.120 --> 0:35:44.520 he's he's like writing the manuscript. He's got a secretary 0:35:44.600 --> 0:35:47.600 with him. He's finishing the book like my life with 0:35:47.640 --> 0:35:50.880 the Eskimo, thinking about how I'm going to turn this 0:35:50.920 --> 0:35:55.360 into a best seller. While this new expedition UH is 0:35:55.360 --> 0:35:57.480 supposed to be taking off in like a month. So 0:35:57.560 --> 0:36:00.480 he arrives on a you know, on a separate ship 0:36:00.920 --> 0:36:05.080 UM and then rolls up to g Nome and it's 0:36:05.160 --> 0:36:09.839 like okay, well let's go now, manuscript and then they 0:36:09.840 --> 0:36:13.560 take the manuscript and he how right up to the 0:36:13.640 --> 0:36:18.640 deadline was he was he a popular writer well a time, yeah, 0:36:18.680 --> 0:36:23.960 I mean he was becoming, um, like an Arctic expert. Right. 0:36:24.200 --> 0:36:27.120 But so this thing he had spent four years, Um, 0:36:27.200 --> 0:36:29.520 he was just dropping this manuscript that was going to 0:36:29.600 --> 0:36:31.640 be like my life with the Eskimo, how you know, 0:36:31.719 --> 0:36:34.239 here's how it's done. And then but that was gonna 0:36:34.360 --> 0:36:38.400 be published like probably when he came back or handled 0:36:38.400 --> 0:36:41.640 by other people so that he would come back to uh, 0:36:41.680 --> 0:36:45.280 you know, a best seller. And he's got the follow up, right, 0:36:45.360 --> 0:36:48.160 he's got the sequel. Um, that's what I've been doing. 0:36:48.239 --> 0:36:53.360 Labruth Device, Empire Advice and then Realm of Ice and uh. Um. 0:36:53.400 --> 0:36:55.480 But what I found so interesting about him is like, 0:36:55.600 --> 0:37:00.120 so he was he was multidimensional. You know, he already 0:37:00.120 --> 0:37:04.280 had lived um in small you know, with small groups, 0:37:04.520 --> 0:37:07.719 um in like the Mackenzie River Delta for years and 0:37:07.760 --> 0:37:11.319 living pretty much off the ice and land and sea ice, 0:37:11.760 --> 0:37:14.919 and so he had um, he was very good at that. 0:37:15.719 --> 0:37:19.239 I think what he was less skillful at is organizing 0:37:19.480 --> 0:37:23.279 an expedition of the magnitude of the Canadian Arctic Expedition. Yeah, 0:37:23.360 --> 0:37:28.480 these guys, you know it goes to ship so unbelievably fast. 0:37:29.000 --> 0:37:32.760 It's amazing. It's like, I mean literally like they leave 0:37:33.520 --> 0:37:37.600 and then then it went to ship. They leave and 0:37:37.280 --> 0:37:42.160 they get all there's you know, like they leave um esquimal. 0:37:42.440 --> 0:37:48.080 They end up going to Nome, and then Bartlett, the 0:37:48.080 --> 0:37:53.120 captain of who's from Newfoundland, he's like, this ship, you know, 0:37:53.400 --> 0:37:56.520 it's not really suited. This guy has been the former 0:37:56.840 --> 0:38:01.359 captain of the Roosevelt, like super bad vessel, right, and 0:38:01.360 --> 0:38:04.919 he's in this this uh small ship with I think 0:38:04.960 --> 0:38:07.560 the um he called the engine. He said, it has 0:38:07.640 --> 0:38:12.759 the power of a coffee pot. It's just not I mean. 0:38:12.800 --> 0:38:15.760 And by the way, these were not um. They weren't 0:38:15.760 --> 0:38:19.080 technically icebreakers anyway, but they had to be nimble and 0:38:19.080 --> 0:38:21.879 they had to be sheathed in hardwood so that you're 0:38:21.920 --> 0:38:24.719 going to encounter ice. Right. The problem is that when 0:38:24.719 --> 0:38:27.560 they took off, when they Bartlett finally stops and says, okay, 0:38:27.560 --> 0:38:29.480 we need to do some work. We got a retrofit 0:38:29.520 --> 0:38:32.600 to what time of year did they Well, so they're 0:38:32.600 --> 0:38:36.799 taking off in July and you know in that in 0:38:36.800 --> 0:38:42.200 that region, the window is pretty short anyway for navigable waters. 0:38:42.719 --> 0:38:45.200 Um and there they were trying to make it from 0:38:45.480 --> 0:38:48.560 uh Nome after they got through the Bearing Street and everything. 0:38:48.600 --> 0:38:52.760 They're trying to make it from Gnome over to Herschel Island, 0:38:52.800 --> 0:38:57.200 which is above Um the Canadian yukon Um to the east, 0:38:57.320 --> 0:39:01.359 so just you know, some a few hundred miles or something, 0:39:01.840 --> 0:39:06.440 and the goal was to get there and then they 0:39:06.480 --> 0:39:09.480 were gonna unload all the ships and like retrofit everything 0:39:09.520 --> 0:39:11.839 and then get get it together from there. And there's 0:39:11.840 --> 0:39:14.120 a sort of ongoing joke among the members of the ship. 0:39:14.160 --> 0:39:16.960 They're like, because what happens is they leave so fast 0:39:17.640 --> 0:39:21.040 um because the weather window is closing that they don't 0:39:21.120 --> 0:39:24.560 have all They've got three ships, the car Look which 0:39:24.600 --> 0:39:27.920 is the flagship of the expedition, the Alaska, and the 0:39:28.000 --> 0:39:30.400 mary Sacks, and they're all going to be used in 0:39:30.440 --> 0:39:33.920 different ways, but they have all the wrong equipment on 0:39:33.960 --> 0:39:36.280 the wrong and the wrong members on the wrong ships. 0:39:36.520 --> 0:39:39.560 So Stephenson is like, we'll sort that out at Herschel 0:39:39.600 --> 0:39:42.959 Island and they end up like it becomes a joke 0:39:43.000 --> 0:39:45.200 among the men. Barlett says it a few times. They're like, 0:39:45.239 --> 0:39:47.840 we can't find the you know, we can't find certain 0:39:48.360 --> 0:39:52.400 scientific tools, and they're like, you got a geologist on 0:39:52.440 --> 0:39:54.839 the car Look and he needs other equipment that's on 0:39:54.880 --> 0:39:58.040 the Mary Sacks, which, by the way, after they all 0:39:58.160 --> 0:40:03.320 leave their separated within a day, the armada is completely separated, 0:40:03.320 --> 0:40:06.479 and they never see the Alaska or the Merry Sacks again. 0:40:06.560 --> 0:40:09.120 The people of the calling the Carlic, don't you know. Yeah, 0:40:09.200 --> 0:40:11.200 it's like it's like like I want I want to 0:40:11.200 --> 0:40:13.799 make sure people understand. It's be like, let's say you 0:40:13.840 --> 0:40:15.200 have a big group of friends. You're all going to 0:40:15.280 --> 0:40:18.560 go on some kind of monster hunting trip, road trip, 0:40:18.600 --> 0:40:22.480 hunting trip, and you're all planning on being in different 0:40:22.520 --> 0:40:25.320 areas hunting different ship. But you're in such a eagerness 0:40:25.320 --> 0:40:28.040 to get out of there and get some miles behind 0:40:28.080 --> 0:40:32.560 you that you just load everything randomly into truck and 0:40:32.600 --> 0:40:34.279 you're not even in the truck you're supposed to be 0:40:34.320 --> 0:40:36.439 in for where you're ultimately going, and then you pull 0:40:36.520 --> 0:40:38.840 out of the parking lot and never see each other again. 0:40:40.320 --> 0:40:43.520 How was the hunt? Well, yeah, so it's it's it's 0:40:43.560 --> 0:40:46.359 really funny you point out, like how quickly this thing 0:40:46.680 --> 0:40:50.800 becomes a debacle. Right, So there Stephenson's on the Carla 0:40:51.000 --> 0:40:53.680 and Captain barlett Or is on the Carla and a 0:40:53.760 --> 0:40:56.120 number of the scientists, right, But then some of them 0:40:56.120 --> 0:40:58.520 are on the Alaska the ray sacks, and they get separated, 0:40:58.760 --> 0:41:04.120 like the day out. So then the ship the Carlick 0:41:04.520 --> 0:41:09.000 gets There was a really really heavy winter ice and 0:41:09.040 --> 0:41:14.800 snow much earlier, so by August early August, they're experiencing 0:41:15.520 --> 0:41:19.520 snow squalls, really zero degree temperatures, and you know they're 0:41:19.560 --> 0:41:22.960 they're starting to encounter big ice pack already, and they're 0:41:23.000 --> 0:41:25.640 they're just like five ten miles off the coast of 0:41:25.920 --> 0:41:30.960 Alaska at this point. Uh, And you know the guy like, 0:41:31.040 --> 0:41:32.960 so there's a bunch of the wrong equipment and a 0:41:32.960 --> 0:41:35.120 bunch of the wrong people are all those ships, and 0:41:35.160 --> 0:41:40.640 then within days, um, they get encased in. So Bartlett 0:41:40.680 --> 0:41:43.120 makes what's kind of a controversial decision, right, So you 0:41:43.120 --> 0:41:45.800 could either in those days there were different theories. You 0:41:45.840 --> 0:41:48.960 could either hug the shoreline, stay close to shore in 0:41:49.000 --> 0:41:52.000 case things got iced up, and then you can make 0:41:52.040 --> 0:41:55.640 it to land like like you ditched the boat, yeah yeah, 0:41:55.760 --> 0:42:01.160 or maybe the boat you find uh enclosed protected bay 0:42:01.400 --> 0:42:03.840 and then you win her there the time the next session. 0:42:04.360 --> 0:42:08.840 But the other approach was to go out farther offshore, 0:42:08.880 --> 0:42:13.120 where often there were bigger open leads and open leads 0:42:13.120 --> 0:42:16.920 of water, and and so Bartlett, after consulting with Stephenson, 0:42:16.960 --> 0:42:19.440 and this becomes kind of controversial because they don't really 0:42:19.520 --> 0:42:23.640 agree on who said what. Bartlett decides to take the 0:42:23.640 --> 0:42:28.240 Boulder choice, which is to go offshore and then head 0:42:28.360 --> 0:42:32.360 east through not you know, weaving through open leads between 0:42:32.400 --> 0:42:34.880 the ice and make it to Harold Island. Yeah. I 0:42:34.920 --> 0:42:37.520 just want to clarify thing here, and you can chime 0:42:37.520 --> 0:42:40.120 in on this. The way you can imagine the polar 0:42:40.160 --> 0:42:44.440 ice is um, it's fracturing all the time and coming 0:42:44.440 --> 0:42:49.800 back together again, and windstorms will blow big chunks away, 0:42:49.840 --> 0:42:51.480 so you you can pick your way through it, and 0:42:51.520 --> 0:42:54.359 then it'll get calm and everything will well together, right, 0:42:54.400 --> 0:42:56.400 and then it might break apart in a different fashion. 0:42:56.480 --> 0:42:59.120 So they're literally like getting stuck in the ice. Then 0:42:59.120 --> 0:43:00.440 they drift for a day and then all of a 0:43:00.440 --> 0:43:03.200 sudden it opens up and they can make some more headway. Yeah, 0:43:03.320 --> 0:43:05.600 and then they dodge chunk eyes and they get frozen 0:43:05.600 --> 0:43:07.520 into some more ice, and then they realize they're still 0:43:07.560 --> 0:43:09.680 moving because the ice. Then they're stuck in ice that's 0:43:09.760 --> 0:43:13.720 moving right. It's high. It's kind of like going through 0:43:14.320 --> 0:43:19.560 you know, an ice jigsaw puzzle whose pieces are being 0:43:19.600 --> 0:43:22.720 moved around by wind and current. Right, and so there's 0:43:22.800 --> 0:43:25.560 kind of there's a way to weave your way through 0:43:25.800 --> 0:43:29.359 the labyrinth. Um, and you know, you have to make 0:43:29.640 --> 0:43:32.279 headway when these things open and part, and there's like 0:43:32.360 --> 0:43:35.880 a few miles of open water. But the stuff is 0:43:35.880 --> 0:43:40.719 all happening earlier than usual, and so um, they never 0:43:40.880 --> 0:43:43.000 The irony of this is that, like the first thing 0:43:43.040 --> 0:43:45.719 they're trying to do, We're gonna take these three ships leave, 0:43:45.960 --> 0:43:49.399 go over Point Barrow and then head east to this 0:43:49.760 --> 0:43:53.399 place called Herschel Island and meet there. They never even 0:43:54.200 --> 0:43:56.920 do that. So like because the car Now, what ends 0:43:57.000 --> 0:43:59.440 up happening is that the two other ships, the Alaska 0:43:59.520 --> 0:44:03.640 and the mary Sacks, they make it through. But the 0:44:03.719 --> 0:44:07.680 story that I follow concerns itself more with what happens 0:44:07.680 --> 0:44:09.799 to the members of the car. Look, which is the flagship, 0:44:10.120 --> 0:44:12.719 and Stephenson and the Captain Bartlett are both on it, 0:44:13.040 --> 0:44:15.920 so and a bunch of scientists and then an Inuit 0:44:16.000 --> 0:44:21.040 family and um, a couple of hunters. So Barlett Truck 0:44:21.160 --> 0:44:23.319 makes the bold move he's going to go offshore and 0:44:23.360 --> 0:44:26.080 try to make his way north and then up and 0:44:26.120 --> 0:44:31.080 around and meet it at Herschel Island. Within days, they 0:44:31.080 --> 0:44:35.600 are what's called biss set or encased in like a 0:44:35.680 --> 0:44:39.200 mile square of ice, right, so it it sort of 0:44:39.320 --> 0:44:42.600 knits all around them and they're they're like, you know, 0:44:42.760 --> 0:44:47.520 floating iceberg, though it's not like high berg. It's it's 0:44:47.520 --> 0:44:51.920 like a flat flow and it's well then so and 0:44:51.920 --> 0:44:55.520 and then things really go wack. So they hang out 0:44:55.560 --> 0:44:57.440 on the ship like waiting around for a while to 0:44:57.480 --> 0:45:00.440 figure out like what's going to happen, and to really 0:45:00.480 --> 0:45:05.080 important things happen early on UM one is that while 0:45:05.120 --> 0:45:09.319 they're still within striking distance of the northern Alaskan coastline, 0:45:09.760 --> 0:45:15.279 Stephenson in in second week in September, decides, Hey, I'm 0:45:15.280 --> 0:45:19.319 gonna go caribou hunting. He basically tells Captain Bartlett, I'm 0:45:19.360 --> 0:45:22.279 gonna go cariboo hunting. I'll be gone for about ten 0:45:22.360 --> 0:45:26.319 days to two weeks should no disaster occur. And Barlt's like, 0:45:26.360 --> 0:45:31.120 what you're going caribo hunting? And no, he pieced out heat. 0:45:31.239 --> 0:45:33.239 So there's a whole there's a whole thing that's going 0:45:33.280 --> 0:45:35.719 on here, which is that UM And you know I 0:45:35.800 --> 0:45:37.880 told you I have not really I hate spoilers, but 0:45:37.920 --> 0:45:42.240 it's like, you know, you gotta lay it out. Yeah, 0:45:42.400 --> 0:45:48.440 And so they're they're frozen in they've been floating in 0:45:48.560 --> 0:45:52.359 kind of a circuitous weaving way. They're not going any 0:45:52.360 --> 0:45:55.319 one direction for very long for a couple for like 0:45:55.360 --> 0:45:59.759 a month. Stephenson's all auntsie because he's like, Okay, my expedition, 0:45:59.800 --> 0:46:03.000 the to other ships are somewhere. I gotta get out 0:46:03.000 --> 0:46:05.239 of here, you know, like I should probably go to 0:46:05.440 --> 0:46:09.560 land Um. And so he says, I'm going caribou hunting 0:46:10.320 --> 0:46:13.439 because under the pretense that they need fresh meat, because 0:46:13.440 --> 0:46:15.120 if they are going to be stuck for a really 0:46:15.160 --> 0:46:18.000 long time on the ship, they're gonna they're gonna they've 0:46:18.040 --> 0:46:20.840 got like a couple of years with how much is 0:46:20.840 --> 0:46:23.080 he really gonna hauld back anyway? That's what I was 0:46:23.120 --> 0:46:26.040 gonna ask. Where they set up for like kind of 0:46:26.040 --> 0:46:29.000 a normal Arctic expedition where they were prepared to be 0:46:29.080 --> 0:46:31.240 there for years, were prepared to be there for maybe 0:46:31.480 --> 0:46:36.560 two years. And they have Pelican because they have like 0:46:39.200 --> 0:46:44.080 they have like presumably former information to base stuff off of, 0:46:44.200 --> 0:46:48.319 like the terror and the Arabis like disappearing, and like 0:46:48.640 --> 0:46:51.520 you think they would they kind of be like man 0:46:51.840 --> 0:46:54.439 hip could go bad out right, So usually you would 0:46:54.520 --> 0:46:58.040 bring more food than you you know, you for a year, 0:46:58.040 --> 0:47:00.279 and then you gotta figure like if they is go 0:47:00.440 --> 0:47:05.400 really poorly, we gotta have even more. But so Stephenson says, um, 0:47:05.400 --> 0:47:09.880 going Caribo hunting. I'm taking these two Inuit hunters can 0:47:09.960 --> 0:47:15.440 be named Jimmy and Jerry, and also the a couple 0:47:15.480 --> 0:47:17.960 of the scientists who were supposed to be on the 0:47:18.000 --> 0:47:21.600 other ships. They're supposed to be doing like ethnological study 0:47:21.840 --> 0:47:25.440 over in above northern Canada. And so he's like, I 0:47:25.480 --> 0:47:27.120 need to take those two guys so that they can 0:47:27.120 --> 0:47:29.240 go where they're supposed to go. And then he brings 0:47:29.239 --> 0:47:32.320 this photographer along, um, this guy named Wilkins, which is 0:47:32.400 --> 0:47:34.800 kind of cool because then you've got this photographic image 0:47:34.800 --> 0:47:38.279 of Stephenson leaving the car. Look like he can't you know, 0:47:38.440 --> 0:47:41.360 he's got the dog sled team and he's like charging 0:47:41.400 --> 0:47:46.880 off and the ship's bailing on his expedition, and there's 0:47:46.880 --> 0:47:49.239 like photographic evidence of him doing it, you know. But 0:47:49.320 --> 0:47:53.279 he says, I'm going hunting and I'll be back, and 0:47:53.640 --> 0:47:57.680 you should probably like big coal fires around the ship 0:47:57.760 --> 0:48:01.439 in case so I can see it so immediately like 0:48:01.719 --> 0:48:06.239 it's just a bad timing, right immediately the freaking whopper 0:48:06.360 --> 0:48:09.960 of a storm comes in. Stephenson gets about like six 0:48:10.040 --> 0:48:12.040 to eight miles and he gets to this little island 0:48:12.440 --> 0:48:17.680 um right above it's called I think I'll find it later. 0:48:17.719 --> 0:48:20.000 But he was walking across the So he's walking across 0:48:20.000 --> 0:48:22.840 the pack ice with dogs led team. He took the 0:48:22.880 --> 0:48:27.200 best dogs too, the best hunters and best and so 0:48:27.280 --> 0:48:33.080 he's like gets to this island and as their camp there, 0:48:33.880 --> 0:48:38.239 a massive storm comes in and by the time the 0:48:38.920 --> 0:48:42.200 like sky is clear, he looks out and the carlak 0:48:42.400 --> 0:48:46.120 is freaking gone, and now it's blining like to thirty 0:48:46.120 --> 0:48:50.439 miles a day on the Arctic drift, just blowing the wind, 0:48:50.480 --> 0:48:54.319 blowing in the wind towards Siberia, right, So he's like, 0:48:55.200 --> 0:48:59.880 where's your ship? Um? So at that point, you know, 0:49:00.000 --> 0:49:03.080 Stephenson makes he has to wait on this island for 0:49:03.280 --> 0:49:05.600 like a week for the for the because now the 0:49:05.680 --> 0:49:07.839 storm also breaks up the ice all around the little 0:49:07.840 --> 0:49:10.239 island is on, so that he there's he's like, there's 0:49:10.280 --> 0:49:14.120 water water, he can't get across um. So he waits 0:49:14.120 --> 0:49:15.640 it out. He's kind of cool. They build like this 0:49:15.719 --> 0:49:21.200 fifteen foot driftwood observation tower where he's up there like looking, dude, 0:49:21.200 --> 0:49:24.279 wears my ship kind of situation, you know. And then 0:49:24.320 --> 0:49:27.319 he just goes to land with these um two INU 0:49:27.480 --> 0:49:31.719 hunters and the photographer and another scientist and he was 0:49:31.800 --> 0:49:33.719 just kind of right, the whole thing off bails he 0:49:33.880 --> 0:49:38.479 so he well, in fairness, he's got it. He's got 0:49:38.480 --> 0:49:40.719 this sort of dance to do because he wants to 0:49:40.760 --> 0:49:43.680 continue doing the scientific work and he knows that two 0:49:43.680 --> 0:49:46.640 of the ships are somewhere. Uh, if he can find them, 0:49:46.680 --> 0:49:49.920 he can maybe re outfit and retrofit and like do 0:49:50.960 --> 0:49:54.640 the and keep doing the science on off the coast 0:49:54.680 --> 0:49:57.920 of Alaska and the Yukon. But as far as the 0:49:57.920 --> 0:50:01.239 carlt goes, he pretty much just puts it out of 0:50:01.280 --> 0:50:05.239 his mind. Um. And then at that point, you know, 0:50:05.520 --> 0:50:12.680 the ship is moving pretty fast toward the northwest and 0:50:12.960 --> 0:50:17.840 it's it's spookily following. Uh. There's a drift that is 0:50:18.000 --> 0:50:21.840 known at that point UM a ship that was captained 0:50:21.840 --> 0:50:25.640 by DeLong And the book that um Hampton Sides wrote 0:50:25.680 --> 0:50:28.840 called In the Kingdom of Ice talks about that journey 0:50:28.840 --> 0:50:31.399 where that that ship got encased in the ice very 0:50:31.440 --> 0:50:35.920 near Wrangel Island where these guys get marooned, and it 0:50:35.960 --> 0:50:39.360 goes for like, I don't know, over a year, and 0:50:39.360 --> 0:50:45.640 and Nonsen, the Norwegian legend, had intentionally encased his ship, 0:50:45.800 --> 0:50:49.920 the Fram in ice to follow this same drift pattern 0:50:50.040 --> 0:50:52.960 to prove that that was the way the prevailing drift went. 0:50:53.360 --> 0:50:56.000 And Nonsen was clever enough. I can never figure out 0:50:56.000 --> 0:50:59.040 why these people didn't learn from Fritz Nonsen, because he 0:50:59.040 --> 0:51:01.400 he designed a boat called the Fram, and he designed 0:51:01.440 --> 0:51:06.440 the hull to be rounded so that when inevitably the 0:51:06.480 --> 0:51:10.480 ice flows encased around your ship, it lifted the boat 0:51:10.800 --> 0:51:12.880 up onto the flow, and then you've just got like 0:51:12.920 --> 0:51:17.040 a hotel, you know, and so instead of like crushing 0:51:17.080 --> 0:51:19.800 the ship. So I mean, it never never really understood 0:51:19.800 --> 0:51:22.799 why they didn't start building all of these ships that 0:51:22.840 --> 0:51:25.800 we're going to be used in this way with rounded halls. 0:51:25.840 --> 0:51:29.480 It's like, um, but they didn't. So anyway, now the 0:51:29.520 --> 0:51:31.960 story ends up being about like it toggles back and 0:51:32.000 --> 0:51:36.520 forth between what I stay with Stephenson for a while 0:51:36.680 --> 0:51:41.440 to uh follow his actions and in actions, and then 0:51:41.560 --> 0:51:44.719 the story goes to what happens to the members of 0:51:44.719 --> 0:51:47.760 the car like because they are saga is really only 0:51:47.880 --> 0:51:51.799 just beginning and Stephensons planned to go overland to the 0:51:51.840 --> 0:51:55.479 rendezvous point or was that even Yeah, well so he 0:51:55.480 --> 0:51:59.120 he did, in fact, like he girlfriends, Oh well, they're right. 0:51:59.160 --> 0:52:02.320 So there's a It turns out he had a secret 0:52:02.560 --> 0:52:06.000 wife and child like in New piet and um I 0:52:06.360 --> 0:52:09.759 theorized that that was partly what his thing was, is 0:52:09.800 --> 0:52:12.239 that he was like, I mean, either I'm probably going 0:52:12.280 --> 0:52:17.600 to be on this ship for a year maybe two. Uh, 0:52:17.680 --> 0:52:21.080 I don't. I'm like within ten miles of land, I'm 0:52:21.120 --> 0:52:24.040 freaking out of here. I mean, you know, he makes 0:52:24.040 --> 0:52:27.000 a bunch of excuses about like the caribou hunt, but 0:52:27.400 --> 0:52:30.040 there was some suggestion that the caribou were sort of 0:52:30.040 --> 0:52:32.520 out of that area by then, like and he they don't. 0:52:32.680 --> 0:52:36.200 They don't get a caribou ever, Like it's like okay. 0:52:36.239 --> 0:52:40.760 So then he ends up reuniting with this um wife 0:52:40.840 --> 0:52:45.000 named Fanny that will call her his indigenous spouse. Uh. 0:52:45.040 --> 0:52:47.200 And they had a young son named Alex, and he 0:52:47.239 --> 0:52:50.520 had left them a few years before and and then 0:52:50.560 --> 0:52:53.279 so he's gonna reunite with her and then try to 0:52:53.480 --> 0:52:57.520 cobble together the remnants of this exhibition for which he has, 0:52:57.920 --> 0:53:00.680 you know, convinced the Canadian government to give him many 0:53:00.800 --> 0:53:03.520 hundreds of thousands of dollars, so you know, he he 0:53:03.600 --> 0:53:09.400 had some rationale to like make this thing work. The 0:53:09.480 --> 0:53:14.120 thing is he I just find that his in action 0:53:14.160 --> 0:53:17.359 around trying to like do anything about the car look 0:53:17.880 --> 0:53:21.440 um ends up being why I view him as a 0:53:21.520 --> 0:53:24.920 little bit villainous. But not I mean, he's he becomes 0:53:25.160 --> 0:53:28.360 he does great science. But anyway, so then the story 0:53:28.400 --> 0:53:31.399 becomes about, like what the hell happens to this ship 0:53:31.480 --> 0:53:37.200 floating in a square mile of ice across the Arctic Ocean. Yeah, yeah, 0:53:37.280 --> 0:53:41.600 we can, we can leave Steven Stevens and behind. But um, 0:53:41.840 --> 0:53:45.120 leading up to it, what was interesting is he's doing 0:53:45.160 --> 0:53:49.640 media and there and he'll he says kind of like 0:53:49.680 --> 0:53:54.440 cryptic ship that the people on the crew um like 0:53:54.480 --> 0:53:58.640 he's a little fatalistic, all the things that could go wrong, 0:53:59.000 --> 0:54:01.080 you know, And people on the crew keep reading or 0:54:01.120 --> 0:54:04.040 reading like interviews from him, like this guy's out of 0:54:04.040 --> 0:54:07.200 his mind. Well he's quite comfortable with the fact that, 0:54:07.239 --> 0:54:09.759 you know, he's like we may never return well, and 0:54:09.760 --> 0:54:13.800 and he says at one point, like the scientific inquiry, 0:54:13.840 --> 0:54:18.160 everyone on the crew and scientists know that the um 0:54:18.200 --> 0:54:23.040 that the goals of the expedition and the scientific information 0:54:23.640 --> 0:54:26.520 is much more important than either the ship or the 0:54:26.600 --> 0:54:29.919 lives of its members. And they're like, wait, but I'm 0:54:29.960 --> 0:54:35.279 one of those. What's going on on? Wait, I'm gonna die, 0:54:35.719 --> 0:54:38.400 that's what you're saying. And so, yeah, they're not happy, 0:54:38.400 --> 0:54:40.600 and they have like, you know, they have big meetings. 0:54:40.640 --> 0:54:42.839 This is before they ever even leave, and you know 0:54:42.920 --> 0:54:44.960 some of them are saying like, I'm not going if 0:54:45.000 --> 0:54:47.720 that's the case, right, if that's his attitude. Well, also 0:54:47.920 --> 0:54:50.399 he makes them sign over, which was not uncommon at time, 0:54:50.680 --> 0:54:53.280 Like they're all going to keep journals and diaries and stuff, 0:54:53.640 --> 0:54:56.560 Thank goodness, or I wouldn't have these books, you know. Um. 0:54:56.680 --> 0:54:59.640 But Stephens is like, oh, by the way, while he 0:54:59.680 --> 0:55:02.759 was in up organizing this trip, he's like made all 0:55:02.760 --> 0:55:07.480 these sweet publishing deals and media deals with um, you 0:55:07.520 --> 0:55:10.840 know papers in England, the New York Times, the Globe 0:55:10.840 --> 0:55:14.839 and Mail in Toronto, and he's like secured book rights 0:55:14.880 --> 0:55:16.600 and everything, and so he's like, oh, yeah, you guys 0:55:16.600 --> 0:55:20.080 gotta hand over all your journals and stuff. Um. So 0:55:20.320 --> 0:55:23.319 he decided he's not gonna get paid. They're all getting paid. 0:55:23.400 --> 0:55:26.480 So as rationality is, look, you're getting paid. I'm not 0:55:26.560 --> 0:55:28.799 getting paid as a member of this expedition, even though 0:55:28.840 --> 0:55:30.520 I'm the expedition leader, but I'm gonna get paid on 0:55:30.560 --> 0:55:34.680 the back end on publishing rights. So he's organized this 0:55:34.719 --> 0:55:40.839 whole um empire of of publishing, and you know they're 0:55:40.840 --> 0:55:43.959 reading about this in the paper also going well, so wait, 0:55:44.000 --> 0:55:46.400 what about like what about us? And he's like, you know, 0:55:47.440 --> 0:55:49.799 you signed, you signed the contracts. What can I tell 0:55:49.840 --> 0:55:55.080 you? You You know, get on this ship, man, Let's pick 0:55:55.120 --> 0:55:57.839 it back up with the car. Look, right, so this 0:55:57.880 --> 0:56:00.200 is where the story where guy think gets really freaking good. 0:56:00.280 --> 0:56:01.960 I look at it in terms of like third or 0:56:02.040 --> 0:56:07.440 three stages of what happens. Right, So, after Stephenson goes 0:56:07.480 --> 0:56:11.439 in his carrybo hunt, you've got I don't know, man, 0:56:11.560 --> 0:56:16.320 the numbers are elusive to me, but like seventeen, no twenty, 0:56:16.400 --> 0:56:20.160 some members are still on the ship. Um, you've got 0:56:20.360 --> 0:56:24.000 like thirty sled dogs. Right, You've got a couple of 0:56:24.040 --> 0:56:26.640 these skin umiaks that are pretty cool. You've got a 0:56:26.640 --> 0:56:29.400 house cat. They got a house cat and Rock who's 0:56:29.560 --> 0:56:35.040 just awesome tough cat. Um, and they're floating really fast 0:56:35.239 --> 0:56:39.240 on this in case of ice, towards Siberia, essentially towards 0:56:39.239 --> 0:56:42.480 the north of Siberia. Now that they float for months 0:56:42.719 --> 0:56:45.960 right now, this is not uncommon, like you know, um, 0:56:46.000 --> 0:56:48.120 and the ship is set up right so they've got 0:56:48.160 --> 0:56:50.400 they're still trying to do some science right there. They 0:56:50.440 --> 0:56:54.440 got this dredging um mechanism, and they build an iglue 0:56:54.440 --> 0:56:58.000 out off the ship and they this one scientist Murray 0:56:58.120 --> 0:57:02.600 is like hauling up also to creatures and you see 0:57:02.600 --> 0:57:04.560 life that has never been seen before. They were doing 0:57:04.600 --> 0:57:08.719 legitimate science, but um, that ends up sort of falling 0:57:08.719 --> 0:57:11.720 apart because they got like that, like sextants and whatever. 0:57:11.719 --> 0:57:15.439 They know where they're at. They're taking soundings of depth. Yeah, 0:57:15.440 --> 0:57:18.600 they have a general idea of where they are. Um. 0:57:19.320 --> 0:57:24.280 But but now okay, it's starting to get to be September, October, November, December, 0:57:24.360 --> 0:57:26.320 right so then in the whether you know, now the 0:57:26.400 --> 0:57:31.760 lights gone. Uh so now you've got basically Arctic night 0:57:32.080 --> 0:57:34.360 has fallen on him. They can't you know, they can't 0:57:34.360 --> 0:57:37.920 really take readings anymore. It's pretty much dark, and so 0:57:37.960 --> 0:57:41.000 they're floating along. They celebrate like Christmas on the ship 0:57:41.040 --> 0:57:42.960 they're out there. What I love too is that you 0:57:43.000 --> 0:57:46.040 know they're they're doing some really interesting things. They got 0:57:46.040 --> 0:57:48.840 this um character who's on the ship named yard Mom, 0:57:48.840 --> 0:57:51.360 and he's only twenty two and he's a Norwegian um 0:57:51.560 --> 0:57:54.680 guy who who's really into skiing. He was a ski champion. 0:57:54.760 --> 0:57:57.480 So he's like teaching all the he's teaching Captain Bartlett 0:57:57.520 --> 0:58:00.440 and all the other scientists how to ski. Right, they 0:58:00.480 --> 0:58:04.280 build jumps and stuff kind of wise because Barlett like 0:58:04.520 --> 0:58:06.720 bites it at one point and almost breaks his hip. 0:58:06.920 --> 0:58:09.560 You know, he's like, probably don't need the Captain, you know, 0:58:09.600 --> 0:58:13.320 doing Nordic ski jumping here, right, Like what the hell? 0:58:13.880 --> 0:58:17.120 And but you know they're living, They've got enough food. 0:58:17.360 --> 0:58:21.040 They you know, they're the living quarters are fine. They 0:58:21.040 --> 0:58:23.360 shooting polar bears. They shoot a couple of polar bears 0:58:23.360 --> 0:58:26.000 and rout um. They go duck hunting. One of the 0:58:26.000 --> 0:58:28.760 scenes I really love is that they had these Peterborough 0:58:28.800 --> 0:58:30.880 canoes that were on the ship that they were going 0:58:30.920 --> 0:58:33.120 to be using. They were going to sort those out 0:58:33.160 --> 0:58:35.640 at Harold Island and they were gonna use them on 0:58:35.680 --> 0:58:39.120 the Mackenzie River Delta. But so they take these out 0:58:39.200 --> 0:58:41.480 in some of them, they start noticing a lot of 0:58:41.600 --> 0:58:44.960 ducks out there, right, So the couple of the Inuit 0:58:45.040 --> 0:58:49.080 members who they had hired on at Barraw Point Barrow 0:58:50.400 --> 0:58:54.600 are doing a lot of seal hunting and Bartlett and 0:58:54.760 --> 0:58:56.960 one of the couple of the scientists are are like, well, 0:58:57.200 --> 0:58:58.800 there's a bunch of ducks out there, and they did 0:58:58.840 --> 0:59:02.000 have some shotguns. So they end up taking these Peterborough 0:59:02.040 --> 0:59:04.760 canoes out in the in the open leads and it's 0:59:04.760 --> 0:59:07.000 pretty cool, like they set behind these ice humms as 0:59:07.000 --> 0:59:08.959 a blind and then they go flush up a bunch 0:59:08.960 --> 0:59:11.280 of ducks. And you know, these these guys were not 0:59:11.440 --> 0:59:16.720 practicing uh, you know, game sportsmanship. They're like water sluicing knucks. 0:59:16.760 --> 0:59:18.920 You know, they won't need them for food. So they 0:59:19.000 --> 0:59:21.080 get a bunch of ducks and and um, they're shooting. 0:59:21.360 --> 0:59:24.760 They shoot a few polar bears. Um. I was surprised 0:59:24.760 --> 0:59:28.600 too that they're eating those bears raw. Yeah, yeah, I 0:59:28.600 --> 0:59:32.280 mean avoid the liver though, Um but yeah, yea you 0:59:32.360 --> 0:59:35.320 explain that, well, well, so they can kill you. Yeah. 0:59:35.400 --> 0:59:41.240 The bears eat high uh portion of seals, right, and 0:59:41.280 --> 0:59:45.880 so they end up having um large quantities of vitamin 0:59:46.360 --> 0:59:50.280 A in their livers. It turns out, and if you eat, 0:59:50.720 --> 0:59:52.720 if you eat a bunch of this it'll kill you. 0:59:52.800 --> 0:59:55.680 It's it's kind of cool because the the inuite members 0:59:55.720 --> 0:59:58.560 of the expedition seem to know this, right. I Like 0:59:58.600 --> 1:00:02.480 there was a um there are stories that were like 1:00:02.600 --> 1:00:06.320 of the what the heck the name of that expedition, 1:00:06.360 --> 1:00:11.400 but of the the Dutch expedition that went in seven 1:00:11.440 --> 1:00:15.800 But they these guys Barrens, William Barrens, like they didn't know, right. 1:00:15.840 --> 1:00:18.800 So they're they're eating, they're eating barrel livers and m 1:00:19.200 --> 1:00:23.440 getting super sick and dying. Um. So yeah, they you know, 1:00:23.600 --> 1:00:28.959 at this point there Bartlett has decided like, okay, our goal. 1:00:29.080 --> 1:00:34.800 Now they know generally from the logs of DeLong the 1:00:34.840 --> 1:00:38.240 trip that like had to go ten months more in 1:00:38.320 --> 1:00:41.439 case and ice, it blew by Wrangle Island and never 1:00:41.600 --> 1:00:43.760 was in striking distance of it, so they missed it. 1:00:44.120 --> 1:00:48.600 Barlton knows that Wrangel Island is really the only hope 1:00:48.680 --> 1:00:50.880 if they're going to make it to land. Once they 1:00:50.920 --> 1:00:53.440 start moving thirty to sixty miles a day in the 1:00:53.680 --> 1:00:59.760 in the drift and current, and as it happens, they 1:00:59.840 --> 1:01:01.880 they reach a certain point where they're probably within a 1:01:02.080 --> 1:01:05.680 d it and they they're able to see it. Okay, 1:01:06.000 --> 1:01:10.560 at a certain point. But but the problem is now 1:01:11.160 --> 1:01:15.320 larger flows are starting to encroach around the flow that 1:01:15.400 --> 1:01:20.080 they're on, and there's there they're gonna get pinched there. 1:01:20.160 --> 1:01:24.400 They know they're gonna get probably crushed. Right, So Bartlett 1:01:24.480 --> 1:01:29.200 has the good sense to begin offloading a whole bunch 1:01:29.240 --> 1:01:34.320 of gear, food sleds, they build kennels for the dogs, 1:01:34.920 --> 1:01:37.960 you know, very organized, and he's getting ready to take 1:01:38.000 --> 1:01:40.600 a walk. He's getting ready if this thing, if the 1:01:40.600 --> 1:01:43.840 boat ship gets crushed, we're gonna have to live on 1:01:44.000 --> 1:01:48.080 the ice for a while, right, And so, um it 1:01:48.200 --> 1:01:51.000 takes a little while, right, So there's some false alarms 1:01:51.040 --> 1:01:55.680 that these fang like you know, teeth of ice crushed 1:01:55.720 --> 1:01:57.880 into the side. But then they're pumping. They're able to 1:01:57.920 --> 1:02:00.520 pump it out for a while. They actually are able 1:02:00.560 --> 1:02:03.280 at one point to um unload a bunch of the 1:02:03.320 --> 1:02:06.520 stuff and the and the car look rises up so 1:02:06.600 --> 1:02:09.320 it's not as imperiled. And that sort of the picture 1:02:09.360 --> 1:02:11.120 on the covers is when it was a little bit 1:02:11.200 --> 1:02:14.600 up higher and they've got ice blocks of stuff shoring 1:02:14.640 --> 1:02:19.040 it up. Eventually that's all, you know, the ice is 1:02:19.160 --> 1:02:23.640 way too powerful and the ship gets crushed and by 1:02:23.640 --> 1:02:27.400 that time though Bartlett has had the great forethought to 1:02:27.960 --> 1:02:30.360 have you know, year's worth of food and gear, and 1:02:30.360 --> 1:02:33.160 they've built some iglue shelters and they with a lot 1:02:33.240 --> 1:02:35.480 of the crates and stuff. They have one it's called 1:02:35.480 --> 1:02:38.960 the Box House. So they have manufactured sleds. Yeah, they 1:02:39.040 --> 1:02:43.200 manufactured some Peri style sleds while still on the car. Look, 1:02:43.320 --> 1:02:48.480 and they've got dogs. So Bartlett's thinking is, okay, if 1:02:48.560 --> 1:02:51.040 I can if the ship gets crushed. When the ship 1:02:51.080 --> 1:02:52.800 gets crushed, we're gonna have to live on the ice 1:02:52.920 --> 1:02:57.760 until March when the light gets good enough to travel again. Right, 1:02:58.040 --> 1:03:02.400 And so invariably the ship does get crushed. Um, it's 1:03:02.400 --> 1:03:05.280 a great scene though. I love the scene where Bartlett's 1:03:05.280 --> 1:03:07.720 got a flair for the dramatic. Right, So he's he's 1:03:07.760 --> 1:03:10.960 in the he's in the galley. Now everyone's off on 1:03:11.040 --> 1:03:13.720 the at the box House and the ice House. They're 1:03:13.800 --> 1:03:16.720 they've taken everything off there. They've got their um beds, 1:03:16.960 --> 1:03:21.920 you know, sleeping situations set up. And Bartlett's like stays 1:03:22.360 --> 1:03:25.200 in the galley and he's got like a phonograph and 1:03:25.200 --> 1:03:29.160 he's playing record after record and then theatrically kind of 1:03:29.200 --> 1:03:32.240 throwing them into the fire. You know, and he saves 1:03:33.000 --> 1:03:37.040 He saves Chopin's Funeral March for the last one. And 1:03:37.200 --> 1:03:38.560 you know, I would love to see this in a 1:03:38.680 --> 1:03:41.960 film like Great, because he's like puts it on, you know, 1:03:42.400 --> 1:03:44.720 and it's got this like dirge thing you could death 1:03:44.840 --> 1:03:47.320 is coming like, and he goes out onto the rail. 1:03:48.120 --> 1:03:49.560 The scene in the movie you would think this is 1:03:52.080 --> 1:03:54.840 because what are you doing? I mean, and he stands 1:03:54.880 --> 1:03:57.480 on the rail and then you know, right as Funeral 1:03:57.520 --> 1:03:59.880 March is playing, the notes are drifting off into the 1:04:00.040 --> 1:04:02.920 Arctic wind. I milk this pretty hard, by the way, 1:04:03.240 --> 1:04:05.440 and then you know he steps off and the car. 1:04:05.520 --> 1:04:08.200 I mean, it's kind of bizarre, like to think you're 1:04:08.200 --> 1:04:11.400 sitting there the ship you've been on for a few months. 1:04:12.440 --> 1:04:15.320 There it is, and like when it goes down, you know, 1:04:15.360 --> 1:04:18.360 it's like they've raised the flag to full mass and 1:04:18.400 --> 1:04:22.120 then it's like it goes down. The flag goes down, 1:04:22.160 --> 1:04:26.080 everybody's watching, and then the steam spout is like you 1:04:26.200 --> 1:04:28.960 just see and then all of a sudden, your ship's 1:04:29.000 --> 1:04:33.240 gone and you're on the ice going okay, now what right? 1:04:42.360 --> 1:04:44.760 The story becomes about To me, I think that one 1:04:44.760 --> 1:04:49.800 of the coolest elements is that Bartlett's driven. He understands 1:04:49.920 --> 1:04:53.959 kind of the situation, which is, I've got to get 1:04:54.000 --> 1:04:58.080 these people to land now. Stephenson later argues, and I 1:04:58.120 --> 1:05:02.680 think incorrectly that they should have probably bolted like he 1:05:02.720 --> 1:05:07.200 did way earlier, um across the ice. But Stephenson was 1:05:07.280 --> 1:05:11.840 already a very skilled uh ice traveler, and he had 1:05:11.880 --> 1:05:14.640 lived with, you know, the Inuit, and he he knew 1:05:14.920 --> 1:05:16.840 how to do it in small teams. You know, you've 1:05:16.880 --> 1:05:21.400 got like fifty and seventeen people, only a few of 1:05:21.440 --> 1:05:26.280 them had any experience on ice. Bartlett and this guy 1:05:26.360 --> 1:05:28.760 named John Hadley that they had picked up in Barrow 1:05:28.800 --> 1:05:32.280 also um and other than that, you know, these are 1:05:32.320 --> 1:05:36.600 not experienced Arctic travelers except the Inuit that they were 1:05:36.600 --> 1:05:40.560 with that they had brought, who basically save all their lives. 1:05:41.080 --> 1:05:45.240 But so Barlet knows, Okay, at some point, I'm going 1:05:45.320 --> 1:05:47.600 to have to get all these people to Wrangle Island 1:05:48.600 --> 1:05:53.720 if we get close enough to it, and then I'm 1:05:53.720 --> 1:05:57.600 gonna probably have to go myself with maybe one of 1:05:57.640 --> 1:06:03.880 the two um Inuits curral Luck and Ktectovic, and take 1:06:03.960 --> 1:06:08.240 them across the long straight south to Siberia and then 1:06:08.480 --> 1:06:13.160 go somehow get word to the larger world that there 1:06:13.240 --> 1:06:16.160 were marooned on Wrangle Island or their maroon on Wrangle Island, 1:06:16.240 --> 1:06:21.320 because he reasons that not going on moss with twenty 1:06:21.360 --> 1:06:24.200 some people is not going to work. Yeah, and only 1:06:24.280 --> 1:06:28.040 one as far as they know, only one white guy 1:06:28.040 --> 1:06:32.200 has ever been there. Yeah, like mirror right, Yeah, yeah, 1:06:32.280 --> 1:06:35.880 I mean John Muir, the naturalists you know, had like 1:06:36.000 --> 1:06:39.480 written the only real first descriptions of the place. Right. 1:06:39.680 --> 1:06:42.440 And it's interesting that they know too that that Wrangel 1:06:42.560 --> 1:06:47.200 Island has driftwood, right, and another island doesn't have driftwood. Yeah, 1:06:47.240 --> 1:06:51.400 Harold Island doesn't have driftwood, and it's small and uninhabitable, 1:06:52.000 --> 1:06:54.320 but it's really close. It's like within thirty miles of 1:06:54.360 --> 1:06:58.640 Wrangel Island, and then Rangel Island is I mean, it 1:06:58.720 --> 1:07:02.960 has populations of polar bear, it has populations of walrus. 1:07:03.000 --> 1:07:07.120 It ends up having a lot, a lot of wildlife. Um. 1:07:07.200 --> 1:07:09.600 But let me hit you with another quick stuff and 1:07:09.680 --> 1:07:12.480 something from my life with the Eskimo when he's up 1:07:12.520 --> 1:07:18.640 in the High Arctic, he's on he's with hunters who 1:07:19.080 --> 1:07:24.200 have never seen a tree, but they have driftwood. Their 1:07:24.280 --> 1:07:27.560 explanation of what driftwood is. They think it's a plant 1:07:27.600 --> 1:07:32.280 that grows under the water. It seems reasonable. Yeah, I mean, 1:07:32.320 --> 1:07:34.960 he's like, it's ship, it's probably he speculates that it's 1:07:34.960 --> 1:07:38.800 trees washing out Mackenzie Delta going into the Arctic Ocean 1:07:39.480 --> 1:07:41.440 landing on these islands. And then you just like, I 1:07:41.480 --> 1:07:44.200 don't know where that ship came from. It's a it's 1:07:44.200 --> 1:07:48.840 a seaweed. Yeah, that's really cool. You've never seen a tree. Yeah, 1:07:48.880 --> 1:07:50.960 it just by the way, there are no there are 1:07:51.000 --> 1:07:53.720 no trees on Wrangl Islands. So the driftwood, you know, 1:07:53.840 --> 1:07:57.000 has has come from other places, right, and you know, 1:07:57.240 --> 1:08:00.400 luckily they know that from these these law us that 1:08:00.440 --> 1:08:04.000 they had and um, and so that you know, Barlett 1:08:04.120 --> 1:08:06.800 understands that basically, if I can get them all to 1:08:06.960 --> 1:08:10.640 Wrangle Island, I gotta go then for help, right, and 1:08:10.680 --> 1:08:13.840 then that's a whole other ordeal. So the book essentially 1:08:13.920 --> 1:08:16.000 toggles between I mean, get first of all, getting to 1:08:16.040 --> 1:08:18.920 Wrangle Island from after they take all the stuff off 1:08:18.960 --> 1:08:21.679 the ship. That place is called they name it shipwreck camp. 1:08:22.240 --> 1:08:25.320 You know, it's like makes sense. And so they're like 1:08:26.200 --> 1:08:28.800 that they've got a complicated problem, which is that they've 1:08:28.800 --> 1:08:30.760 got a year's worth of food. We can't move. We 1:08:30.800 --> 1:08:33.120 can't move it like you can move some of it 1:08:33.200 --> 1:08:38.320 and fuel. Right, So there's an odyssey of getting from 1:08:38.320 --> 1:08:41.920 shipwreck camp to Wrangle Island and then the other odyssey 1:08:41.960 --> 1:08:44.679 of Barlett trying to go get help. Well real quick, 1:08:44.760 --> 1:08:46.960 hit those dudes that that try the other guys that 1:08:47.000 --> 1:08:51.240 pieced out right, So um is really while they're drifting 1:08:51.240 --> 1:08:56.120 along Stephenson's left and you know, during the dark night, 1:08:56.760 --> 1:08:58.720 things are starting to get you know, as they do 1:08:58.760 --> 1:09:01.080 on a ship, like some people are getting freaking cabin 1:09:01.160 --> 1:09:04.120 fever and some people are like you know, uh, we're 1:09:04.160 --> 1:09:09.679 in close proximity. There's arguments and the scientists, uh three 1:09:09.720 --> 1:09:16.680 of them. One is named Murray, one is named Mackay um, 1:09:16.720 --> 1:09:20.240 and this other Frenchman named Rich and that those three 1:09:20.240 --> 1:09:26.519 guys um. The two guys um Forbes, Mackay and Murray 1:09:26.600 --> 1:09:30.840 had been with Shackleton on the nineteen o nine expedition. 1:09:31.280 --> 1:09:34.679 So in the in those expeditions, they didn't use dogs. 1:09:34.680 --> 1:09:39.080 They're like man hauled, right, so harnesses on you and 1:09:39.120 --> 1:09:43.040 you're pulling lighter loads, right, and so for a number 1:09:43.040 --> 1:09:47.400 of reasons that aren't fully explained, like why they're so 1:09:47.479 --> 1:09:52.679 adamant Um. These three guys decide we want to leave 1:09:52.720 --> 1:09:54.640 the car. Look, go it alone. We want to go 1:09:54.680 --> 1:09:58.200 it alone. And Bartlett is in a tough spot because, 1:09:58.400 --> 1:10:02.120 you know, in if if this were a military situation, 1:10:02.520 --> 1:10:05.040 he would be able to say, like, you, you you can't 1:10:05.120 --> 1:10:07.719 leave the ship. I'm in command of you and the ship. 1:10:07.800 --> 1:10:12.720 But because they were scientists hired by Stephenson, it was 1:10:12.760 --> 1:10:16.800 sort of a gray area. And Bartlett um decides that 1:10:17.080 --> 1:10:19.920 he's going to support them in their decision. I mean, 1:10:19.920 --> 1:10:22.600 there were some murmurings of mutiny and stuff at a 1:10:22.640 --> 1:10:25.439 certain point. But and actually the three guys asked this 1:10:25.520 --> 1:10:28.840 other Norwegian guy, um if he will go with them, 1:10:28.840 --> 1:10:31.640 and he's really become close to Bartlin, He's devoted to him. 1:10:31.720 --> 1:10:34.640 He's like, basically, if you asked me again, we're going 1:10:34.680 --> 1:10:36.400 to have a problem, you know, like I'm not going 1:10:36.439 --> 1:10:40.040 with you, and um, you could could ask me about it. 1:10:40.320 --> 1:10:44.840 But so they end up um striking off on their 1:10:44.840 --> 1:10:48.880 own and before Bartlett and the rest of them head 1:10:48.880 --> 1:10:51.720 for Wrangel Island. Now what's kind of cool is that 1:10:51.800 --> 1:10:54.439 they have built a series of in knowing that they 1:10:54.479 --> 1:10:57.680 have to transport all this gear and food in the 1:10:57.720 --> 1:11:00.080 direction of Wrangle Island. They built a bunch of of 1:11:00.160 --> 1:11:03.880 like a relay system of igloos, maybe ten miles apart. 1:11:04.120 --> 1:11:06.519 It's kind of cool, really smart, because you know, if 1:11:06.560 --> 1:11:08.880 you keep going back and forth and bringing some stuff, 1:11:09.120 --> 1:11:12.640 setting up cash is, coming back to shipwreck camp, and 1:11:12.680 --> 1:11:15.479 then going forward again and moving to and building another igloo, 1:11:15.720 --> 1:11:19.080 you're also creating a kind of trail. You know, there's 1:11:19.080 --> 1:11:23.160 a lot of wind blown activity and so and so. 1:11:23.360 --> 1:11:27.520 It doesn't stay completely there, but they mark these igloos 1:11:27.560 --> 1:11:32.759 with flattened Pemmican tins so that they can hopefully see them. Um, 1:11:32.800 --> 1:11:37.160 but these three guys decided to go it alone, and um, 1:11:37.320 --> 1:11:40.000 they don't take dogs, even though Bartlett offers them dogs 1:11:40.000 --> 1:11:42.800 because they had were used to the man hauling technique 1:11:42.800 --> 1:11:45.160 that they used with Bartlett makes a sign of things 1:11:45.200 --> 1:11:48.360 saying a waiver. It makes a sign of things saying 1:11:48.439 --> 1:11:52.120 we've decided to take off. Yeah, but it's not my fault. 1:11:52.200 --> 1:11:54.439 Are they gonna do the same thing the rest of 1:11:54.439 --> 1:11:56.599 the crew is gonna do? Are they just they got 1:11:56.640 --> 1:11:59.560 a different plan. They got different plan, and they said, well, 1:11:59.320 --> 1:12:02.080 we think going to use some of the igloos on 1:12:02.080 --> 1:12:04.599 our way. But their plan is to is to head 1:12:05.040 --> 1:12:08.439 south either. They were kind of clueless because they didn't 1:12:08.479 --> 1:12:11.360 at this point, they didn't exactly know, you know, to 1:12:11.560 --> 1:12:14.080 the spot where they are. They have a general notion 1:12:14.160 --> 1:12:18.559 that they're like, you know, one hundred miles west of 1:12:18.680 --> 1:12:21.719 Wrangle Island, but I mean it's a pretty big space 1:12:21.800 --> 1:12:25.679 out there, so they end up going on their own. 1:12:25.880 --> 1:12:29.240 There's a really really grim scene in which um Barlett 1:12:29.280 --> 1:12:33.680 continues to uh send out his own small teams that 1:12:33.720 --> 1:12:35.640 are going to try to make it over in in 1:12:35.720 --> 1:12:39.400 like relays to Wrangle Island, and they come across these 1:12:39.400 --> 1:12:42.680 guys after like a week or ten days on one 1:12:42.760 --> 1:12:47.639 of their forays. And I mean it's a really grim scene. 1:12:47.800 --> 1:12:53.000 You know, like two guys are sitting there. Uh. One 1:12:53.000 --> 1:12:57.360 guy's hand is out of its glove. Um and this 1:12:57.479 --> 1:13:01.519 is Murray, you know, and he has himself with a 1:13:01.560 --> 1:13:05.840 Pemmican tin and he's got like infected hand, right, it's 1:13:05.840 --> 1:13:10.679 all swollen up, and um, they're they're barely moving, They're 1:13:10.720 --> 1:13:12.800 all you can tell. Their faces are all frost bitten. 1:13:13.160 --> 1:13:14.960 They don't really know what direction they're going. And the 1:13:15.000 --> 1:13:18.400 other guys from Varlett's teams are you know, they're on 1:13:18.560 --> 1:13:21.160 dog sleds and they're they're like, you guys need help, right, 1:13:21.400 --> 1:13:24.360 and they say, well we we decided to do it alone. 1:13:24.760 --> 1:13:27.840 The mile behind them is this French guy, Henri Bouschot, 1:13:27.960 --> 1:13:32.080 who um is just in a dire situation. They and 1:13:32.080 --> 1:13:35.840 there's all this strewn gear like they've been lightning their loads. 1:13:35.840 --> 1:13:38.320 So it's like you know, a yard sale. And you said, 1:13:38.840 --> 1:13:40.439 you said they had only been out there like a 1:13:40.479 --> 1:13:43.840 week at that, yeah, a week to ten days and 1:13:43.479 --> 1:13:47.880 and and there you know, but they're frozen like they 1:13:47.920 --> 1:13:50.800 haven't been, um taking good care of themselves. Like what 1:13:50.880 --> 1:13:52.439 you need to do is each night, get to an 1:13:52.439 --> 1:13:55.840 igloo or build an igloo, set up a primus stove, 1:13:56.360 --> 1:13:59.439 eat food, stay warm, stay dry if you can, and 1:13:59.520 --> 1:14:01.799 hope that, of course, that the ice doesn't crack underneath 1:14:01.800 --> 1:14:04.720 your igloo, which it often did, you know. Um. And 1:14:04.760 --> 1:14:07.519 then so they've come across like the strewn gear and 1:14:07.560 --> 1:14:10.840 everything pemmican, and they come across this Henre boshock guy 1:14:10.920 --> 1:14:13.439 and he's he's just his feet are halfway out of 1:14:13.479 --> 1:14:17.760 his mucklucks, his his gloves are mittens are off, you know, 1:14:17.880 --> 1:14:22.320 his hands are like black and necrotic and pustules and 1:14:22.360 --> 1:14:25.559 he's like them, they're like, we need to take you 1:14:25.600 --> 1:14:28.400 back to shipwreck camp. Get on the sled and he says, 1:14:28.520 --> 1:14:32.880 you know, let me die, and like I'm done. Um, 1:14:33.080 --> 1:14:36.559 and you you know, then they just like cluck the 1:14:36.600 --> 1:14:38.679 dogs on and head out. It's kind of and those 1:14:38.720 --> 1:14:42.320 dudes never seen again. It's just like never seen again, 1:14:42.680 --> 1:14:45.519 you know. In fairness, Bartlett sort of makes token efforts 1:14:45.520 --> 1:14:48.160 to look for him a couple of times. But um, 1:14:48.320 --> 1:14:52.799 four other guys get stranded on um on Harold Island, 1:14:53.320 --> 1:14:57.439 which they came to accidentally, you know, they were trying 1:14:57.479 --> 1:14:59.719 to reach Wrangle Island and they ended up on Harrold 1:14:59.760 --> 1:15:04.400 is Harold Island, which is that really small, inhospitable, no 1:15:04.600 --> 1:15:08.360 drift wouold, no food place, and they're those guys, um 1:15:08.920 --> 1:15:12.839 are screwed. You know. Yeah, when did someone find their bodies? 1:15:13.240 --> 1:15:19.320 It's like nineteen twenty six, I'm thinking lands on the islands. Yeah, 1:15:19.439 --> 1:15:24.000 and they this they were US, um, the US expedition 1:15:24.040 --> 1:15:29.800 and they um, I believe they were. They had the 1:15:29.840 --> 1:15:33.120 notion of finding out if they were still there. They 1:15:33.160 --> 1:15:35.400 were aware of them, They were aware of them, and 1:15:35.560 --> 1:15:37.800 you know, so it's like, but what's What's interesting is 1:15:37.840 --> 1:15:41.439 that that so for four members, Barlett's trying to get 1:15:41.479 --> 1:15:45.360 everybody over to Wrangle Island. But during the during these 1:15:45.479 --> 1:15:50.160 relay halls, UM, at one point Mom and Yard, Mom 1:15:50.160 --> 1:15:52.880 and the Norwegian member of the team. Um, he gets 1:15:53.760 --> 1:15:57.519 disoriented and he ends up like within two miles of 1:15:57.760 --> 1:16:01.880 Harold Island. And at this point everyone's in mom and 1:16:02.000 --> 1:16:04.640 is in pretty bad condition, you know, he's like dislocated 1:16:04.720 --> 1:16:08.559 his knee and there they don't have that much food left. 1:16:09.320 --> 1:16:13.559 He realizes he's at the wrong island. So he decides, uh, 1:16:13.600 --> 1:16:18.000 after consultation with the other members of that little advanced team, 1:16:18.040 --> 1:16:22.160 that he's going to go back to shipwreck Camp and 1:16:22.560 --> 1:16:25.600 these guys can stay there within like two miles of 1:16:25.920 --> 1:16:29.880 this island. But um, there's there's open leads of water 1:16:29.960 --> 1:16:32.360 between it and the island at the moment. So it 1:16:32.439 --> 1:16:34.599 has to make a hard decision, right. He's kind of, 1:16:34.720 --> 1:16:37.160 um the leader of this little team, and he says, 1:16:37.160 --> 1:16:40.240 I'm going back to shipwright Camp. You guys make it here, 1:16:40.240 --> 1:16:42.280 And then they write letters to Barlett saying, Okay, here's 1:16:42.280 --> 1:16:44.280 what we're gonna do. Stay here as long as I can, 1:16:45.600 --> 1:16:47.400 as long as we can come try to get us. 1:16:48.000 --> 1:16:51.200 If we don't hear from you will eventually make it 1:16:51.240 --> 1:16:54.240 over to Wrangle Island ourselves. How are they all kind 1:16:54.240 --> 1:16:58.679 of getting split up? And I mean it's really what's 1:16:58.720 --> 1:17:02.439 interesting about that is like, you know, if you think 1:17:02.479 --> 1:17:05.080 about polar ce a lot of times you imagine it 1:17:05.160 --> 1:17:09.840 being flat, you know. And what is so remarkable about 1:17:09.840 --> 1:17:16.240 this landscape seascape is how ruptured and undulating and uh, 1:17:16.320 --> 1:17:24.400 you know difficulty, Yeah you so. And also you know 1:17:24.479 --> 1:17:26.920 the light. There's a really great question though. You know 1:17:26.960 --> 1:17:30.920 there are there are also um experiencing a lot of 1:17:31.160 --> 1:17:36.240 um Arctic mirages, right there are these um like uh, 1:17:36.439 --> 1:17:41.200 celestial conditions make it so that um, something out there 1:17:41.240 --> 1:17:44.799 will appear to be a land mass and it's like uh, 1:17:44.840 --> 1:17:47.639 you know water sky that has come up over open 1:17:48.120 --> 1:17:50.320 water and you know it sort of looks like a 1:17:50.439 --> 1:17:53.799 land mass and it's like an optical illusion. So that's 1:17:53.920 --> 1:17:57.320 part of it. Um. The conditions of trying to navigate 1:17:57.400 --> 1:18:01.400 are really hard because the ice is continually breaking up, 1:18:01.400 --> 1:18:03.120 and so you can't go in a straight line. You 1:18:03.120 --> 1:18:05.679 have to follow leads till they narrow and then cross 1:18:05.760 --> 1:18:10.799 there um and so they end up getting quite disoriented. Uh, 1:18:10.840 --> 1:18:13.040 in a number of instances. But once they have this 1:18:13.080 --> 1:18:18.200 start hit with another stuff and until your guy Stephenson 1:18:18.240 --> 1:18:22.720 talked about one time stalking a grizzly bear that wand 1:18:22.800 --> 1:18:26.000 up being a ground squirrel. We're talking about he talking 1:18:26.000 --> 1:18:30.880 about how deceptive, Oh, the Arctic light is. Yeah, and 1:18:30.920 --> 1:18:33.720 there's another guy that was like, I can't remember which 1:18:33.720 --> 1:18:37.040 way it was, like they think they're looking at island 1:18:38.320 --> 1:18:42.800 and it has two glaciers. It's a walrus head sticking 1:18:42.800 --> 1:18:45.920 out of the water. That's how in terms of like 1:18:46.160 --> 1:18:52.040 just distances and mirage. Yeah, and then and then when 1:18:52.040 --> 1:18:55.080 the light comes, all the snow blindness, snowblindness, and and 1:18:55.080 --> 1:18:58.880 everything's blowing. So yeah, it's and also you're not the 1:18:58.960 --> 1:19:01.439 conditions of such there not able to take really accurate 1:19:01.520 --> 1:19:04.519 readings right and then and then not to mention the 1:19:05.040 --> 1:19:08.080 ice that you're on is moving, you know, sometimes great 1:19:08.080 --> 1:19:14.200 distances like so, so that all contributes to, um, the difficulty. Uh. 1:19:14.240 --> 1:19:15.720 And and you know, I'm glad you brought up the 1:19:15.720 --> 1:19:17.960 pressure ridges because one of the most badass things they 1:19:17.960 --> 1:19:21.760 do in this book is that once they decide, okay, 1:19:21.840 --> 1:19:26.400 we're making a break for a wrangle island. Um, they 1:19:26.520 --> 1:19:30.759 encounter when the shore ice. When when when this floating 1:19:30.840 --> 1:19:34.439 sea ice gets within proximity of maybe thirty miles of 1:19:34.479 --> 1:19:39.000 Wrangel Island, it starts bumping up against these extended spits, right, 1:19:39.280 --> 1:19:42.200 and so the ice that's hitting it's kind of like 1:19:42.240 --> 1:19:46.200 a wave, a frozen wave. So the ice is is 1:19:46.240 --> 1:19:51.679 hitting the shoreline far out off shore, buckling and then growing, growing, 1:19:51.760 --> 1:19:53.720 and like some of them are not up to a 1:19:53.800 --> 1:19:56.120 hundred feet high. And there's some really cool pictures in 1:19:56.160 --> 1:19:57.880 the book of like them standing on these things, and 1:19:57.880 --> 1:20:00.720 you realize, oh my god. So they have to now 1:20:00.800 --> 1:20:03.920 get sledge and everything over these things. And Bartlett when 1:20:03.920 --> 1:20:07.320 he encounters them, a couple of the other guys had 1:20:07.320 --> 1:20:09.800 gone like maybe one or two miles each direction, and 1:20:09.840 --> 1:20:12.400 the thing extends for ten or twenty miles, this long 1:20:12.600 --> 1:20:14.920 ridge of ice, and he's like, well, we're gonna have 1:20:14.920 --> 1:20:16.960 to cut our way through it. That's it, right. So 1:20:17.000 --> 1:20:19.560 then they take to take some like four days to 1:20:19.840 --> 1:20:25.120 hack a trail, and with the dogs and ice axes 1:20:25.160 --> 1:20:28.759 and shovels, h hack a trail through the series of ridges. 1:20:29.280 --> 1:20:31.640 And they do some clever things, like they tie a 1:20:31.720 --> 1:20:34.920 rope between two sleds and then they'll get one of 1:20:34.920 --> 1:20:37.200 the sleds up the top of these ridges are really 1:20:37.840 --> 1:20:40.840 terrifying and precipitous, like if you fall down you could 1:20:40.920 --> 1:20:43.200 well be dead or battered at the bottom. So they 1:20:43.240 --> 1:20:45.040 take these sleds and they get one to the top, 1:20:45.520 --> 1:20:49.320 and then they using men and dogs, they push it over, 1:20:49.600 --> 1:20:52.720 and then it pulls the other sled behind it. The 1:20:52.760 --> 1:20:55.320 weight of that sled pulls the other sled up, and 1:20:55.360 --> 1:20:58.479 then they disentangle that one or on time and then 1:20:58.640 --> 1:21:02.320 do it again and makes some you know, weeks weeks 1:21:02.320 --> 1:21:06.320 to get from shipwreck camp to Wrangle Island, and at 1:21:06.360 --> 1:21:13.240 that point, you know, all ideas of them all making 1:21:13.280 --> 1:21:16.800 it across the long straight to Siberia are out the 1:21:16.800 --> 1:21:20.840 window because they're in quite bad shape. He makes an 1:21:20.840 --> 1:21:23.479 interesting call here, and this is where I'm at in 1:21:23.479 --> 1:21:26.200 the book, So from here on out, I'm I'm you're 1:21:26.240 --> 1:21:29.080 You're on your own. But he makes an interesting call 1:21:29.120 --> 1:21:31.720 at Wrangle Island where he wants everyone to break up 1:21:31.920 --> 1:21:38.280 into really small groups and spread out all over the place. Yeah, 1:21:38.360 --> 1:21:42.240 well the theory it seems so weird to me. Well, 1:21:42.320 --> 1:21:47.599 his rationale is uh. Bob Barlett decides very quickly when 1:21:47.600 --> 1:21:49.400 he lands on Wrangle Island. So, so first of all 1:21:49.439 --> 1:21:53.439 they find driftwood. So, and they've got some um. They 1:21:53.479 --> 1:21:56.120 have brought with them some tents right from the ship 1:21:56.160 --> 1:21:58.439 they brought these bell tents are kind of like yurts, right, 1:21:58.840 --> 1:22:01.960 big ones though big big yards um and some other 1:22:02.000 --> 1:22:06.400 canvas tents. But at first they it's more conducive to 1:22:06.600 --> 1:22:12.160 its march when they land March March twelfth. And at 1:22:12.200 --> 1:22:14.519 first that they decide like, we'll build you glues right 1:22:14.520 --> 1:22:18.800 because the um they're efficient. Um. So Barlett determines, Okay, 1:22:18.800 --> 1:22:23.320 there's driftwood there, um is some game. They have been 1:22:23.439 --> 1:22:27.360 encountering seals, but the seals are quite offshore. Uh. And 1:22:27.400 --> 1:22:30.640 then some Arctic foxes and some bears that they have 1:22:30.760 --> 1:22:34.519 encountered in Usually the bear situation was like they're not 1:22:34.680 --> 1:22:37.559 hunting bears. The bears are kind of hunting camp man. 1:22:37.600 --> 1:22:40.880 You know, the bears have been following them, or the 1:22:40.920 --> 1:22:42.960 bears will be duking it out with the dogs, right, 1:22:42.960 --> 1:22:45.840 and the bears like bear while he's duking it out 1:22:45.880 --> 1:22:48.719 with the dog. There's really close encounters though, like where 1:22:49.040 --> 1:22:52.040 one guy Hadley has to snag his rifle, like while 1:22:52.120 --> 1:22:54.320 the bear is trying to get to the dogs and 1:22:54.320 --> 1:22:55.840 he's on the other side of the sled, you know, 1:22:55.920 --> 1:23:00.040 and he's like grabbing his rifle within feet of a 1:23:00.080 --> 1:23:02.400 freaking ten foot polar bear. You know when they when 1:23:02.400 --> 1:23:05.400 they gourmet butcher polar bear, they like the back legs, 1:23:05.560 --> 1:23:10.200 the backs drafts, and the heart. Oh yeah, yeah, there's 1:23:10.320 --> 1:23:15.160 there's no human presence on Wrangle Island. And by the way, 1:23:15.600 --> 1:23:19.080 visited at all um from you know, that's the last 1:23:19.120 --> 1:23:21.920 known place that had wooly mammoth. Yeah, and that cool. 1:23:21.760 --> 1:23:26.400 So also there's like a very yes some people most 1:23:26.400 --> 1:23:30.600 people say four somewhere like a dwarf wooly mammoth. But 1:23:30.640 --> 1:23:33.200 so that's a really good question. Um, at that time, 1:23:34.280 --> 1:23:38.320 there's no residents on Wrangle Island and even to this day, um, 1:23:38.400 --> 1:23:42.599 there there's like a couple of so it's it's Russians 1:23:42.880 --> 1:23:46.120 own it. But um they're they have like one full 1:23:46.160 --> 1:23:49.320 time resident, one or two full time residents. And then 1:23:49.640 --> 1:23:51.920 I was really bumb man. I had almost went to 1:23:51.920 --> 1:23:55.559 Wrangle Island twice. First time my trip got scuttled. So 1:23:55.640 --> 1:23:59.200 there's a couple of expedition companies that take you, um 1:23:59.240 --> 1:24:03.120 in you like a fifty person um, you know, ship 1:24:03.160 --> 1:24:05.040 and then you get off on zodiacs and you can 1:24:05.080 --> 1:24:07.000 go camp for a few days on Wrangle Island with 1:24:07.040 --> 1:24:11.160 these nature um naturalists and rangers be really cool. Had 1:24:11.160 --> 1:24:15.600 it set up, uh pandemic scuttled that, and then I 1:24:15.680 --> 1:24:19.000 was going to go the next summer, and the Putin 1:24:19.040 --> 1:24:22.600 invaded uh crying, and then like it's they weren't going, 1:24:22.800 --> 1:24:25.720 called that Russia. Yeah, we can't go to Russia. So 1:24:25.920 --> 1:24:28.559 that was kind of a bummer. But so then Barlett, 1:24:28.560 --> 1:24:30.639 you're right, he made the call that like these people, 1:24:31.040 --> 1:24:33.680 so in getting across the pressure ridges and getting over 1:24:33.720 --> 1:24:36.720 from ship at camp to Wrangle Island, UM, some of 1:24:36.760 --> 1:24:39.760 the members are in pretty bad condition. Now, I will 1:24:39.760 --> 1:24:43.680 say the Inuit members Kurl Luck, his wife Kirak, who 1:24:43.840 --> 1:24:46.599 nicknamed Auntie, and the two kids, Helen and mug Pe 1:24:47.040 --> 1:24:50.599 are like nothing. It's like nothing has happened to them. 1:24:50.720 --> 1:24:53.080 They're in absolutely great I love they got little kids. 1:24:53.080 --> 1:24:55.080 The little kids are always playing. The little kids are playing, 1:24:55.080 --> 1:24:57.040 and they got the cat. You know, everybody else's like 1:24:57.479 --> 1:25:01.720 the kids. They're like, I don't see problem, eat seal 1:25:01.800 --> 1:25:05.400 blubber and have really nice arctic clothing, you know. But 1:25:06.240 --> 1:25:08.280 you could blame Stephenson in part for this because he 1:25:08.680 --> 1:25:12.280 brought Antie along Kiuk to so Arctic clothing and then 1:25:12.600 --> 1:25:15.160 but he bought a bunch of the skins pretty late 1:25:15.200 --> 1:25:17.600 in the game. So like she's sewing and teaching the 1:25:17.640 --> 1:25:20.519 members to sew while they're still floating along, and they 1:25:20.560 --> 1:25:23.799 didn't like they weren't fully kidded out all the members anyway, 1:25:23.840 --> 1:25:27.519 Barlette makes the call that like, these people are two tired, 1:25:27.600 --> 1:25:32.400 frost bitten uh and to make and inexperienced to make 1:25:32.439 --> 1:25:35.640 it across. It's about a hundred miles from the southern 1:25:36.080 --> 1:25:42.960 coastline of Wrangel Island to Russian UH Northeastern disease, So 1:25:43.360 --> 1:25:46.679 that's yeah, it's interesting that there they start coming down. 1:25:47.120 --> 1:25:51.519 Within days after Bartlett leaving with Kateactobic, they start coming 1:25:51.560 --> 1:25:54.400 down with this swelling sickness. So their limbs are getting 1:25:54.439 --> 1:25:58.080 really um. Their limbs are some of their hands and 1:25:58.120 --> 1:26:00.280 feet are swelling to like twice their normal side eyes 1:26:00.640 --> 1:26:04.360 and the there's two theories. One is that the pemmican 1:26:04.520 --> 1:26:08.960 that they had was somehow flawed in the ratio of 1:26:09.080 --> 1:26:13.679 fat to protein was wrong, I mean, not not good enough, 1:26:13.800 --> 1:26:17.280 so that they begin to get um. What's called nephritis 1:26:17.479 --> 1:26:21.800 or it's like an inflammation of the kidneys um and imbalance. 1:26:21.880 --> 1:26:25.559 You know, they've got like a dietic dietetic imbalance. But 1:26:25.600 --> 1:26:29.040 it's freaking everybody out because it's not scurvy because they're 1:26:29.080 --> 1:26:32.719 getting some meat you know here and there with Arctic foxes, 1:26:32.760 --> 1:26:36.880 the seals and the polar bears. Um. But then you know, 1:26:37.720 --> 1:26:42.040 they start to So that's the other thing. Stephenson doesn't 1:26:42.120 --> 1:26:44.559 know that, Like he's like, well, they should have all 1:26:44.600 --> 1:26:49.360 gone with Bartlett. Bartlett just leaves with one Inuit guy, Karactobac. 1:26:50.240 --> 1:26:53.519 The problem is, you know, it'd be like taking all 1:26:53.560 --> 1:26:56.559 your buddies and there there's in terrible shape and they 1:26:56.560 --> 1:26:59.120 can't go, like you know, they're they're no longer fit 1:26:59.200 --> 1:27:01.479 for this track across the ice that's going to be 1:27:01.560 --> 1:27:03.920 dangerous itself. To go fetch a boat, yeah, I mean 1:27:03.920 --> 1:27:06.320 in a very roundabout way, go fetch a boat. Yeah. 1:27:06.320 --> 1:27:12.200 When would they have been like considered missing or how 1:27:12.240 --> 1:27:17.400 long would have been? So Stephenson makes land in like 1:27:17.520 --> 1:27:23.559 October or late September, early October of and eventually he 1:27:23.640 --> 1:27:30.120 does he sends word to the Canadian government that uh, oh, 1:27:30.160 --> 1:27:32.320 I've lost my ship but no, he has no idea 1:27:32.360 --> 1:27:34.040 where it is. I have I have no idea where 1:27:34.080 --> 1:27:36.800 my ship is. But it will probably be fine because 1:27:36.840 --> 1:27:40.200 they have these umiaks, which are skin boats. And you know, 1:27:40.200 --> 1:27:43.519 Stephenson's thinking more like what he would do, and but 1:27:43.600 --> 1:27:46.000 he would only do this alone or with a really 1:27:46.000 --> 1:27:48.200 small with him and two into a un He's not 1:27:48.280 --> 1:27:51.120 going to do it with like a bunch of inexperienced people. 1:27:51.360 --> 1:27:54.320 So he reports to the Canadian government that like the 1:27:54.320 --> 1:28:00.479 flagship Carlaic has gone, it will it will either be rushed. 1:28:00.640 --> 1:28:04.680 Most likely it will be crushed or it's going to 1:28:05.120 --> 1:28:11.519 like bypass wrangle Island and end up like somewhere else. Yeah, 1:28:11.760 --> 1:28:14.200 there's this, there's this. I forgot about that when he's 1:28:14.240 --> 1:28:17.880 talking about the like in some number of years, when 1:28:17.880 --> 1:28:21.400 you're all dead, it'll spit you out like in Greenland. Yeah, 1:28:21.560 --> 1:28:23.920 he says. I love his line. He says he'll go 1:28:24.000 --> 1:28:26.040 around the Arctic and it'll like spit you out. But 1:28:26.120 --> 1:28:28.400 it takes a few years. Yeah, it says, either either 1:28:28.760 --> 1:28:33.680 them or their wreckage. And great. So there they were 1:28:33.720 --> 1:28:36.720 going west, but watch to the east. Are they are 1:28:36.840 --> 1:28:40.320 coming back? Are the other two ships? Meanwhile, just like 1:28:40.800 --> 1:28:42.960 they've gotten where they were supposed to go, and they're 1:28:43.000 --> 1:28:47.240 just hanging out waiting. Right. So when Stephenson arrives back 1:28:47.280 --> 1:28:52.160 on mainland Alaska, he he's cruising along the coast and 1:28:52.200 --> 1:28:54.600 he runs into some of the people that actually that 1:28:54.640 --> 1:28:57.200 he had known from the previous expedition he was on, 1:28:57.280 --> 1:29:02.680 and they have you know, they're hearing stories like there's reports. Okay, 1:29:02.760 --> 1:29:06.439 uh yeah, the Alaska and the Mary Sachs have been 1:29:06.479 --> 1:29:11.639 seen and they're actually winnering over in this bay before 1:29:11.720 --> 1:29:14.080 Harold Island. But they're safe. So he learns that those 1:29:14.120 --> 1:29:17.719 two ships are safe. So at that point Stephenson decides, Okay, 1:29:17.720 --> 1:29:22.439 I'm gonna reoutfit what's called the New Northern Party and 1:29:23.479 --> 1:29:25.679 that other one that's the Old Northern Party and they're 1:29:25.720 --> 1:29:31.280 screws like Europe. It's like, well, there's still your people. 1:29:31.960 --> 1:29:35.120 But anyway, he's like, I got this. I'm gonna I'm 1:29:35.120 --> 1:29:37.519 gonna do what I said I was gonna do. He's 1:29:37.560 --> 1:29:40.280 also really clever because he knows from where he is 1:29:40.680 --> 1:29:44.479 how long it takes mail to get to the Canadian government. 1:29:44.520 --> 1:29:46.919 It has to go by like dog sled, and it's 1:29:46.960 --> 1:29:50.520 he knows that it's going to leave like by December 1:29:50.600 --> 1:29:53.519 one or something, and then it's gonna take a couple 1:29:53.600 --> 1:29:57.080 of months to get to the Canadian government. So by 1:29:57.120 --> 1:29:59.880 the time he knows that, by the time they get 1:30:00.000 --> 1:30:04.120 the report that the car looks gone and I'm reoutfitting, 1:30:04.400 --> 1:30:06.479 he will already have done it, Like he'll already be 1:30:06.640 --> 1:30:09.120 out on the ice doing his thing, and they can't 1:30:09.120 --> 1:30:12.639 really say don't do that, right, And he he does 1:30:12.680 --> 1:30:15.360 some pretty m debout things like he's gotta he's got 1:30:15.360 --> 1:30:19.280 an open checkbook, right. So he arrives at one of 1:30:19.320 --> 1:30:22.479 these trading posts and it turns out the guy is 1:30:22.520 --> 1:30:24.880 basically leaving because he's been there too long and he 1:30:24.920 --> 1:30:27.120 can't stand the winners anymore. And he's like selling everything 1:30:27.160 --> 1:30:29.400 sevens and like buys it all, and he goes to 1:30:29.439 --> 1:30:32.160 another guy and he's like, he finds the guy has 1:30:32.160 --> 1:30:36.080 a really cool schooner, so he's like, hey, can I 1:30:36.080 --> 1:30:38.439 buy that schooner? And he writes of a check for 1:30:38.479 --> 1:30:41.960 like thirteen grand right on top of the two ships 1:30:42.000 --> 1:30:45.960 that he's already bought. Um. Yeah, the numbers are astronomical 1:30:46.000 --> 1:30:49.360 what he ends up spending, right, But so Stephenson quickly 1:30:49.920 --> 1:30:52.680 um regroups and he he has like he has it 1:30:52.760 --> 1:30:56.960 out with UM, the the expedition leader of the Southern Party, 1:30:57.240 --> 1:31:01.280 this guy Dr Anderson, UM, and you know, Dr Anderson 1:31:01.320 --> 1:31:04.880 sees that Stephenson. First of all, he's like, where's your ship? 1:31:04.920 --> 1:31:06.280 Why you know? And why aren't you going to do 1:31:06.320 --> 1:31:10.000 anything to go find them. Stephenson's like, I can't do anything. 1:31:10.240 --> 1:31:13.280 Nobody can go there until summer. Right that part of 1:31:13.280 --> 1:31:16.519 the world, You've got like a six week maybe window 1:31:16.720 --> 1:31:20.800 where there's going to be open water, and some of 1:31:20.800 --> 1:31:22.960 these places are accessible. But at this point I don't 1:31:22.960 --> 1:31:25.120 even know where the car Look is. So Stephenson is 1:31:25.240 --> 1:31:27.120 right to say, like, there's nothing I can do about 1:31:27.120 --> 1:31:30.519 it personally right now, except to say we should be 1:31:30.640 --> 1:31:35.599 organizing rescue missions for next summer. Right anyway, He goes 1:31:35.680 --> 1:31:41.040 off onto the ice re outfits, grabs a couple Norwegian 1:31:41.120 --> 1:31:46.080 dudes and goes off and Um continues to do you know, 1:31:46.120 --> 1:31:53.120 ethnological and um scientific study and sort of bid bids 1:31:53.160 --> 1:31:55.760 goodbye to the car Look. And by the time he 1:31:55.840 --> 1:31:59.920 ultimately gets back, oh, by the way, he abandons his 1:32:00.040 --> 1:32:03.000 wife and child again after being with that for a 1:32:03.040 --> 1:32:06.479 little while. UM. This is a touching scene of good farewell. 1:32:07.880 --> 1:32:11.600 UM anyway, so Stephenson is doing that, and then and 1:32:11.640 --> 1:32:16.040 then the the book takes off onto where it really 1:32:16.080 --> 1:32:21.519 picks up. I think momentum is after Bartlett leaves with 1:32:21.600 --> 1:32:25.000 this cateactobic guy. Yes, let me let an ordeal. Yeah, 1:32:25.080 --> 1:32:29.040 let's let's just Yeah. So they get to Wrangle Island. 1:32:29.360 --> 1:32:32.960 He leaves everybody most people people Wrangle Island, gives them 1:32:32.960 --> 1:32:35.639 instructions written instructions, do you use that and the other 1:32:35.680 --> 1:32:40.880 thing I'm gonna split, watch for me and such such 1:32:40.920 --> 1:32:45.439 and such harbor July August, watched for me to come 1:32:45.479 --> 1:32:56.840 back with a boat, right, and I should answer your 1:32:56.840 --> 1:32:59.720 pbous questions. So when they got to Wrangle Island, Bartlett's 1:32:59.800 --> 1:33:02.880 um rationale was, if we set up there there on 1:33:02.920 --> 1:33:07.080 the northern the northeastern tip of Wrangel Island, it's only 1:33:07.160 --> 1:33:10.400 like ninety miles wide, and you know, fifty or sixty 1:33:10.400 --> 1:33:15.160 miles um top to bottom um. So Bartlett's rationale is 1:33:15.200 --> 1:33:17.760 that there, if we spread out and have some people 1:33:17.800 --> 1:33:19.800 at icy Spit, which is where they land, there's another 1:33:19.800 --> 1:33:22.920 place called Cape Wearing it's about midway, and then there's 1:33:23.000 --> 1:33:27.840 Rogers Harbor, which is the southern h western point of 1:33:27.880 --> 1:33:31.600 the island. He figures that if we distribute people in 1:33:31.640 --> 1:33:36.160 different teams, they can have better luck hunting in smaller 1:33:36.200 --> 1:33:39.080 groups and and taking care of themselves rather than having 1:33:39.120 --> 1:33:42.479 to have, you know, cook for fifteen people every day. 1:33:42.960 --> 1:33:46.320 So smaller groups, and also it will um, it will 1:33:46.360 --> 1:33:50.160 distribute the hunting um landscape a little more spread out. 1:33:50.360 --> 1:33:53.720 That's his rationality. Now then, so right that he ends 1:33:53.760 --> 1:33:57.439 up like on a rate, the book becomes like a 1:33:57.560 --> 1:34:00.840 race against time because Barlin needs to get across the 1:34:00.880 --> 1:34:05.840 Long Straight to Siberia and then somehow get all the 1:34:05.880 --> 1:34:08.040 way over to the east and fight a shipped across 1:34:08.080 --> 1:34:11.160 the Bearing Strait and get back to Alaska where he 1:34:11.160 --> 1:34:15.360 can send a telegram to tell them they're on Wrangle Island. Right, 1:34:15.960 --> 1:34:19.120 so their lives like at every moment are kind of 1:34:19.160 --> 1:34:22.840 dependent on whether Bartlett makes it. And so I cut 1:34:22.920 --> 1:34:29.920 back and forth. It's like if Bartlett and his Intuit hunter, 1:34:30.600 --> 1:34:32.320 like you know, you got all these people dying and 1:34:32.400 --> 1:34:34.360 stuff happened, like if they had just gone off ten 1:34:34.400 --> 1:34:37.639 miles and fell into a lead and died. Yeah, it's 1:34:37.680 --> 1:34:39.960 reasonable soon no one on no one on Wrangle Island's 1:34:40.000 --> 1:34:43.679 gonna survive. I think maybe that the Inuits would happen 1:34:44.400 --> 1:34:47.120 because there's a at anecdote I'll get to because they 1:34:47.120 --> 1:34:49.200 could have been they could have been there anyway, right right. 1:34:49.240 --> 1:34:53.240 I mean, you know it's not ideal because um of 1:34:53.400 --> 1:34:57.760 how remote it is, but um yeah, so Bartlett yea, 1:34:57.880 --> 1:35:00.240 you know, there's it becomes it's sort of this race 1:35:00.280 --> 1:35:03.559 against time where Bartlett is trying to get to mainland 1:35:03.560 --> 1:35:05.760 Siberia and then to get word to the world that 1:35:05.880 --> 1:35:07.679 there's a bunch of stranded people from the car look 1:35:07.680 --> 1:35:10.920 on Wrangel Island and you cut back and forth to 1:35:10.960 --> 1:35:14.000 what's happening with them on Wrangel Island and things begin 1:35:14.080 --> 1:35:16.719 to so they you know, they don't have a finite 1:35:16.760 --> 1:35:19.840 amount of um or they do have a finite amount 1:35:19.840 --> 1:35:21.960 of food um that they've been able to bring. And 1:35:21.960 --> 1:35:24.840 they make a couple of um gnarly treks back to 1:35:24.920 --> 1:35:28.519 shipwreck camping to get more uh some really some really 1:35:28.600 --> 1:35:32.360 dangerous treks where the leads break open, they get guys 1:35:32.400 --> 1:35:33.760 get so I don't want to ruin it for you, 1:35:33.800 --> 1:35:38.280 guys get separated from each other and from there and 1:35:38.320 --> 1:35:41.080 the dog has to like lead them back, you know. 1:35:41.400 --> 1:35:46.800 So things are starting to deteriorate on Wrangel Island in 1:35:46.840 --> 1:35:50.840 that um their physical condition is poor and they're not 1:35:51.400 --> 1:35:56.360 they're hunting constantly, but they're not able to procure enough food. 1:35:56.479 --> 1:36:00.479 They can just barely stay ahead, you know. The woman 1:36:00.479 --> 1:36:03.240 and the kids, Like I'd run an essay rolled about 1:36:03.240 --> 1:36:06.000 this where the woman and the children want to be 1:36:06.080 --> 1:36:10.360 in some of the primary procures. Yeah, of game. Yeah, 1:36:10.400 --> 1:36:13.960 it's so it's really cool. Curl look, uh is the 1:36:14.280 --> 1:36:17.120 husband and father of the two children, and so he's 1:36:17.240 --> 1:36:19.080 really good hunter. I mean he's you know, he's what 1:36:19.160 --> 1:36:23.719 he's getting seals. Um seals start to go off shore, 1:36:23.800 --> 1:36:26.479 so it gets harder to get seals, and as things 1:36:26.560 --> 1:36:30.000 become um more dire and they're running out of food, 1:36:30.520 --> 1:36:34.840 Auntie is really industrious, Like she figures out how first 1:36:34.840 --> 1:36:38.320 of all, Curl look, you know, fashion some um bows 1:36:38.320 --> 1:36:41.080 and arrows because they're going to run out of ammunition too. 1:36:41.600 --> 1:36:43.960 So he starts to figure like, if we can if 1:36:44.000 --> 1:36:48.799 we can shoot um arctic foxes and birds with arrows, 1:36:49.200 --> 1:36:52.879 that'll save us ammo because we're gonna need the bullets 1:36:52.920 --> 1:36:57.519 for walrus, bears, seals, bigger things and so. But Auntie 1:36:57.840 --> 1:37:01.000 is really really clever, so she figures out how to 1:37:01.280 --> 1:37:04.840 um jig for cod She takes a sewing needle and 1:37:05.000 --> 1:37:06.880 bends it and then hooks it up to some sinew 1:37:07.040 --> 1:37:09.719 twine and then they stand over this little title crack 1:37:09.960 --> 1:37:15.040 and like snagging. Um these like twelve inch tom god there, like, yeah, 1:37:15.120 --> 1:37:18.600 can they get a bunch of those? Um, She's the 1:37:18.680 --> 1:37:22.040 kids do some really clever stuff. One of the girls, Helen, 1:37:21.920 --> 1:37:24.320 the eleven year old, figures out how to put a 1:37:24.320 --> 1:37:29.280 piece of seal blubber onto a feather quill where you 1:37:29.320 --> 1:37:32.479 pull it out right, and then she has that attached 1:37:32.560 --> 1:37:36.240 to a piece of string and chucks the blubber over 1:37:36.280 --> 1:37:39.840 there and kind of hides and seagull come up and 1:37:40.479 --> 1:37:42.880 eat the blubber. The quill gets stuck in their throat 1:37:42.920 --> 1:37:45.280 and then she drags it over and wrings its neck. 1:37:45.360 --> 1:37:47.880 You know. Um, that's like one seagull at a time. 1:37:48.520 --> 1:37:52.000 But the biggest hunting, um, I mean kind of the 1:37:52.040 --> 1:37:56.639 most hunting that they do. That's effective. Um oh also 1:37:56.720 --> 1:38:01.360 curl look. Uh. He creates snare tracks for snare traps 1:38:01.400 --> 1:38:07.000 for Arctic foxes. Um. And he builds two things. One 1:38:07.080 --> 1:38:10.720 he builds a kayak um, which is really cool. I 1:38:10.760 --> 1:38:14.080 mean there's there's a there's an image of him working 1:38:14.120 --> 1:38:16.679 with the Scotsman and William McKinley that they had a camera, 1:38:16.760 --> 1:38:18.519 you know, like they have a picture of building. It's 1:38:18.720 --> 1:38:21.840 crazy that they're gonna like and then I know, like 1:38:22.200 --> 1:38:24.479 and so he takes a couple of weeks and he 1:38:24.560 --> 1:38:26.920 it's really funny because he's hedging, like they're they're starting 1:38:26.920 --> 1:38:28.800 to run out of food, and they're like they hear 1:38:28.840 --> 1:38:30.519 walrus in the bay and they're like, if we can 1:38:30.560 --> 1:38:33.800 get a Walruss or two, we're set. Like, you know, 1:38:33.960 --> 1:38:37.200 now it's getting to be August. They're thinking, if Winner 1:38:37.240 --> 1:38:41.040 hits again, we're screwed. We're gonna die here. Um. So 1:38:41.600 --> 1:38:44.680 he he builds a kayak and Auntie is awesome, like 1:38:44.800 --> 1:38:47.800 has has gotten all these skins from the bearded seal 1:38:47.840 --> 1:38:50.679 the brook and um, you know, he he uses an 1:38:50.720 --> 1:38:54.200 ads and you know, he uses a hatchet as an 1:38:54.240 --> 1:38:58.120 ads and he has like you know, a skinning knife 1:38:58.600 --> 1:39:01.719 and some snow knives and they he's able to fashion 1:39:01.720 --> 1:39:04.880 you know, find driftwood planks and stuff and fashions out 1:39:04.920 --> 1:39:08.720 the frame and then they bring it inside the one 1:39:08.720 --> 1:39:13.920 of the wall tents and uh Anti like completely fabricates 1:39:13.920 --> 1:39:18.040 the skin outside of this kayak. But Carola has been 1:39:18.080 --> 1:39:20.400 like hedging because he doesn't want he's the only one 1:39:20.439 --> 1:39:22.920 who knows how to run uh and he and he 1:39:22.920 --> 1:39:25.760 builds a really nice two handled paddle, you know, but 1:39:25.800 --> 1:39:29.640 he he has no interest in being solo in the 1:39:29.680 --> 1:39:33.560 water with the pound walrus, right, so he's here to 1:39:34.040 --> 1:39:36.320 like telling him I don't really want to do it, 1:39:36.560 --> 1:39:39.839 and they're finally like, you gotta go get the walrus. 1:39:39.840 --> 1:39:41.960 Work we can't do it, you know. He ends up 1:39:42.000 --> 1:39:45.000 he ends up getting a walrus. Uh and you know, 1:39:45.040 --> 1:39:47.320 but it's a small one and it doesn't last that long. 1:39:47.600 --> 1:39:51.559 So by by the time, um it's starting to get 1:39:51.640 --> 1:39:56.040 near late August, you know, they're into some uh rough rations. 1:39:56.040 --> 1:40:00.439 They're eating scurvy grass. You know, it's like um coke hilaria. 1:40:00.600 --> 1:40:04.200 It's a it's a little arctic grass that has actually 1:40:04.280 --> 1:40:11.599 named scruby grass because yeah. And then Auntie is starting 1:40:11.640 --> 1:40:14.200 to make the stuff that one of the members names 1:40:14.520 --> 1:40:18.599 salad oil. So she takes like chunks of blubber and 1:40:18.720 --> 1:40:21.479 puts them in a skin poke or a little bag 1:40:21.960 --> 1:40:24.400 and puts the chunks of blubber in there and leaves 1:40:24.439 --> 1:40:28.479 them out to ferment. And then when that stuff gets 1:40:28.479 --> 1:40:31.479 all congealed and fermented. They open up the bag and 1:40:31.600 --> 1:40:34.680 dip other chunks of seal meat and blubber into it, 1:40:34.760 --> 1:40:38.920 like you know, and and the and the you know what. 1:40:39.080 --> 1:40:43.080 People are like, we're good and uh, but like the 1:40:43.120 --> 1:40:45.160 other guys are like, do you know we really need 1:40:45.240 --> 1:40:50.000 something bigger? Um. So anyway, they start to plan, Like 1:40:50.120 --> 1:40:54.639 they realized that the window for ship getting there. Bartlett 1:40:54.720 --> 1:41:00.120 had told them that in mid July someone needs to 1:41:00.160 --> 1:41:02.559 be at Rogers Harbor on the southern point, and that's 1:41:02.600 --> 1:41:05.360 where if a ship is going to come, that's where 1:41:05.479 --> 1:41:09.800 it will will meet. You. Um, but you know, things 1:41:09.800 --> 1:41:12.280 are getting really sparse in terms of food. They know 1:41:12.360 --> 1:41:14.400 that the window is closing, and so they start planning, 1:41:14.960 --> 1:41:18.639 um to to go inland, follow this stream, go inland, 1:41:18.640 --> 1:41:21.760 build a cabinet and try to make their stand for 1:41:21.840 --> 1:41:26.280 winter on Wrangel Island, which is a really um daunting prospect, 1:41:26.320 --> 1:41:30.400 you know. And at that point, you know, without giving 1:41:30.439 --> 1:41:36.479 away too much, um, Bartlett has uh conspired to send 1:41:36.720 --> 1:41:40.559 a rescue our mata of ships. And then so these 1:41:40.560 --> 1:41:44.439 people are dying on Wrangel Island essentially, or are going 1:41:44.479 --> 1:41:49.080 to die, and unless Bartlett gets these ships to them 1:41:49.120 --> 1:41:54.080 in a really tight window. Uh, it's probably not known, 1:41:54.240 --> 1:41:57.759 But what why don't the when things get real bad? 1:42:00.240 --> 1:42:02.479 Why don't the into it? Just like what's preventing them 1:42:02.479 --> 1:42:05.479 from just taken off? You know? That's like they have 1:42:05.560 --> 1:42:07.559 the skill set to take like they can make boats. 1:42:07.600 --> 1:42:09.400 They know what they're doing. Yeah, I mean I think 1:42:09.439 --> 1:42:14.680 that there's a there's a a kind of ethical standard, 1:42:14.720 --> 1:42:17.559 like they were hired, you know, they were hired to 1:42:17.800 --> 1:42:20.800 do a job, because it's like pulling the weight for 1:42:20.840 --> 1:42:22.640 all these people. You think at a point you'd be like, 1:42:22.680 --> 1:42:24.080 I don't know that you I don't know what you 1:42:24.080 --> 1:42:26.519 guys do this for me? Right? Okay? Yeah. So the 1:42:26.560 --> 1:42:28.120 other thing I forgot to tell you though, is that 1:42:28.240 --> 1:42:32.400 like so so curl look um, you know, they they 1:42:32.439 --> 1:42:36.479 stay and they you know, they probably do realize like 1:42:36.560 --> 1:42:38.479 I'm we're doing most of this. But though Hadley is 1:42:38.479 --> 1:42:40.840 a pretty good hunter, McKinley is a good hunter. This guy, 1:42:40.920 --> 1:42:43.080 Ernest Chafe, he's young, he's he was the mess room 1:42:43.160 --> 1:42:45.120 boy on this car. Look, he's like nineteen, and he 1:42:45.200 --> 1:42:48.960 brought with him his shooting medals from competitions that he 1:42:49.000 --> 1:42:50.960 had won. He's sort of badass, and so he ends 1:42:51.000 --> 1:42:53.240 up being pretty good. But what one of the things 1:42:53.280 --> 1:42:57.680 that wearing keep wearing. Um. There's all these cliffs and 1:42:57.680 --> 1:43:01.719 they're filled with thousands of they name them crow bills, 1:43:01.760 --> 1:43:05.760 but their ox or meewers um. So they're on these 1:43:06.120 --> 1:43:08.960 cliffy you know, they're like little kind of penguiny looking birds, 1:43:09.000 --> 1:43:12.639 but they you know, great diving duck um diving meewer 1:43:13.040 --> 1:43:15.160 and and so they're up there and they realize, Okay, 1:43:15.160 --> 1:43:17.439 there's a lot of meat there. We can get it 1:43:17.560 --> 1:43:21.160 if we can get it. So they they use driftwood 1:43:21.360 --> 1:43:24.480 and and rope and they build this ladder. That McKinley, 1:43:24.520 --> 1:43:26.400 who's this little they call him a we mack. He's 1:43:26.439 --> 1:43:29.200 only weighs like a buck thirty. It's a little dude. 1:43:29.200 --> 1:43:32.040 But he's spry, and so he's gonna climb up these 1:43:32.120 --> 1:43:35.800 ladders and get you know, they don't have shotguns another 1:43:35.840 --> 1:43:38.080 thing they blew, but they have rifles. So they get 1:43:38.160 --> 1:43:40.960 up to where these crow bills ox are nesting and 1:43:40.960 --> 1:43:43.639 they're in the thousands. So and they they're still they're 1:43:43.680 --> 1:43:46.400 getting the eggs and they're shooting as many as they 1:43:46.439 --> 1:43:49.519 possibly can. Right one time, McKinley like falls off the 1:43:49.600 --> 1:43:52.200 ladder and goes battering down onto the snow and ice, 1:43:52.240 --> 1:43:54.479 and he's luckily and nothing breaks, but he's all bruised. 1:43:54.520 --> 1:43:57.280 And then they build this other thing like a Boson's chair. 1:43:57.400 --> 1:43:59.760 The plan is they're gonna lower him, hike around and 1:43:59.760 --> 1:44:02.840 then lower him down, you know, because I don't know 1:44:02.880 --> 1:44:06.160 about this gig, you know. Um. But so they're able 1:44:06.200 --> 1:44:11.479 to like subsist and they also um curl. Luck figures 1:44:11.479 --> 1:44:14.160 out that they have the buried under snow. They had 1:44:14.200 --> 1:44:16.960 this net from the car look, and so the they 1:44:17.040 --> 1:44:20.599 noticed that ducks are starting to um, you know, pool 1:44:20.720 --> 1:44:22.960 up in some of the larger leads. So they go 1:44:23.040 --> 1:44:25.599 out there, sneak up on the edge of a lead 1:44:25.640 --> 1:44:28.040 and they take in unison, like three of guys will 1:44:28.160 --> 1:44:30.839 throw this net and scoop up a bunch of birds. 1:44:31.320 --> 1:44:33.800 But you know, the birds are not big enough where 1:44:33.840 --> 1:44:36.320 that's going to um. You know. That's like a couple 1:44:36.360 --> 1:44:38.719 of days. It gets you through. So that all that's 1:44:38.760 --> 1:44:43.559 happening while Bartlett is on his odyssey. Now at this point, 1:44:44.000 --> 1:44:47.720 we're the only three people who died, Like the three 1:44:47.760 --> 1:44:50.000 that took off, those are the only people that had 1:44:50.040 --> 1:44:53.160 died up to this point. Well, those three we know 1:44:53.800 --> 1:44:56.040 the other guys that went to the wrong Old island 1:44:56.280 --> 1:44:59.320 and then probably they're probably dead by that. No, so 1:44:59.400 --> 1:45:02.559 there's some other carnage. I don't want to give anything away. 1:45:02.720 --> 1:45:07.719 I mean it's uh, it's really sad man because so 1:45:08.400 --> 1:45:12.000 in the split up Icy spit wearing point in the 1:45:12.040 --> 1:45:14.160 middle and then the other place Roger's Harbor. So some 1:45:15.120 --> 1:45:19.800 yarn mom and the Norwegian guy Templeman to cook, uh, 1:45:19.800 --> 1:45:22.000 and this other guy George Malloch who is one of 1:45:22.000 --> 1:45:25.439 the scientists there. They end up at Roger's Harbor and 1:45:25.479 --> 1:45:28.360 the hunting is not not good there. They get some 1:45:28.479 --> 1:45:31.400 Arctic foxes, but they they're and they're also in really 1:45:31.400 --> 1:45:36.520 bad shape. So um, that scene at Rogers Harbor becomes 1:45:36.840 --> 1:45:41.360 um like really dires almost like the Greeley and that's 1:45:41.360 --> 1:45:44.800 going and so a couple of times it's really sad. 1:45:44.880 --> 1:45:48.120 Like McKinley goes down there and you know, he realizes 1:45:48.320 --> 1:45:51.519 one of the guys from that's been at mid Island. 1:45:51.800 --> 1:45:53.800 He gets down to them to check on how they're doing, 1:45:53.840 --> 1:45:57.520 and it's like not well, you know, they're like hallucinating 1:45:57.560 --> 1:46:01.920 and they're they're malnourished, and so McKinley tries to make 1:46:01.960 --> 1:46:08.200 this you know, noble herculean track back to get different 1:46:08.280 --> 1:46:11.599 pemmican for mom and who can't eat this stuff anymore? 1:46:11.960 --> 1:46:14.360 And find some more and bring them, bring them food. 1:46:14.840 --> 1:46:17.559 And there's some really touching scenes where like McKinley has 1:46:17.560 --> 1:46:20.240 brought him like a can of condensed milk, you know, 1:46:20.320 --> 1:46:22.360 and he's like giving it to him like he's a 1:46:22.360 --> 1:46:26.000 little baby, you know, and you're just like, oh my god, 1:46:26.160 --> 1:46:28.920 is this guy gonna make it or not? You know, 1:46:29.160 --> 1:46:33.040 I got all Arctic explore stuff that that was one 1:46:33.080 --> 1:46:41.120 of the things I kept wanderings, Uh, was there during 1:46:41.160 --> 1:46:43.240 this period? Were there any of these trips were everything 1:46:43.439 --> 1:46:47.719 just went like name for me, one just went great. 1:46:48.960 --> 1:46:51.120 That's a really good question, like when you signed up, 1:46:51.200 --> 1:46:53.040 like when they so at this point, they've been at 1:46:53.080 --> 1:46:54.960 it for a while, Like you're in the in the teens, 1:46:55.080 --> 1:46:58.800 nineteen teens, people been up there dying for a long time. 1:47:00.040 --> 1:47:05.920 You getting anyone to fund him? What are they looking 1:47:05.960 --> 1:47:09.799 at as the sort of like way it could go right? Well, 1:47:09.880 --> 1:47:14.720 So that's a really great question. Um. I mean, ironically, 1:47:14.960 --> 1:47:17.439 and I don't really want to say this because you know, 1:47:17.720 --> 1:47:20.960 I'm I'm kind of anti Stephenson on this whole thing. 1:47:21.400 --> 1:47:26.560 But so yeah, they're like, well he did it. Yeah, 1:47:26.600 --> 1:47:29.840 so he was able to. I mean he had he 1:47:30.240 --> 1:47:34.559 went with this guy Rudolph Anderson who ends up being 1:47:34.600 --> 1:47:38.920 on this the Southern Party. Uh, and Stephenson had brought 1:47:39.040 --> 1:47:43.280 back like artifacts and it was for the American Museum 1:47:43.280 --> 1:47:46.200 of Natural History. So the things that that Stephenson was 1:47:46.200 --> 1:47:49.160 bringing back in the findings that they were making about 1:47:49.280 --> 1:47:52.479 like maybe you know, underscoring all of this is like 1:47:52.520 --> 1:47:55.360 a desire to find potentially new land and claim it 1:47:55.680 --> 1:48:00.439 for Canada. So that you know, I think people's ability 1:48:00.520 --> 1:48:06.760 to um fundraise and to be really um convincing and persuasive. 1:48:06.800 --> 1:48:10.400 I mean Perry was very good at it. Um. You know, 1:48:10.560 --> 1:48:14.920 some of some of the expeditions had worked. I mean Perry, 1:48:15.000 --> 1:48:19.040 even though it's contested now um had in nine made 1:48:19.080 --> 1:48:21.160 it to the North Pole. So you've got like, he 1:48:21.160 --> 1:48:23.720 didn't lose a bunch of guys. No, no, and you 1:48:23.760 --> 1:48:25.920 know they he did it better though. I mean he 1:48:25.960 --> 1:48:29.559 brought out steel holed icebreaker, the SS Roosevelt, right, so 1:48:29.640 --> 1:48:32.920 he you know, um, so people could look at that 1:48:33.200 --> 1:48:35.439 and you could be like, you know, he did he 1:48:35.479 --> 1:48:38.519 did it. But also there's there's a bit of a difference. UM. 1:48:38.600 --> 1:48:40.920 I think in all of the in many of the 1:48:40.960 --> 1:48:45.320 expeditions leading up to this, like first were what they 1:48:45.320 --> 1:48:49.240 were about, or discovery of new lands, being the first 1:48:49.280 --> 1:48:51.519 to the north Pole, the first to farthest north, the 1:48:51.640 --> 1:48:55.160 first to go through the Northwest Passage. UM, this was 1:48:55.200 --> 1:48:57.880 one of the early like purely it's going to be 1:48:57.960 --> 1:49:01.640 scientific in nature, and so it was worth it for 1:49:01.720 --> 1:49:04.519 the Canadian and also the Canadian government had sort of 1:49:04.560 --> 1:49:10.240 designs on UM. If we can expand our holdings our 1:49:10.360 --> 1:49:13.800 land mass, that's good, you know, in terms of UM 1:49:15.120 --> 1:49:18.640 dominion over the north right. But so I think Stephenson's 1:49:18.720 --> 1:49:21.840 ability to persuade the Canadian government that this thing was 1:49:21.880 --> 1:49:26.559 going to be an unprecedented scientific UM success. And in 1:49:26.600 --> 1:49:29.240 many ways it was because the work that he ends 1:49:29.320 --> 1:49:31.720 up doing, which I don't I cover it briefly in 1:49:31.760 --> 1:49:35.160 the book, because my interest was more about the car 1:49:35.240 --> 1:49:39.960 look and that story. But I mean, so Stephenson ends 1:49:40.080 --> 1:49:44.080 up continuing on. I mean he conveniently, like so World 1:49:44.120 --> 1:49:49.480 War One breaks out like right as Um Bartlett and everybody, 1:49:49.520 --> 1:49:52.000 you know, right right as the regular island fiasco is 1:49:52.040 --> 1:49:56.320 going on, and Stephenson conveniently, uh, like goes onto the 1:49:56.360 --> 1:49:59.880 ice in like nineteen fourteen and conveniently sort of re 1:50:00.080 --> 1:50:03.200 surfaces to the world right right as World War One end. 1:50:03.560 --> 1:50:08.720 It's like good timing. You know what happened? Yea, give 1:50:08.760 --> 1:50:12.880 me a paper the Great War? What? Right? And so 1:50:13.080 --> 1:50:15.800 you know a number of the other members like have 1:50:15.920 --> 1:50:19.519 to go serve and stuff. You know, So how did uh? Um? 1:50:20.439 --> 1:50:22.720 I never looked this up. How does Steffan's gonna end up? Like? 1:50:22.720 --> 1:50:25.680 How long does he live? Well? He lives forever? Yeah, 1:50:25.720 --> 1:50:33.320 I mean, uh sixty two. He dies of I don't 1:50:33.360 --> 1:50:37.880 think it's anything like cataclysmic, like cancer or anything. No, no, 1:50:38.000 --> 1:50:39.840 But the funny thing is, and I have to add 1:50:39.880 --> 1:50:43.960 this because it has to do with your question about whether, um, 1:50:44.040 --> 1:50:47.559 you know, Curl look and his family could probably have 1:50:47.600 --> 1:50:52.479 survived or walked a hundred miles. Um. So this is 1:50:52.560 --> 1:50:57.759 bizarre Stephenson. You gotta hand it to him. So he resurfaces, okay, 1:50:58.200 --> 1:51:01.719 And now he's he is, His books are selling, he's rights, 1:51:01.760 --> 1:51:04.400 he's written My Life with the Eskimo, and he also 1:51:04.439 --> 1:51:10.280 writes The Friendly Arctic, which is a great title for 1:51:10.280 --> 1:51:13.479 a book in which most people vacation. And that's him 1:51:13.520 --> 1:51:15.400 kind of laying out how you go about it, right, 1:51:15.680 --> 1:51:17.960 He's like, what's you do is you take off as 1:51:18.000 --> 1:51:23.160 soon as things look bad with the Inuit who will 1:51:23.240 --> 1:51:25.680 keep you alive? And by the way, Amandsen, you know 1:51:25.880 --> 1:51:31.600 the famous uh Norwegian bowler explorer, he he contests the 1:51:31.680 --> 1:51:35.720 friendly Arctic big time. He's like, this is actually irresponsible 1:51:35.800 --> 1:51:40.040 because you're you're making it sound like any ea, who 1:51:40.080 --> 1:51:43.639 can just go with a rifle and live off the ice. 1:51:43.840 --> 1:51:46.280 And it's like most of the people that dry that 1:51:46.360 --> 1:51:49.479 are going to die, you know, because but Stephenson, in 1:51:49.560 --> 1:51:53.320 fairness to him, he developed a great deal of skill 1:51:53.720 --> 1:51:56.160 in living in this way. But so he does the 1:51:56.200 --> 1:51:59.519 most man. No, there's like, no, whatever you're saying about 1:51:59.640 --> 1:52:04.960 his like allegiances and in his his cavalier attitude about 1:52:05.120 --> 1:52:09.599 human life, you cannot deny. I mean the guy could 1:52:09.640 --> 1:52:12.479 do insane ship. Oh yeah, yeah, and he teached he 1:52:12.560 --> 1:52:16.000 knew how to pick his company, that's what. But he 1:52:16.320 --> 1:52:20.280 could go and just go right. What he couldn't do was, 1:52:20.880 --> 1:52:24.000 you know, put together an expedition of this magnitude. Right, 1:52:24.400 --> 1:52:26.000 but you give him in a couple of hundreds and 1:52:26.000 --> 1:52:27.880 they would do some crazy ship. Yes, So I was 1:52:27.880 --> 1:52:30.880 gonna kind of follow up on that, Like there's so 1:52:30.920 --> 1:52:33.479 many variables and there's no way of knowing obviously, But 1:52:33.520 --> 1:52:37.080 in your opinion, does this trip go a different way 1:52:37.120 --> 1:52:42.439 of Stephenson doesn't leave from the get go, or at 1:52:42.479 --> 1:52:44.679 least when he sees the ship has floated away, turns 1:52:44.680 --> 1:52:47.040 around and tries to find it. Maybe yeah, because I 1:52:47.040 --> 1:52:51.280 mean I think it's Stephenson. UM might well have been 1:52:51.320 --> 1:52:56.240 able to get more of them to land. Um, he 1:52:56.680 --> 1:53:00.400 still would have been challenged by the fact that most 1:53:00.439 --> 1:53:03.599 of the scientists and the crew members did not have 1:53:04.080 --> 1:53:07.920 um arctic ice skill, you know. So the thing I 1:53:07.920 --> 1:53:10.679 was gonna say though, that UM that he does that's 1:53:10.720 --> 1:53:16.360 really a head scratcher. Um Is that so one? You know? 1:53:16.680 --> 1:53:23.120 Like some years after this expedition, Um, he decides he's 1:53:23.160 --> 1:53:28.040 going to organize another expedition to Wrangle Island, right, Um, 1:53:28.360 --> 1:53:34.040 And one of the survivors, this guy's name is Fred Mauer, Uh, 1:53:34.280 --> 1:53:36.559 decides that he wants to go back to Wrangle Island 1:53:36.560 --> 1:53:38.639 because he had so much fun there the first time, 1:53:39.840 --> 1:53:42.759 and Stephenson convinces him to do it. So he gets 1:53:42.800 --> 1:53:46.719 like four part of the rationale. And Stephenson wasn't really 1:53:46.760 --> 1:53:50.880 wrong about this was that there He's already envisioning. I mean, 1:53:50.920 --> 1:53:54.160 Stephenson thought about some things, like he predicted polar flight 1:53:54.360 --> 1:54:00.200 to across the Arctic. Um, he predicted submarine travel in 1:54:00.240 --> 1:54:02.439 that region. I was kind of I was gonna ask, 1:54:02.560 --> 1:54:07.080 was was this expedition kind of the end of an era? Absolutely, 1:54:07.120 --> 1:54:09.840 they call at the end of the dog Sled Adventurer, 1:54:10.080 --> 1:54:13.960 you know, because things, you know, things began to change 1:54:14.000 --> 1:54:18.200 in terms of technology. But so Stephenson organizes this other trip. 1:54:18.280 --> 1:54:20.400 Now the Canadian government wants no part of it, even 1:54:20.439 --> 1:54:23.240 though he was going to originally try to claim Wrangle 1:54:23.320 --> 1:54:27.280 Island for Canada. Um. So he's become a Canadian citizen 1:54:27.360 --> 1:54:29.479 by this time, and he's like, well, um, we can 1:54:29.520 --> 1:54:32.680 plant the flag. It was kind of contested, so he, 1:54:33.800 --> 1:54:37.120 I mean, nobody will pay. So he self finances this 1:54:37.160 --> 1:54:40.160 thing from like his book proceeds and he uh, he 1:54:40.360 --> 1:54:44.360 sends Fred Mauer, one of the guys from the car. Look, 1:54:44.760 --> 1:54:47.680 these two other members and a woman also seemed just 1:54:47.760 --> 1:54:50.640 her name is Ada Blackjack. This is you might want 1:54:50.640 --> 1:54:53.560 to read this book. It's freaking cool. Read Empire biss 1:54:53.600 --> 1:54:59.320 at first. But yeah, so, um they go to Wrangle Island. 1:55:01.440 --> 1:55:04.600 It's things go south there, you know, as they do, 1:55:04.880 --> 1:55:07.320 and they realize they're not gonna they're not gonna make it. 1:55:07.680 --> 1:55:11.000 And so I think when things go south and the 1:55:11.040 --> 1:55:15.720 north might be exactly so anyway from our or the 1:55:15.760 --> 1:55:18.560 guy from the car look and this other guy decided 1:55:18.680 --> 1:55:21.800 there they know, well Bartlett did it with Karactobic. We're 1:55:21.800 --> 1:55:24.520 gonna strike across the long straight to go. They're they're 1:55:24.560 --> 1:55:26.200 running out of food and it's just not gonna work 1:55:26.240 --> 1:55:30.960 either of this. They leave Aida black Jack with the 1:55:31.000 --> 1:55:35.440 one other member. These two guys strike for Siberia and 1:55:35.880 --> 1:55:39.520 die out on the ice, and Aida Blackjack nurses this 1:55:39.600 --> 1:55:43.440 guy who has scurvy for a while until he dies 1:55:43.480 --> 1:55:48.080 in her arms. She lives on Wrangel Island by herself 1:55:48.280 --> 1:55:54.480 for a year, like figuring out Ada black Jack. Yeah, 1:55:54.520 --> 1:55:56.760 I mean she is tough, she's industrious, she knows how 1:55:56.800 --> 1:55:59.400 to um use bow and arrow, and she eventually get 1:55:59.400 --> 1:56:05.680 picked up, She gets she gets recovered. It's a good name. 1:56:06.000 --> 1:56:08.200 He already got a great name. I'll take her name, 1:56:09.200 --> 1:56:13.040 Stevie black Jack. Oh wow, I can lead an expedition 1:56:13.080 --> 1:56:16.360 at that name. Well, um, we didn't give it too 1:56:16.400 --> 1:56:19.240 much away, did we. Okay, good. You know what's the 1:56:19.240 --> 1:56:23.560 book about a black jack? It's called Ada Blackjack. It 1:56:23.600 --> 1:56:26.400 sounds a good name. Yeah. Uh and it was written 1:56:26.480 --> 1:56:30.000 by a woman named Jennifer Niven, who who wrote the 1:56:30.080 --> 1:56:34.600 last book about this, um but like twenty years ago. 1:56:35.040 --> 1:56:37.840 Um and uh this this woman is is a really 1:56:37.840 --> 1:56:42.320 great writer and has transitioned into like young adult um writing. 1:56:42.360 --> 1:56:45.360 Now she didn't right about this got their hands on 1:56:46.240 --> 1:56:51.280 not not yet, No, they didn't. Um. And Russians do. Um. 1:56:51.320 --> 1:56:54.160 And you know it's cool because today, I don't know 1:56:54.160 --> 1:56:56.480 if you guys know this, but today Wrangle Island is 1:56:57.080 --> 1:57:01.440 um a spectacular nature preserve. You can't go there without 1:57:01.640 --> 1:57:05.160 like being you know, you have to have specific paperwork 1:57:05.680 --> 1:57:08.800 sure you're not bringing Yeah. And and it's the largest 1:57:09.000 --> 1:57:13.640 uh Pacific walrusts breeding ground and the largest polar bear 1:57:13.840 --> 1:57:16.560 dead ing ground in the world to this day. Um. 1:57:17.040 --> 1:57:20.400 And it's just spectacular if you look at um, like, 1:57:20.760 --> 1:57:24.160 just look at images online of it. It's so rugged. Man, 1:57:24.600 --> 1:57:27.960 the top of it's like thirty feet um. And you 1:57:28.000 --> 1:57:30.200 know it's cool because there's you know, there's beautiful rivers 1:57:30.280 --> 1:57:33.880 running out to the sea and um, polar bears hanging 1:57:33.880 --> 1:57:37.600 out now The weird thing is that musk oxen people 1:57:37.800 --> 1:57:40.160 they go, well, why didn't they just eat all the 1:57:40.240 --> 1:57:42.280 musk oxen that are there? Because if you look at 1:57:42.280 --> 1:57:45.960 Wrangel Island, there's musk ox in there. Now they were 1:57:45.560 --> 1:57:48.600 they were there, you know, so it's like, well, they 1:57:48.640 --> 1:57:52.960 wish they'd had those muskoks And oh, well, man, you 1:57:53.040 --> 1:57:55.800 got a good New York Times review. Hey, I appreciate 1:57:55.840 --> 1:57:59.120 the shout out there. Yeah, this morning New York Times 1:57:59.320 --> 1:58:03.960 uh uh said some nice things about this book, and um, 1:58:04.000 --> 1:58:08.720 I'm pleased. We're gonna, you know, pump it up next week. 1:58:09.080 --> 1:58:11.680 December six is the drop date. You're not doing any 1:58:11.720 --> 1:58:16.400 more podcasts, are you? Let's do that? No, no competitive ones, 1:58:16.880 --> 1:58:20.840 nothing that's good. No, nothing that There's no podcasts that 1:58:20.880 --> 1:58:26.240 are that are like this, really that are Yeah, I 1:58:26.360 --> 1:58:30.280 like RBS or something. It's all structured and formal. Yeah, 1:58:30.640 --> 1:58:34.480 you're already working on the third book in the trilogy. Yeah, 1:58:34.520 --> 1:58:37.760 thanks for asking that. Man. I so I do need 1:58:37.800 --> 1:58:40.920 to get off the ice eventually, because it's started my numbing, 1:58:41.000 --> 1:58:45.000 you know. Um, but I did pitch book and I'm 1:58:45.040 --> 1:58:47.000 I have I'm under contract to write a third book 1:58:47.000 --> 1:58:49.680 in the trilogy and it's called realm of ice and sky, 1:58:49.920 --> 1:58:54.360 and it's about the first uh what are called airships 1:58:54.680 --> 1:58:59.760 or blimps, um, they're actually semi rigid dirigibles. But try 1:58:59.760 --> 1:59:02.200 to say that a whole bunch of times, you know, um, 1:59:02.240 --> 1:59:04.760 semi rigid originals, that we're going to try to fly 1:59:05.480 --> 1:59:08.760 to the North Pole in nineteen o five. This American 1:59:09.120 --> 1:59:11.200 just seems like such a bad idea. I know, well 1:59:11.240 --> 1:59:14.480 in this American dude named Walter Wellman. So this is 1:59:14.520 --> 1:59:17.280 before Pierry has made it to the North Pole or 1:59:17.320 --> 1:59:20.600 Cook or whoever you did. Um, he's like trying to 1:59:20.640 --> 1:59:23.400 fly from smaal Bard, you know, Spitzberg and north of 1:59:23.720 --> 1:59:28.680 Norway in in a blimp to get to the North Pole. 1:59:28.800 --> 1:59:32.280 Right now. It doesn't go well for Wellman. He he lives, 1:59:32.680 --> 1:59:36.120 but he ends up being kind of pioneer for in 1:59:36.120 --> 1:59:42.800 in n six and then later um ammonds and ultimately 1:59:42.920 --> 1:59:47.240 goes with this guy named Umberto Noble a um he's 1:59:47.280 --> 1:59:52.120 an Italian airship designer. They make it to the North 1:59:52.200 --> 1:59:55.440 Pole and from smaal Bard and then but pass over 1:59:55.520 --> 1:59:58.320 it and continue on to No right, So it's a 1:59:58.640 --> 2:00:04.760 transcontinental flight trans Arctic trans Arctic ice continent flight of 2:00:05.040 --> 2:00:09.320 the pole. So two years later, Amondson takes a lot 2:00:09.400 --> 2:00:11.480 of credit for it, and this this Italian guy, Noble 2:00:11.680 --> 2:00:13.480 is like, man, I need to do that again, like 2:00:13.520 --> 2:00:16.200 and get and make it more about me. So he 2:00:16.240 --> 2:00:19.040 he this is a really bad idea. So he takes 2:00:19.120 --> 2:00:22.680 He has mostly an Italian crew. At this point Amandson 2:00:22.760 --> 2:00:26.920 and him are scrapping and so Noble a takes I 2:00:26.920 --> 2:00:29.880 mean these things are huge, like a four ft blimp, 2:00:29.920 --> 2:00:34.160 you know, with like the cabin underneathe right, yeah, yeah, 2:00:34.200 --> 2:00:38.400 like exactly the led Zeppelin. Yeah, And so they take it. 2:00:39.320 --> 2:00:41.440 They make it to over the North Pole and instead 2:00:41.480 --> 2:00:46.480 of continuing on, so the plan was to like land, 2:00:46.600 --> 2:00:48.360 It's hard to land a blimp because you need these 2:00:48.360 --> 2:00:51.360 like poles that you tie to right tether to them. 2:00:51.600 --> 2:00:54.160 Though they're gonna try to like lower dudes down and 2:00:54.240 --> 2:00:59.120 do uh North Pole study right out of like repelling 2:00:59.160 --> 2:01:02.920 out of the damn ship and so that that will work. 2:01:03.280 --> 2:01:06.600 So anyway, this is the bizarre thing that happens is 2:01:06.960 --> 2:01:08.680 that they make it to the North Pole. It's really 2:01:08.680 --> 2:01:12.760 fucking windy and it's not going well for their ability 2:01:12.840 --> 2:01:17.560 to um you know, uh, nobody wants to go back 2:01:17.760 --> 2:01:20.520 right back to Spitsberg and not do the same thing 2:01:20.600 --> 2:01:23.720 that he did already, which is with continue on. So 2:01:23.760 --> 2:01:26.360 they turn it around. They can't land or land people. 2:01:26.720 --> 2:01:29.360 They throw the Italian flag out and they're like, okay, 2:01:29.400 --> 2:01:31.080 they know they're at the north Pole. They've got good 2:01:31.600 --> 2:01:36.560 readings on the way back. By the way, Noble at 2:01:36.600 --> 2:01:39.120 this point is like been awake for seventy six hours. 2:01:39.120 --> 2:01:42.160 He's all sleep deprived, and he makes some mistakes. They 2:01:42.280 --> 2:01:45.840 crashed the blimp like a hundred and fifty miles back 2:01:46.240 --> 2:01:51.000 toward UH Norway Spitzberg A's fall Bark. They crashed the 2:01:51.000 --> 2:01:56.160 blimp in this catastrophic accident. The cabin that has like 2:01:56.520 --> 2:01:59.480 most of the people in it, bunch of them, nine 2:01:59.520 --> 2:02:04.320 of them billing out onto the ice right like they're 2:02:04.440 --> 2:02:07.640 thrown onto the ice. Their legs are shattered, they're broken. 2:02:08.200 --> 2:02:11.560 And then they look up and the six of the 2:02:11.560 --> 2:02:17.600 other members UH are still in the cabin and and 2:02:17.680 --> 2:02:20.520 the blimp is sailing off into the sky and they're 2:02:20.560 --> 2:02:26.280 like hell they fly away, never to be seen again. 2:02:26.520 --> 2:02:29.400 And now you've got these guys on the ice, and 2:02:29.440 --> 2:02:33.920 it it creates the largest rescue operation in polar history, 2:02:34.120 --> 2:02:37.760 right and then in which, by the way, the famed 2:02:37.760 --> 2:02:41.879 explorer Roald Ormondson goes to go save Noble A flies 2:02:41.960 --> 2:02:45.880 off in a Fokker ship you know, seaplane and never 2:02:46.000 --> 2:02:51.080 is seen again. It's awesome. The blimp really have been seen, 2:02:51.800 --> 2:02:56.680 never been seen? And yes, how is that? I mean 2:02:57.480 --> 2:03:02.160 maybe it's still flying around big place and things get 2:03:02.280 --> 2:03:06.320 engulfed by the leads in the ice, you know, just swallowed. 2:03:07.800 --> 2:03:09.920 I kind of rather be in a boat for a year, 2:03:09.960 --> 2:03:13.720 I think. Yeah, So that one I gotta, I gotta 2:03:13.920 --> 2:03:16.920 really got it right now. Once you write that one, 2:03:16.960 --> 2:03:18.840 come back all right? You want to hear more about 2:03:18.920 --> 2:03:21.640 Noble A and there bring bring a to black Jack 2:03:21.720 --> 2:03:27.920 with thanks, man, I really appreciate you. So give the 2:03:28.320 --> 2:03:29.920 hit people once more with the name of the book. 2:03:30.320 --> 2:03:33.160 All right, this is the Empire of Ice and Stone, 2:03:33.400 --> 2:03:36.880 the disastrous and heroic Voyage of the car Look by 2:03:36.960 --> 2:03:40.080 Buddy Levy available blame where books are sold. You bet 2:03:40.360 --> 2:03:43.400 in audio too, And oh did you do the read? That? 2:03:43.600 --> 2:03:45.800 Sons of bitches, they don't let you do the read. 2:03:45.640 --> 2:03:50.880 Did you tell me what have you heard these pipes? Man? Listen, man, 2:03:50.960 --> 2:03:53.760 I wouldn't I know? They said, I'm doing another I 2:03:53.800 --> 2:03:56.240 got it. I got so, I got another book that's 2:03:56.280 --> 2:03:58.920 hitting the ten year mark, so I'm getting the audio 2:03:59.000 --> 2:04:01.320 rights back. I'm gonna do my and read it. Was 2:04:01.360 --> 2:04:03.360 just the first time, you will Nope, oh no, you 2:04:03.480 --> 2:04:08.120 did so. I had a book like okay, American when 2:04:08.160 --> 2:04:12.760 when I sold so when I sold American Buffalo, the 2:04:13.120 --> 2:04:17.800 my publisher at Random House, they sold the audio to 2:04:17.880 --> 2:04:21.680 an outside place. The outside place did had bought the 2:04:21.720 --> 2:04:24.960 audio for ten years. They hired some soap opera guy 2:04:25.000 --> 2:04:27.160 to read it and the hunt him down and kill him. 2:04:27.840 --> 2:04:32.320 Then at ten years it ran out. Random House got 2:04:32.320 --> 2:04:34.320 it back. At that point they were doing more audio. 2:04:35.000 --> 2:04:37.320 Then I went and did the read. Now the book 2:04:37.360 --> 2:04:40.880 I published after American Buffalo, my book Me Eater is 2:04:42.760 --> 2:04:44.840 the ten year thing is reverting and I'm going to the 2:04:44.800 --> 2:04:47.000 the studio and read that. Son of a bit. Yeah, well, 2:04:47.440 --> 2:04:49.840 you know, I would like to if I write something 2:04:49.960 --> 2:04:53.320 more more personal memoir, I will probably read it. I'm 2:04:53.440 --> 2:04:56.360 very happy so far with McMillan. Audio. Did a good 2:04:56.440 --> 2:04:59.680 job guy as an actor professional. I listened to six 2:04:59.760 --> 2:05:02.600 voice Shish and I'm like, that guy's pretty good. Shout around. 2:05:02.600 --> 2:05:04.800 You went through a voice cattle idea, you know, voice. 2:05:05.240 --> 2:05:08.360 What do they call it um when you go up 2:05:08.400 --> 2:05:12.360 for the job, right, not yeah voice audition. I've told 2:05:12.400 --> 2:05:14.720 the story of Hunter times Man probably fifty times on 2:05:14.760 --> 2:05:17.600 the show. But the one I got my first book 2:05:17.680 --> 2:05:22.120 that a guy that a soap opera person read. I 2:05:22.200 --> 2:05:26.240 turned it on and he couldn't get two words out 2:05:26.240 --> 2:05:28.640 of his mouth and I had to race over turn 2:05:28.720 --> 2:05:32.160 it off and never it was just like, that's not 2:05:32.240 --> 2:05:37.240 what it sounds like. It was an actual soap opera line. 2:05:38.160 --> 2:05:41.960 He's probably he's probably a great family man, loves his wife, 2:05:42.560 --> 2:05:45.600 loves his children. It was like, you're gonna hut him 2:05:45.600 --> 2:05:48.080 down and kill him. I'm not. I want to take 2:05:48.120 --> 2:05:53.400 you back. My name went down. But loves his country, 2:05:53.440 --> 2:05:55.280 loves his wife, loves his children, I have no doubt. 2:05:55.880 --> 2:05:59.520 But it was like he had no business saying those words. 2:06:00.000 --> 2:06:01.720 It's too bad. I don't want to hear it now. Yeah, 2:06:01.760 --> 2:06:03.960 I think I'll get it. I'll lend it to tell 2:06:04.000 --> 2:06:05.640 me how it is. No, this guy is great. And 2:06:05.800 --> 2:06:08.480 by the way, sometimes, man, you're glad they because some 2:06:08.560 --> 2:06:11.280 of the words are really hard to pronounce. You don't 2:06:11.320 --> 2:06:13.080 need to figure it out. Yeah, you're just like, let 2:06:13.080 --> 2:06:15.600 that guy handle it. You know, I know how to 2:06:15.600 --> 2:06:18.320 spell them out, how to say him, spell a villain 2:06:18.560 --> 2:06:22.120 or like times. Yeah, I'll leave that up to you, 2:06:22.160 --> 2:06:25.040 but it's tough. Good luck. Thank you, oh man, Well, 2:06:25.080 --> 2:06:27.040 thanks a lot. Good luck on the book and when 2:06:27.040 --> 2:06:28.840 you get the next one ready to come back. I 2:06:28.880 --> 2:06:31.240 appreciate it. Always love what you guys do. Man, Thank 2:06:31.240 --> 2:06:31.840 you very much,