but very coarse and tough. So Caton became “The Wild Cattle Island.” Nikolski, an island further westward had a sheep ranch so was nicknamed “The Woolly Island.”
Feb 29th Good day and calm so we called off school told the kids to go home and pack a lunch, we planned an educational field trip to Company Harbor. 10 kids showed up so we left at 10 AM and arrived there at 11:45. There was an old empty school building, still in fairly good condition, an old graveyard and a few fallen down buildings. We were invited to Old Nellie Carlson's house for coffee and smoked salmon. Nellie ,Old Man Carlson and Albert Carlson were the only people there. Albert is kinda strange. We only saw him when peeking around the corner at us. Sandy found an old WW II helmet, cartridge belt and canteen, out in the Tundra on the way back. Wonder what was the history of that? There were no recorded battles here during WWII. All the kids were tired after the 14 mile trip. This field trip gave all the kids a common adventure, to write about, draw pictures and talk about in their "show and tell." They needed something different from the regular routine.
There was clearly a devil-may-care attitude prevalent on the island. It may have stemmed from the island's early history. There was never any firm restricting laws even from Sanak's early beginning. While visiting our school agents home, Chris Gunderson told of an ancient battle way back in the 1600's between rival Aleut chiefs just offshore on the south side of Sanak at a small island. It is locally called Bone Island, because of the crumbling human bone fragments and weapon parts that used to be found there. I had to check it out, but found no artifacts.
During the time of Peter the Great, in the 1700's, Russia sent fur traders to harvest the fur pelts of the Aleutian area and Sanak was one of the many islands that Russians forced Aleuts to hunt down the sea otter, take their skins in trade for a fraction of their value. If the hunters resisted, they were killed. Superior weaponry over the bone spears of Sanak hunters caused them to be treated as slaves.
In 1807 there was a shipwreck on the northern reef of Sanak. The Aleuts living on the island at that time performed an act of compassion that was described by one surviving seaman in his journal. The Sanak Islanders rescued the crew and helped them navigate their repaired lifeboat all the way to Kodiak.
By the 1920's, there was a thriving cod fish industry located on the west end, inside a semi-protected bay, called Company Harbor. Without getting any official permission, those people just walked in and set up business on the island. There were no rules to restrict an enterprise from taking the sea resources for profit in those times. They set up the salting station and hired dory fishermen to catch the cod with hook and line, no questions asked. One season in the 1930's the cod suddenly changed their migrating route and not one showed up. The company folded and just left their buildings never to return.
During World War II, (1944) the US Army occupied both Sanak and Caton Island as a supply bases for the fighting westward along the Aleutians. They built a road across the island from Company Harbor to Pauloff Harbor, where they put in a dock and several buildings. There were no Japanese attacks against the island, even though it was in the war zone.
There was a giant tidal wave in 1946 that wiped out the 60 foot Scotch Cape light house, on nearby Unimak Island. The tsunami kept rolling eastward from Japan, where it originated, and hit the Sanak reef, destroying the buildings of Company Harbor where people had been living freely in trespass among the old Company buildings. The survivors, mostly fisherman and free spirited gypsy types, moved to the more protected Pauloff Harbor and inhabited what was left of the deserted Army buildings.
When we arrived in 1951, there was no village council, no established law enforcement nor any religious order, only a postal clerk. A certain camaraderie existed among these freedom seeking souls. The common bond that seemed to unite them was the common battle against nature.
Sanak people seemed to take pride in the unique reputation they’d earned, knowing that they were the talk of the town among the more conforming mainlanders. They didn't strive to acquire social graces nor to live up to any standards set by others. Every man created an independent self-styled life without society’s restraints while each woman, who had teamed up with him, went along with it.
Pride in a neat, well-maintained house was non-existent. Many were half completed, unpainted and some had cables over the roof that were anchored into the ground on both sides to keep them in place during 100 mile-an-hour winds and the occasional earthquakes.
March 10th Raining and blowing about 80 mph with gusts up to 100. It blew down three outhouses including the schools and tore the porch off the old school storehouse. Occasionally our outer door gets blown open, then all the rest of the doors in the school are sucked open and it puts a vacuum in your ears. It blew down our radio antenna again. During the storm a loose 50 gal drum, sailing in the air of the village, hit the roof of our Quonset sounding like a bomb. Something went wrong with the regulator on the old Kohler light plant. The lights got brighter and brighter until they started blowing out bulbs one by one. We're back to Coleman lamps again. Oh Well!
March 19th Benjamin caused so much trouble, today, that Sandy had to pick him up and shake him. He was very disrespectful to me. The poor kid must have had a bad morning at home, but we just couldn't allow his profane language in school.
Sanak was known as the Isle of Free Love, however, there weren’t any sexy island maidens to make the idea attractive. Yes, it was a surf worn Pacific Isle, but it was the North Pacific not South Pacific. That surf was so threatening that no small craft could land safely on the coarse sandy beaches and there were no Bikini clad natives. All the females were always bundled up in furs and oilskins against gale winds.
Early in the school year, there was one man who quite regularly pounded on our door at 3:00 A.M. drunk, usually he just wanted to talk but once he came to my door and tried to get in. When the door was locked he pounded and pounded. I finally asked what he wanted through the slightly cracked door. He wanted to trade wives for the night. He said it was the custom and I would not be disappointed. It was after that incident that I hung up my rifle over the door of our quarters.
The Free Love Bedroom Reputation was maintained by many of the young fishermen. I hired a female to clean the school each afternoon, at the suggestion of my school agent. He said she needed an income during the winter as she was the wife of an inmate of McNeil Island Federal Prison who had been incarcerated for the last two years. She always did a good job and lived "alone" in a small house up the hill from our Quonset. I noticed that one of the local men, who I knew well as my goose hunting partner, carried in buckets of needed domestic water occasionally to her house. I thought that was friendly of him. One day she didn't arrive to work and also the next, so I asked about her. I was informed that she had just given birth to a baby. Because of the heavy foul weather clothing she and most everyone wore, I didn't even notice her condition.
My own bedroom story: In our Quonset, the wind always made the stove damper flap until we physically put a wedge in it to stop the noise. It was right over our bed so when we'd almost get to sleep, the wind would start the damper flapping and I'd say, "That's all right dear, I'll get up and fix it." Marie was closer as she slept on the outside of the couch. She would always answer, "Oh No! I'll do it." then jump out to fix it. That became a nightly ritual. One night it was louder than normal and when I said, "I'll do it." She surprised me by saying, "OK!" At that moment, I knew that I had to do my share of the household duties. Male domination in our house was forever gone!!
One of our sidelines was the hobby of photography. I brought up an old bellows camera, that used 3x4 sheet film, plus a supply of film, photograph paper, chemicals to develop film as well as the developer, shortstop and hypo to develop black and white prints. I expected to have 110volt power so brought up a printer with big enlarger lens. But when electricity wasn't available, I improvised.
