To Mum, who taught me to read and started me on the journey
CHAPTER ONEALL IN A DAY’S WORK
December 23, 1924, Northwest Alaska
On a midwinter’s evening around a hundred years ago, outside the town of Nome in Alaska on the southern edge of Inupiaq country, a brown-and-gray husky padded out from the Little Creek dog barn. Swirls of tiny snowflakes melted on his nose as he sniffed the scents on the frosty air. There was the warm-fur-and-fresh-hay smell of the other dogs settling down to sleep. The supper of salmon and oat mash they’d just eaten. A faint whiff of woodsmoke. He sniffed again. A brisk west wind was coming in from the coast, but it carried no hint of the salt tang of seawater. At this time of year, the Bering Sea was frozen over, its waters dark and mysterious beneath a thick layer of ice.
All was well. Togo stretched. He was twelve years old, and although he hid it well, a touch of stiffness was creeping into his joints. Nothing that would slow him down, of course. Plenty of miles left in these old legs yet, he thought.
It was good to be back home after four days on the trail. Leonhard Seppala, the owner of the Little Creek barn, had hitched up six of his favorite huskies—with Togo leading the team, as always—for the run to White Mountain. There, Seppala had lashed a whole spruce tree onto the sled—far taller than anything that grew on the scrubby tundra around Nome. Before they’d set out, Seppala’s wife, Constance, had attached bells to the dogs’ harnesses, which jingled with every step. Togo had found the ringing in his ears a little bothersome, but when they’d trotted back into town, it had been worth it. At the sound of the bells, all the children came flying out of their houses, clapping and cheering—“The Christmas tree! The Christmas tree!”—as excited as puppies on their very first reindeer chase.
Now Togo turned one ear toward the barn. He could hear his beloved Seppala making his evening rounds, quietly checking in with each of the thirty or so dogs. “How’s that sore paw, Fox? Settle down, Fritz. Hush now, Tillie.” Seppala’s assistant, Gunnar Kaasen, was in the barn too. The two men were good friends and had worked together for years at Hammon Consolidated Gold Fields, the biggest mining company in the region. They traveled many miles by dogsled each day, transporting workers and equipment and inspecting the dredging ponds and ditches. Togo sniffed the air once again. Aha! Kaasen was sneaking leftovers from his lunch to Balto. Did the man really think that the other dogs didn’t know about these extra treats? Togo could smell the bread and ham from here! He could hear Balto slurping it down, too, his great fluffy tail thumping the ground.
Balto was a good-natured young dog, jet-black with a distinctive white foreleg. Big and strong, with a calm, steady attitude. A little too steady, perhaps. Togo could tell that Seppala thought Balto lacked the speed and spark needed in a lead dog. Togo reckoned he was right. (In Togo’s opinion, Seppala was always right!) But Balto was Kaasen’s favorite. Perhaps it’s because they’re so alike, thought Togo. Kaasen was calm and steady too, a tall, broad-shouldered, gentle giant. It’s the same with Seppala and me. We’re alike too. Both small and scrappy, smart and quick. We’re kindred spirits.
* * *
Meanwhile, throughout Alaska, countless other dogs were settling down for the night. In ports and trading towns, hard-knock mining camps and remote villages. In barns and kennels, iglus and cabins. Wherever there were humans, there were dogs. Strong, powerful Alaskan malamutes: perfectly adapted to the cold, with their double coats of thick fur. Siberian huskies, only recently imported from across the Bering Sea: equally at home in freezing conditions, but smaller and swifter than the native malamutes. Not to mention all the other breeds and crosses of every shape and size that had found their way to Alaska over the years.
And, like Togo and Balto, almost every last one of them had put in a full day’s work.
In the Far North in 1924, as for centuries before, dogs were the only form of winter transport—other than strapping on a pair of snowshoes and setting out on foot. During the summer months, people could get around by boat, up and down the coast or along rivers and creeks. But as the season turned, rivers froze over, and even the ocean waves were locked in the grip of ice. The sole railroad in Alaska, completed just two years earlier, ran only from Seward to Fairbanks. Although the new automobiles were becoming an everyday sight in many parts of the world, they were of little use here. Their combustion engines were unsuited to extreme cold, and their wheels slipped on ice or snow. No one had built highways in northern Alaska yet. As for snowmobiles, they belonged to the future, along with rocket ships and hoverboards.
But dogs could run on anything. They didn’t need highways.
Hitched to wooden sleds, dog teams hauled firewood and fetched supplies. They ferried hunters to their traplines. They took miners to mines, doctors to patients, priests to churches, children to school, and friends and families to visit one another. They even brought the mail. Dogs were the tow trucks, station wagons, taxicabs, ambulances, school buses, and delivery vans of the North. Some were even the race cars too. Dogsled racing was a wildly popular sport, talked about—and wagered on—in every workplace, diner, and social gathering.
No wonder Alaskans said that a good dog was worth its weight in gold!
Togo was a very good dog. He had led his team of Siberian huskies to victory in all the big dogsled races of the day. More importantly, he was Seppala’s most trusted workmate and his faithful companion on every adventure. They had traveled more than fifty thousand miles of trail together, across sea ice, through wilderness, and over mountains, in fair weather and foul.
Now Togo stood and shook the snow from his thick outer fur. Time to turn in. But first, one last duty. He threw back his head and sang out in a high, haunting howl. Then he listened for the answering calls. The malamute chorus, the humans called it. For dogs, it was simply the evening news round. They were reporting on the day’s events, the trails they’d run, the reindeer they’d rounded up, the wolves and bears they’d scared off—with a side order of bragging and a pinch of gossip for good measure.
Sound travels far in cold air, and it travels fast. From one dog to the next, news flew out into the night. In a small mining village called Bluff, fifty miles to the east, Star was resting by the fire with her musher (musher is another word for a dogsled driver) on a stopover on their mail route along the craggy, wind-scoured coast of Norton Sound. She slipped outside to pick up the news from Nome, adding her own report to the chorus: “Sea ice holding up well here.”
Soon the message could be heard across the sound in Unalakleet, where the team from Traeger’s store was still out making deliveries. It seemed everyone had ordered extra supplies for the holidays. Peg, the lead dog, didn’t mind. People were in a festive mood, and there’d been plenty of scraps on offer: salmon, bacon, and even turkey. “All’s well in Unalakleet!” she hollered as they dropped off a sack of navy beans at an outlying cabin. “No time to stop.”
The dogs’ chorus snowballed its way inland, leaving Inupiaq country behind and echoing onward across Athabascan lands. It reached the old mining town of Ruby on the south bank of the Yukon River, where Prince had been hauling firewood all day. Upriver to Whiskey Creek, where Dixie and his team were taking their humans home after a family get-together. At last, it reached the Athabascan railroad town of Nenana, almost seven hundred miles to the east, where a young malamute called Bear and his teammates were just home from the mail run. The sled had been piled high with holiday letters and packages. The dogs were tired, but they were young and strong. Once they’d wolfed down a bowl of caribou meat, they had energy to spare for a bout of friendly roughhousing.
“Quiet!” snapped their lead dog, Blackie. He stood at the barn door, ears perked. “I’m trying to listen. There’s a report from Togo out in Nome…”
The young dogs yipped with excitement. Togo, the great racing champion! The fastest dog in Alaska. Bear enjoyed delivering the mail with their musher, Bill Shannon. He loved their hunting trips deep into the forests and high into the mountains. But flying across the finish line in the All-Alaska Sweepstakes or the Ruby Derby—that would be something else!
“What’s the news?” clamored Cub. “Has Togo won another trophy?”
Blackie’s ears stood down. “No. He just delivered a Christmas tree.”
“Is that all?” laughed Jet.
Bear circled three times and curled up on his cozy bed of spruce branches. Togo was his hero. If only, thought the young dog as he drifted off, I could be the hero in a big race one day too …
* * *
Balto lumbered out of the barn to join Togo to listen to the last howls of the malamute chorus. His gentle brown eyes clouded with concern at a report from the Sandspit village on the edge of town. “There’s human sickness in the air” came the message. “I can smell it on their youngsters.”
“Oh dear,” murmured Balto. “I don’t like the sound of that.”
Togo remembered the children tumbling out to welcome the tree riding in on the sled. They had all looked healthy enough. “Probably just the usual winter sniffles,” he said as they headed back into the barn.
Before Seppala left for the night, he paused, his hand resting on Togo’s head. Then, with a quiet murmur of “Good dog,” he closed the door and headed through the snow back to the house, where his own supper was waiting.
Good dog! Seppala hadn’t needed to say more. Togo loved to win races, but he was just as happy to haul trees. As long as Seppala was pleased with him, that was enough.
CHAPTER TWOTRY NOT TO WORRY
December 24, 1924, Nome, Alaska
Margaret Eide threw back the blanket. I can’t be late for the Christmas Eve concert! There was going to be a Nativity play. Games. Treats. Santa Claus on a sleigh pulled by real reindeer. Most important of all, the church choir would be singing carols, and Margaret had a solo in “Silent Night.” She’d been practicing for weeks. “Sleeee-eeeeep in heavenly peeeeace—ouch!” Her throat was so sore that even humming the words under her breath felt like swallowing brambles.
Margaret’s mother left the pot of broth that she was stirring at the fireside, hurried over, and tucked her back into bed. “You are sick, Maggie. You must rest,” she said softly in Inupiaq. That was the language of Mom’s people, the Inupiat, an Alaska Native people, whose lands stretched along the western and northern coast from Nome in the south to Barrow—known today as Utqiagvik—over five hundred miles to the north.1 Margaret’s father was from a different people, who lived in a far-off country called Norway. Norway, Pa had told her, was in Europe. It was cold and beautiful, just like Alaska, but with better cheese, and without the gold in the rivers that could make a man’s fortune.
Pa was far away just now, herding reindeer. He was going to miss the concert. “But I want to hear all about it when I come home in spring,” he’d said.
The concert! Margaret struggled to sit up again. I need to get going! An age-gnarled hand pushed her firmly back onto the pillow. Grandmother had elbowed Mom aside and was holding a cup to Margaret’s lips. “Drink this. Stinkweed tea. My special recipe.” Margaret took a sip. Grandmother smiled. “That’s better, eh?”
It was a little. The tea tasted like wet socks, but it numbed the pain in her throat. Margaret closed her eyes. She was running through tall grass, the sun warm on her face, a haze of bugs filling the air. Her heart leaped for joy. I’m at spring camp!
Like many local Inupiaq families, Margaret’s spent the winter in the Sandspit village on the banks of the Snake River outside Nome, where they lived in houses built from driftwood and sod, and in the tumbledown shacks left behind by gold prospectors. Twenty years back, Nome had been a major boomtown. Gold had been discovered in nearby Anvil Creek in 1898. Soon gold dust was found in the black sand along the beaches, too, triggering a full-blown attack of “gold fever.” The population skyrocketed, as thousands of hopeful prospectors flocked to Nome, all with the same big dream—striking it rich! At one point, their tents stretched for thirty miles along the coast, and Nome (or Anvil City, as it was called in the early days) was as rambunctious and unruly as any Wild West town. But the gold soon thinned out and stormy weather took its toll; within a year or two, most of the prospectors had moved on in search of easier pickings farther south. By the 1920s—the time of this story—Nome had settled back down to a small town of around fifteen hundred people. But Inupiaq families still made use of the abandoned shacks for winter shelter.
Each year, when the thaw came around, the Eide family moved out to their camp near Solomon to hunt for geese and gather wild greens, and, as spring rolled into summer, to fish for salmon. As soon as their day’s chores were done, Margaret and her brothers and sisters and cousins were free to play through days that never seemed to end. Now, in her fever dream, Margaret was at spring camp once again, scrambling down the riverbank, startling a family of ducks into noisy flight. Reaching her favorite berry patch, she picked a ripe salmonberry and popped it in her mouth. But … ugh! The berry tasted just like stinkweed. It was growing thorns, sticking in her throat …
Margaret awoke with a jolt, gasping for breath. When the coughing fit was over, she saw a man looking down at her. A white man … Margaret peered through the dim, smoky light of the seal-oil lamp hanging from the rafter. Father? Pa? No, this man was older.
“It’s Dr. Welch, Maggie,” said Mom. “He’s come to see you.”
The doctor placed a cool hand on Margaret’s burning forehead. He had kind eyes under a wave of white hair. “Can I take a look at your throat?”
Margaret nodded. But when she tried to open her mouth, she groaned with pain.
“It’s not the influenza, is it, Doctor?” her mother whispered in a voice full of fear.
Margaret shuddered. She’d heard stories about the “great sickness” that had swept through Alaska the year that she was born. She couldn’t remember it, of course, but many of her mother’s family had died. Even Grandmother’s stinkweed tea hadn’t been able to save them.
“No, no,” Dr. Welch reassured them. “It’s just a nasty throat infection. You’re doing all the right things, Mrs. Eide. Plenty of rest and fluids. Try not to worry.”
“What is he telling you?” Grandmother demanded impatiently. She didn’t understand the doctor’s English words.
“He says we are not to worry,” Mom translated.
Grandmother frowned. “I’ll decide when I worry about my own granddaughter, thank you very much.”
The oil lamp flickered in a blast of cold air as the doctor opened the door to leave.
“But … what about … the Christmas Eve … concert?” Margaret rasped.
Dr. Welch shook his head. “I’m sorry. There’ll be other concerts. You’ll be singing again soon enough.”
As the door swung closed, their neighbors’ grizzled, one-eyed malamute mix struck up his nightly howl, joining the calls of dogs all over town. Margaret and her friends called it the dogs’ choir practice. Long after the doctor had gone, the familiar chorus soothed her, as if the dogs were singing her a lullaby. Sleeee-eeeeep in heavenly peeeeace …
* * *
Dr. Curtis Welch stepped out into the night. After the fug of woodsmoke, stinkweed, and sickness in his young patient’s house, the freezing air was almost dizzying. But he was dressed for the cold. In his squirrel-skin parka and caribou mukluks he was almost too warm as he tramped back into town. Families called out greetings of “Merry Christmas!” as they hurried past on their way to Eagle Hall for the Christmas Eve concert, the children hanging back to gaze at the toys and candy canes on display in the storefronts. Poor Margaret, thought the kindhearted doctor. She’s missing out on all the fun.
Through softly falling snow, he could see candles glowing in every window. Lights sparkled from the enormous Christmas tree in Barrack Square. Brighter still shone the cross at the top of St. Joseph’s Church, blazing with electric light. The townspeople of Nome were very proud of their electric cross, which they had put up as a beacon to guide travelers to safety through blizzards or stormy seas. They were quite sure that there was nothing to beat it, even in big-city Fairbanks or Anchorage.
It was a scene to lift the spirits. Yet the doctor’s steps were heavy. Try not to worry, he’d told Margaret’s mother. There were always coughs and colds in December. Dr. Welch had lived and worked in northern Alaska for almost twenty years. He knew that better than anyone. But he was having trouble taking his own advice. He’d seen more sore throats than usual this winter, and Margaret was clearly running a fever, too. Tonsillitis, perhaps? he mused, as the first high, sweet notes of children’s singing rose from Eagle Hall.
* * *
“What is it, Curtis, dear?” Dr. Welch’s wife, Lula, asked when he arrived back at their apartment above the bank on Front Street. She sat him down by the fire in the parlor, where she was busy wrapping Christmas gifts, and handed him a glass of mulled cider. He hadn’t said a word, but Lula had been married to the quiet man long enough to know when there was something on his mind. “How was little Margaret Eide?”
Dr. Welch sipped the hot cider, lost in thought. “Throat inflamed…,” he murmured at last. “Very painful … a slight fever…”
“You’re thinking tonsillitis?” Lula had trained as a nurse and knew the symptoms well.
Dr. Welch prodded at the fire with the poker. “I can’t help worrying that it could be more serious.”
“Oh no! Not … the influenza?” Lula Welch whispered the word, as if just naming the dreaded disease might invite it to walk in and make itself at home. She remembered only too well the dark days of the terrible pandemic of 1918–1919. Influenza (or flu, as it is often known) had killed over fifty million people worldwide—including more than half the Alaska Native population of Nome.
Her husband sighed. “No. But possibly just as bad.”
Lula dropped the ribbon she’d been tying, and the reel unspooled across the floor. “What in heaven’s name,” she asked, “could be as bad as the flu?”
“No, you’re right. It’s probably just tonsillitis.” Dr. Welch smiled and shook his head. “Now pass me that ribbon and I’ll help wrap these gifts.”
CHAPTER THREETHE COLD, HARD TRUTH
January 22, 1925, Nome, Alaska
“Diphtheria!” spluttered Judge Lomen. “Here? In Nome? Are you sure?”
Dr. Welch nodded gravely. They were in his office at the hospital along with all the leading members of Nome’s town council. Dr. Welch had called the emergency meeting himself, because there was no longer any doubt in his mind. Just a few days after his visit on Christmas Eve, young Margaret Eide had died. Over the following weeks, other children had begun to show the same ominous symptoms …
Mayor Maynard almost spat out his coffee. “So, the rumors are true?” As well as being mayor, George Maynard was publisher of the town’s newspaper, the Nome Nugget. Very little happened without him knowing about it. “It was diphtheria that killed young Billy Barnett?”
Dr. Welch exchanged a glance with his head nurse, Emily Morgan. She’d been with him at Billy’s bedside when the little boy lost his fight two days earlier. Now she sat up straight with a rustle of her starched white uniform, but there were dark shadows under her eyes. Neither of them would forget the pitiful sound of the three-year-old struggling for every breath. “Yes, I’m afraid so,” he said. “And there have been several more deaths over in the Sandspit, too.” Dr. Welch paused, remembering the latest victim. Poor Bessie Stanley, a friend of Margaret’s, had died only yesterday. In each case, the children had developed the telltale symptom of diphtheria—a thick membrane, or crust, that grew across the throat and clogged the windpipe.
A grim silence fell over the room as the men took in the news. Diphtheria was a serious, often deadly disease, especially for young children. In the 1920s, between one and two hundred thousand cases had been recorded in the United States each year, resulting in thirteen to fifteen thousand deaths. (Cases from Alaska would not have been included in these totals since it did not gain statehood until 1959. At the time of these events, Alaska was a territory of the United States.) Worst of all, diphtheria was highly infectious, spreading like ripples on a lake, faster and faster until the ripples joined up to form an unstoppable wave. An outbreak could soon spiral into a major epidemic.
The chimes of the mayor’s pocket watch, ringing the hour, broke the spell. Suddenly everyone began to speak at once. “Where did it come from, Doc? Couldn’t you have spotted it sooner?”
Dr. Welch had been turning the same questions over and over in his own mind. Through long, sleepless nights he’d asked himself a million times: How had the bacteria that caused diphtheria found their way to Nome?2 The last supply ship, the Alameda, had left port last fall, and since then Nome had been cut off from the outside world by a wilderness of snow and ice. Could the carrier have been that little boy he’d seen back in October? the doctor wondered. The family had been traveling through Nome from a mission village south of Norton Sound, and the child, who was very weak and sickly, had died the next day. Dr. Welch had put the boy’s death down to tonsillitis, combined with the long, cold journey by dogsled. But what if it hadn’t been tonsillitis? The doctor felt a knot tighten in his stomach. He’d had his suspicions even then, but he hadn’t believed them. After all, he hadn’t come across a single case of diphtheria in all his years in Alaska. Maybe I should have seen the red flags sooner …
“There’s a cure, though, right?” Mark Summers’s voice cut through the hubbub. He was the boss of Hammon Consolidated Gold Fields, the big mining company where Leonhard Seppala and Gunnar Kaasen worked, and he was used to getting things done. “Isn’t there a drug of some sort for diphtheria?” Summers insisted. “Surely you keep a supply here in the hospital.”
Mr. Summers was correct. There was a cure. A special serum. A serum is a clear liquid formed by filtering out the solid particles of a fluid—in this case, blood. What made this blood serum so special was that it contained powerful antitoxins that could help patients to fight off diphtheria. Antitoxins are a key part of the immune system. They protect the body from harmful bacteria by neutralizing the poisons (or toxins) that they produce. Different kinds of antitoxin target a specific “enemy”—for example, diphtheria. Diphtheria serum had been developed around thirty years earlier by a scientist called Emil von Behring, and it had already saved the lives of thousands of children all over the world. Mark Summers was also right that an emergency supply was kept at the hospital. But there was a problem. That serum had been sitting on the shelf for six years! Dr. Welch doubted that the out-of-date antitoxins it contained would still be effective. And anyway, there were only enough doses for a handful of patients.
“Six years old! Why in heaven’s name didn’t you order fresh supplies?” Judge Lomen demanded, before Dr. Welch could finish explaining the situation.
Nurse Morgan leaped up to defend the doctor. “We did, sir! There should have been a new batch from Seattle on the Alameda last fall, but it was left off the order…” She broke off, gazing out the window at the snow falling steadily outside.
The mayor thumped the table, making coffee cups rattle. “Well, we need some fresh serum, and we need it now!”
Nurse Morgan glared at him. No amount of table thumping was going to conjure a batch of serum out of thin air. The Maynard Columbus Hospital in Nome had just twenty-five beds. Emily Morgan headed up a team of three other nurses, and Curtis Welch was the only doctor. Yet they were the largest medical center in the Inupiaq region. The cold, hard truth was that if there was no serum in Nome, there was none to be had for hundreds, maybe thousands, of miles in any direction.
To say that Nome was remote would be an understatement. Only two degrees south of the Arctic Circle, the town lies on the southern coast of the Seward Peninsula. A peninsula is an area of land that extends out into the water from the mainland; this one juts out into the Bering Sea, reaching westward from Alaska toward Siberia, a vast region of Russia. From the Siberian side, the Chukchi Peninsula reaches in the opposite direction; at the narrowest point, little over fifty miles of ocean separates the two.
Through the summer months Nome could be reached by sea. Ships brought in a steady stream of passengers and supplies, including coal, food, medicines, and even toilet paper. But from October to April, the only way in or out was on foot or by dogsled. Supplies were delivered by the mail carriers who worked for the Northern Commercial Company, driving their dog teams along the network of trails between scattered towns and villages. It could take three or four weeks for a delivery to make it to Nome from the nearest railroad station, almost seven hundred miles away in Nenana.
Just think, in 1925, if you lived Outside (a term that Alaskans still use for anywhere that is not Alaska), and you wanted to wish your friend in Nome a Happy New Year, you’d need to have mailed your greeting card before Thanksgiving back in November 1924.
But, however long it took, finding a new supply of the serum was the only hope of controlling the diphtheria outbreak in Nome. Dr. Welch sat down at his desk and wrote a message. Then he hurried out to send it by the fastest means possible.
In 1925 there were no computers. No internet connections. No cell phones. The telephone had been invented, over fifty years earlier, but many remote areas were not yet connected. The telephone lines from Nome stretched only as far as a few nearby settlements. Luckily, though, Nome was home to a US Army Signal Corps station, which meant that it could communicate with the outside world by telegraph. Messages were sent as electrical pulses along cables or using the latest technology of radio waves.
The sergeant in charge at the Signal Corps station took the piece of paper that Dr. Welch handed to him and puffed out his breath as he scanned the troubling words. “Where am I sending this, Doc?” he asked.
“Everywhere!” said Dr. Welch. “All points in Alaska. And the US Public Health Service down in Washington, DC. I need to alert them to the situation.”
The sergeant could see that there was no time to lose. He tapped the message into the telegraph transmitter as fast as the Morse code key would allow.3
AN EPIDEMIC OF DIPHTHERIA IS ALMOST INEVITABLE HERE. I AM IN URGENT NEED OF ONE MILLION UNITS OF DIPHTHERIA ANTITOXIN. MAIL IS ONLY FORM OF TRANSPORTATION.
* * *
The doctor trudged back to the hospital through the early evening darkness. The only sound was the grinding and grating of the ice out on the Bering Sea. From somewhere in the distance came the mournful howl of a dog. Another dog joined in. Then another and another, like an orchestra tuning up for a concert. Dr. Welch loved the peace and remoteness of Alaska. The room to breathe. But right now, he felt very alone.
Even if a supply of serum was found tomorrow and dispatched immediately, how many more children would die before it reached Nome?
CHAPTER FOURTROUBLE AND FEAR
January 23, 1925, Nome, Alaska
Like all dogs, Balto could sense fear and smell trouble. Especially human fear and human trouble. They made his fur bristle as if it had been brushed the wrong way. For some dogs, just a faint whiff of human fright rattled them so much that they would lash out at anything in reach. Not Balto. He’d always been good at keeping his cool.
Constance Seppala was in her kitchen, baking an apple pie, when she received an urgent telephone call from Sigrid’s school. Suspected diphtheria outbreak. School closing with immediate effect. Please collect your student as soon as possible. Her husband, Leonhard, was out working at a mine over ten miles away with Togo and the team. Constance barely stopped to throw her coat on over her apron before running out to the barn, where she hitched Balto and three other dogs to the family’s spare sled. As they dashed along the trail out of Little Creek, the dogs could sense her fear. It pulsed down the tow line as clearly as a Morse code signal along a telegraph wire.
In town the air simmered with the smell of trouble. People rushed up and down the streets of Nome, yelling instructions at one another. Anxious parents gathered outside the school. There were so many dogsleds parked at the gate that Balto had to pull up in the middle of the road. He was glad to be away from the other teams. The tension was too much for many of the dogs, who were lunging at one another and snapping their teeth. A crowd of children spilled out from the schoolhouse. “There are germs everywhere!” a tiny girl wailed to her mother over the noise of the bickering dogs. Her breath made a white cloud in the cold air. “We can’t touch anything!”
“Yippee! School’s out!” cheered an older boy. “Who’s coming ice-skating?”
“Not so fast!” scolded a tall woman who had followed the children out. She was wearing a white uniform under a thick woolen sweater and fur parka. “This is a lockdown, not a vacation,” said Nurse Morgan sternly. “All children must go straight home and remain at home.”
“Aw!” grumbled another boy. “Can’t we stop off at the North Pole Bakery for a hot chocolate?”
“Sorry. No can do,” said Nurse Morgan. “Anyway, all restaurants are now closed.” She began to hand out flyers to the parents. “Here are some guidelines to try to keep the outbreak under control. Look out for more information in the Nome Nugget.”
At last, Balto spotted Sigrid and barked to let her know they were there. Sigrid ran over and hugged all four huskies in turn. Then her face fell. “Oh, Mom!” she cried. “Can dogs catch diphtheria? What if I give them germs?”
Constance smiled. “No, Sigrid. Dogs can’t get it. They have their own diseases.”
“Like kennel cough,” said eight-year-old Sigrid seriously. She’d spent her whole life around dogs, so she knew about such things.
Constance took a flyer from Nurse Morgan and scanned the advice. “‘Wash face and hands frequently…,’” she read. “It says we should use mild soap, not the cheap, strong sort, which can crack the skin so the germs can get in. Hmm, we’d better stock up.”
But at Polet’s Store, a line of customers snaked out the door. It seemed everyone had had the same idea. The clerk was putting up a sign in the window: SOAP—SOLD OUT. They tried all the other stores, too, but it was the same story everywhere. “Well, we’ll make do with what we have,” said Constance. “Mush, Balto! Home!”
Heading out of town, they passed Nurse Morgan again. She had just put up a notice—on the front door of the Rynnings house. The stark warning was spelled out in big black-and-red lettering.
Balto couldn’t read, of course, but he didn’t need to. His sensitive nose had already detected the odor of sickness, sharp and sour, swirling through all that fear and trouble.4 Which was why, when two girls from Sigrid’s class came skipping along the sidewalk from the opposite direction, he growled and gave his fiercest bark. The smaller girl jumped back in surprise. She’d met Balto many times before. He was usually such a quiet, friendly dog. She didn’t know that he was telling her to get away from the house and the infection that it held. But the other girl stopped to read the sign, her eyes wide as she took in the news. “Diphtheria!” she gasped. “The Rynnings family has it.” Then she grabbed her friend’s hand, and they ran for home, passing the house as fast as their legs would carry them, both holding their breath.
Mr. Rynnings was their schoolteacher.
* * *
Emily Morgan was tough and levelheaded and good at her job. A nurse for over twenty years, she had even treated soldiers on the front line in France during World War I (known at that time as the Great War). But she knew that they had a long, hard battle ahead of them. Diphtheria was mainly transmitted by coughs and sneezes, but it could be spread by people who didn’t have symptoms, as well as those who were sick. It was particularly dangerous for young children and people with little resistance to disease.
And, thought Emily as she strode along Front Street to make sure that the Dream Theater movie house had closed its doors as instructed, if you were trying to pick the single worst place and time to fight a highly infectious disease, Nome in January would be top of the list. Given the extreme cold and only four hours of daylight, people stayed cooped up together inside their houses—doors and windows tightly sealed. And, with the holiday season just over, there had been even more large gatherings than usual: concerts, plays, church services, barn dances, family get-togethers, and even indoor baseball games. Although Nome was so remote—perhaps because it was so remote—it was just about the most sociable town she’d ever known.
Emily reached the Dream Theater in time to see the manager putting up a placard. CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE. Good. That was the last item checked off her task list. Hunched against the biting wind that was now whipping snow from the rooftops, she set off for the hospital to report back to Dr. Welch.
It had been a busy morning. In her role as quarantine nurse, Emily Morgan had already closed the town’s schools, restaurants, bars, social halls, and the lending library. Before that, she had been to the Sandspit village. She’d given doses of the serum from their small supply to six children with sore throats—hoping against hope that the out-of-date antitoxins would still work. She was pleased to find that each family was keeping to a strict quarantine, with groups of neighbors arranging to take them food and water.
Still, Emily couldn’t help worrying about those children—and all the families in the Sandspit, where the houses were so small and close together. Many Alaska Native residents had not been exposed to diseases like diphtheria before, which meant they were more vulnerable to its deadly effects. But it was important not to set off a panic. The last thing we need, she and the other nurses had agreed, is for people to start packing up their sleds, trying to “outrun” the disease. That was the surest way to spread it far and wide. That had happened in the influenza pandemic in 1918. Whole villages had died.
Emily muttered a silent prayer. Please don’t let it get that bad this time. The church bells rang out from St. Joseph’s as if in answer. As she reached the hospital, the bright, modern electric lamps glowed comfortingly from the windows. The wards were filling up fast. All we can do is try to slow the disease down until we receive a new supply of serum …
Squaring her shoulders, she headed inside.
* * *
All the while, as Nome locked down, Dr. Welch’s plea for help traveled from signal station to signal station, from post office to post office, by electrical telegraph, radio wave, and telephone line. The message was received in Fairbanks and Anchorage, Seward and Juneau, as well as Outside—in Seattle and San Francisco and Washington, DC.
Politicians got involved. Newspapers—the most powerful media of the day—ran stories about it. All declared that something must be done.
Appeals were sent to medical centers all over the North.
Someone, somewhere, had to have a supply of diphtheria serum they could send …
CHAPTER FIVEYOU CAN DEPEND ON A DOG
January 26, 1925, Nome, Alaska
“Good news!” announced Mayor Maynard, waving a slip of paper.
The town council was meeting again. Or rather, the Nome Health Board, which had now been created to deal with the diphtheria crisis. This was, essentially, the key members of the council plus Dr. Welch.
“Thank you, Mayor,” said Mark Summers. As leader of the newly formed board, the boss of the mining company felt it was his job to convey important information. He took the piece of paper, which contained a typed message. “It’s a telegram from Governor Bone in Juneau,” he announced. “Just in this morning. They’ve located a supply of serum for us. It’s at the Railroad Hospital down in Anchorage.”
There were several cheers. Dr. Welch smiled for the first time in days. “That is good news! How big a supply are we talking about?”
Summers checked the details on the telegram. “Three hundred thousand units. Pretty good, huh?”
Dr. Welch nodded slowly. Although three hundred thousand units of serum might sound like a lot, it was only enough for thirty or so patients. But it would buy valuable time until a larger supply could be found. “Pretty good,” he agreed. “But you can probably guess my next question, gentlemen. Just how soon can we get it here?” With at least twenty confirmed cases, and more showing up every day, the clock was ticking … very loudly.
“Yes, well, that is indeed the question of the moment,” said Judge Lomen. “They’ll send it by railroad from Anchorage to the closest station. That’s Nenana, I guess. But, from there…”
“Dogsled, of course,” Summers cut in. “Westward along the mail routes. We’ll tell Northern Commercial to make it an express delivery. With a bit of luck, we could have that serum here inside three weeks.”
“Three weeks?” Dr. Welch’s heart sank into his boots. His twenty cases could be hundreds by then. “We don’t have three weeks!”
But Mayor Maynard was on his feet. “Dogsled?” he roared. “Dogsled? This is the twentieth century, man! We’re in 1925, not 1825! We’ll fly the serum from Fairbanks. I’ve been talking to my newspaper contacts. They’ve got an airplane on standby. A pilot, too. We’re just waiting for Governor Bone to give the go-ahead. We’ll have the serum here in days, not weeks.”
* * *
“Airplane? Whose bright idea was that?” Gunnar Kaasen looked up from rubbing bear grease into the splintered birchwood of an old sled runner. He was in his favorite place: the barn at Little Creek, working late into the evening alongside his friend Leonhard Seppala. Like little Margaret Eide’s father, they had both been born and raised in Norway. They had left their homeland more than twenty years ago to seek their fortunes in the Alaska gold rush—and had never gone back.
As well as working together, the two men shared a love of dogsled driving. With the woodstove crackling in the corner, the air thick with the smell of wood, grease, and caribou leather, and the small, comfortable sounds of the dogs licking their fur clean on the other side of the barn, the world felt safe and warm. It was hard to believe that only a few miles away, the “strangling angel” (the grisly name often given to diphtheria in those days) was tightening its deadly grip. Kaasen and his wife had no children of their own, but it made his heart ache all the same. “Airplane?” he repeated.
Leonhard Seppala grinned. “Mayor Maynard was all for it. ‘We can fly the serum to Nome in under two days!’” Seppala mimicked the mayor’s confident tone. Mark Summers had come to see Seppala right after the health board meeting and had given him a blow-by-blow account of the debate. Now Seppala was enjoying replaying it for Kaasen. “Apparently they have a flying machine standing by in Fairbanks. An army training plane left over from the war. They’ve even found a pilot crazy enough to fly the thing in this weather.” Seppala peered at the harness he was mending, holding it up to the electric lamp for inspection. “To hear Maynard tell it, by 1930 airplanes will be zooming all over like swarms of bees. We’ll be able to fly home to the old country for dinner and be back in Nome in time for ice cream! Yes, it seems that airplanes are the future,” Seppala went on. “And we, my friends”—he threw out his arms to include Kaasen and the dogs—“are the past!”
“But Maynard was voted down?” asked Kaasen.
“Right!” said Seppala. “Turns out that in the present, there’s no way you can fly one of those airplanes in Alaska in January without the engine freezing solid. Looks like there’s a big storm coming in too. Odds are the airplane would crash in the middle of nowhere and we’d never see that serum again.”
Kaasen nodded. A man of few words, he was happy to let his friend do the talking.
Of course, air travel in 1925 was not the same as it is now. It had only been twenty-two years since 1903, when Orville and Wilbur Wright had made history with the first ever flight in a motorized aircraft. Aviation had come a long way since then. Fighter planes had flown in Europe in World War I, and by 1923 a small airline company had even been set up in Alaska. (Its very name, the Farthest-North Airplane Company, shouted adventure!) This close to the Arctic Circle, though, winter flights were still extremely risky. The planes’ engines were cooled by water, which would freeze in cold conditions. Not to mention the poor pilot, sitting in an open cockpit! And it was exceptionally cold that January—even by north Alaskan standards.
No wonder Governor Bone had decided to give his full support to the land option rather than looking to the skies. The serum would be brought to Nome by dogsled.
“I’ve nothing against the future,” said Seppala, “but sometimes the old ways stick around for a reason.”
Kaasen ran his palm over the sled runner. The birchwood was now smooth. It would glide over the snow like a fish through water. He looked across the barn. Balto and Togo were sitting up, ears pricked, as if they were listening to every word. “Yup,” he said. “You can depend on a dog.”
“Ain’t that the truth!” Seppala laughed as he jumped up from the workbench and slapped his old friend on the shoulder. “Come on! Help me look over the huskies and pick out my team for this mission.”
CHAPTER SIXTHE TEAM FOR THE JOB
January 26, 1925, Nome, Alaska
Once they had finally agreed that dogsleds were a safer bet than an airlift, the health board had gotten down to work on the details. The serum would be sent by train from Anchorage to Nenana, the closest railroad station. From there, the Serum Run—as it was now being called—would be in two parts.
First, a series of mail drivers—the best that the Northern Commercial Company could muster—would transport the serum westward along the network of mail trails that followed the Tanana and Yukon Rivers. For extra speed, each team would sprint a short stage of thirty to fifty miles before handing the precious cargo over to the next. This relay system would allow the serum to be on the move nonstop, day and night, and would continue as far as the village of Nulato, roughly halfway along the route.
Second, the best musher in Nome would race east, collect the serum from Nulato, and bring it home. Unlike the short stages of the first half of the journey, this was to be a marathon six-hundred-mile round trip. There was no argument over this part. Everyone on the health board agreed that there was only one man—and one dog—for the job.
In fact, the job—the sprint-three-hundred-miles-to-grab-the-serum-then-sprint-three-hundred-miles-back-again-all-at-top-speed-in-record-low-temperatures-quite-possibly-with-a-storm-coming-in job—was only in the cards at all because of that one man and one dog.
Leonhard Seppala and Togo, of course.
And when they asked Seppala to take on the mission, how could he refuse? The lives of his daughter and all the other children of Nome were on the line. And anyway, he’d never been one to say no to a challenge—especially when that challenge involved an expedition with his beloved huskies.
Seppala had fallen in love with dog mushing from his first winter in Alaska. He loved it so much that when there was no snow for the sled in the summer months, he would hitch his dogs to a little wheeled cart that he called the Pupmobile and ride the trails on that instead.
The dogs in his Little Creek barn were all Siberian huskies. Siberians were a new breed to Alaska, and at first many people considered them too small and lightweight for serious work. But Seppala had always admired their energy and cheerful can-do attitude. The moment he was given his first team to train, Seppala found that what huskies lacked in size they more than made up for in speed and stamina. He had proved his point by winning the famous four-hundred-mile All-Alaska Sweepstakes three years in a row.
Siberian huskies’ great stamina means that they can run for hours and hours, needing little food—a major plus in the days before ready-made kibble and canned dog food, when it took a whole lot of work to catch and dry enough fish and meat to keep dogs fed through the winter. Seppala and Togo and the team had broken many a long-distance record together. Crucially for the Serum Run, they knew every twist and turn of the route between Nome and Nulato. For much of the way, the trail ran along the rocky, windswept coast of Norton Sound—sometimes even cutting across the sea ice itself. It was treacherous terrain, but that didn’t stop this intrepid team. They had once made the three-hundred-mile journey in just four days.
No wonder Leonhard Seppala was known as the King of the Trail!
No wonder he’d been asked to bring the serum all the way from Nulato!
Now, in the Little Creek dog barn, it was time for the King of the Trail to pick his team. Although he wouldn’t need to set off for Nulato for another day or so—at this point, the serum was still on the train to Nenana—Seppala planned to give the dogs some long training runs together before leaving. Along with Kaasen, he got up from the workbench and crossed to the dogs’ sleeping quarters.
“No prizes for guessing who you’ll take as lead,” said Kaasen. “Togo, the old champ!”
Togo sprang up at his name. He knew something important was afoot. He could tell by the urgent way the men had been talking all evening. There must be a big race coming up. He ran to meet Seppala, tail wagging, to show that he was ready for anything. More than ready! Fritz and Scotty and Fox and Balto were right behind him, prancing and panting, all eager to be picked too. These dogs lived to run. No one wanted to be left out.
Seppala crouched down beside Togo. “You’re the best lead dog in Alaska, aren’t you?” He looked into the husky’s perceptive ice-blue eyes. “But I wonder … This is going to be a tough run.” He ruffled Togo’s fur. “I’ve spotted you stretching those achy bones, old man, even if you thought no one saw! Will this be too much for you?”
Togo tried to figure out what Seppala was saying. One thing was clear: This was no ordinary race. There was a lot more fear and hope in the air. Were they going to find a lost traveler? Or maybe rescue an injured miner? Togo licked Seppala’s nose, to tell him from deep within his big, faithful heart, Whatever it is, just hook me to the tow line, and I’ll lead the team to the ends of the earth.
Seppala understood. There was a special bond between them. At first, Seppala had been slow to pick up on it, but as Togo knew well, humans weren’t always as clued in as dogs. You had to give them extra time to figure things out; they usually got there in the end.
As a puppy, Togo had been small and sickly. But he’d loved to watch the older sled dogs at work. Somehow, he always knew exactly what Seppala wanted them to do—even before the musher gave the command. Why aren’t they getting it? Togo had wondered as he’d scampered alongside the team. Keep to the side of the trail! Pick up the pace! Hold steady at the back! Togo had barked out Seppala’s orders to the team, even nipping at their ears to get their attention. There was just one problem: Togo knew that he was a natural-born leader, but to everyone else, he was just a noisy little troublemaker. In fact, Seppala was so sure that Togo wouldn’t make a good sled dog—he was too small, too mischievous—that he had tried to give him away to a neighbor as a house pet. A house pet! The memory of it made Togo’s claws curl. He’d soon escaped through a window (a closed one—Togo still remembered the shock of the glass breaking around him!) and hightailed it back to Little Creek. That was when Seppala had begun to see Togo’s true spirit …
Seppala smiled. “Yes, of course. I couldn’t go on an adventure without Togo.” He began moving among the other dogs, deciding who else he would take. Putting together a good dog team is like picking a soccer team. It’s no good having eleven goal-scoring superstars if you have no defenders or midfielders. The best teams are a balance of speed and strength, experience and enthusiasm. Out front, the lead dog is key, of course. They need to understand everything their musher asks of them, while also commanding the respect and trust of the other dogs, so that they will follow without question. The best leaders can handle pressure in dangerous situations. They can find the faintest of trails in a storm, detect hidden patches of thin ice, and even, in a crisis, know when to ignore a bad command from their musher.
But the other members of the team are just as important. Tucked behind the lead, the swing dogs must be on alert at all times, ready to act instantly on orders from the leader. At the back, the wheel dogs do the heavy lifting, pulling the biggest share of the load. And then there are the team dogs in the middle, who must run in perfect harmony. No drama, no distractions: the steadily beating heart of the whole operation.
Seppala reached down to Fritz and patted his mottled cream-and-brown fur. Fritz was Togo’s half brother and was also a good leader. “You’re coming too,” Seppala told him. Then he spoke to Kaasen. “I’ll take extra dogs. Maybe twenty in all. I’ll drop some of them off to be kept at roadhouses on the way. Then I can swap out any tired or injured dogs on the return journey.”
“Good plan,” said Kaasen. “Although what if the musher gets tired or injured?”
“Don’t worry about me!” Seppala laughed. “I’m indestructible. Now, let’s see. We’ll also need a few good reliable dogs…”
Balto pushed forward, his plume of a tail waving like a flag.
“Like Fox here. And Balto…,” Seppala continued, patting the two of them on their flanks.
Balto could hardly contain his excitement. Seppala had never taken much notice of him before—but now, at last, he’d picked him for the A team! This is my big chance! Like Togo, Balto could tell that this was going to be an important run. The men had been using the same strange words that Balto had heard when he’d gone to fetch Sigrid from school: diphtheria, antitoxin, serum. He was pretty sure that it was something to do with the children who were getting sick, and all that trouble and fear.
“… to stay home,” Seppala went on, “and work with you, Kaasen, while I’m away. Those new pipes will need hauling out to the dredging pond. I’ll leave you the ‘slow and steady’ crew. Balto is solid. And Fox is a decent lead. He’ll keep them in line.”
Seppala turned and headed back to the workbench. Balto’s tail drooped. What? Seppala hadn’t chosen him after all? But then Kaasen was at his side, stroking his thick black fur. “I know, Balto! I know. I wish I was going on the Serum Run too. Don’t look so down, bud.” He reached in his pocket and found a scrap of cheese and held it out to Balto. “Hauling pipes may not be as exciting as a life-and-death mission to Nulato, but hey, someone has to stay and hold the fort.”
Balto was so disappointed he almost refused the cheese.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
This book is based on true events that took place in western Alaska during the winter of 1924–25.
In telling the remarkable story of the Serum Run, I have stuck as much as possible to the facts that we know from historical records. All the locations are real, and all the characters you meet in this book, both canine and human, were real dogs and real people—although on a few occasions I have given a name to a dog who is not named in the history books.
However, to bring the story to life, I have used my imagination to re-create the conversations between the human characters, and their thoughts and feelings as the journey unfolded—always drawing on information that we have from newspaper reports, interviews, and other accounts. I have also filled in some gaps by adding several scenes based on what I think is likely to have happened, but I cannot know for certain. In the pages that follow, I have noted the main points where I have ventured beyond the known facts in this way.
Of course, the real focus of this book is the sled dogs rather than the people! Wherever I could, I wanted to tell the story of the Serum Run from the viewpoint of the dogs themselves—which meant stretching my imagination even more. I had to “think like a dog.” How would Togo, Balto, and the other members of the sled teams have felt about the relay? How would they have acted and communicated with one another? More generally, how much do dogs understand of the strange and complicated goings-on of the humans they live alongside? We can never truly experience the world through a dog’s eyes (and nose and ears!), but I have done my best to capture the canine spirit.
REFERENCES
I read many books and online articles to research the events described in this story. Three of the most helpful books were:
The Cruelest Miles: The Heroic Story of Dogs and Men in a Race Against an Epidemic, Gay Salisbury and Laney Salisbury (W. W. Norton & Company, 2003)
The Race to Nome: The Story of the Heroic Alaskan Dog Teams That Rushed Diphtheria Serum to Stricken Nome in 1925, Kenneth A. Ungermann (Harper & Row, 1963)
Alaskan Sled Dog Tales: True Stories of the Steadfast Companions of the North Country, Helen Hegener (Northern Light Media, 2016)
Of the many online resources, the following were especially helpful:
Nome Nugget, archived in the Library of Congress: chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn87062013/1925-01-31/ed-1/seq-1/
Northern Light Media: northernlightmedia.wordpress.com
Alaska Native Knowledge Network: ankn.uaf.edu
Alaska Native Language Center: uaf.edu/anlc
The History of Vaccines from the College of Physicians of Philadelphia: historyofvaccines.org
Perri Klass, “How Science Conquered Diphtheria, the Plague Among Children,” Smithsonian Magazine, October 2021, smithsonianmag.com/science/science-diphtheria-plague-among-children-180978572
Alaskool: alaskool.org
The following two collections of spoken interviews recorded with Alaska Native elders were also invaluable. They are a treasure trove of personal memories and insights into life in western Alaska over the last hundred or so years.
KNOM Radio Mission’s Elder Voices series: knom.org /programs/#elder-voices
Project Jukebox, digital branch of the University of Alaska Fairbanks Oral History Program, especially the Dog Mushing in Alaska and Raven’s Story series: jukebox.uaf.edu
NOTES
These notes outline the main points at which I have gone beyond known facts to tell the story.
Chapter 1
According to The Cruelest Miles, dogsled teams from Nome would make the four-day round trip to White Mountain to fetch Christmas trees for the town each year. I am not sure that Leonhard Seppala and Togo made this trip in 1924, but it’s quite possible that a community-minded man like Seppala would have volunteered to help out in this way.
The “malamute chorus” is a real phenomenon—although I have, of course, imagined the actual messages that the dogs howl to one another.
Chapter 2
Margaret Solvey Eide was a real child who was seen by Dr. Welch on Christmas Eve, as reported in The Cruelest Miles. Very little information seems to have been recorded of this visit, so I have filled in the blanks by imagining the scene from Margaret’s point of view. I based the scene on the more detailed account of a visit to Bessie Stanley, another little Inupiaq girl in the Sandspit village, later in January.
The Christmas Eve concert was a real event. Programs can be found in the pages of the Nome Nugget, the town’s newspaper. I invented the detail that Margaret was going to sing the solo in “Silent Night,” but the concert did feature carol singing by children from the “Eskimo church.” Margaret’s Norwegian father was reported as being “away for work” at this time. There is no record of his occupation, but I thought it may well have been herding reindeer, as this was the time of year when they would have been rounded up. (I imagined his words about Norwegian cheese, of course!) The description of spring camp in Margaret’s dream is based on details recalled in interviews with Inupiaq and Athabascan elders in the Raven’s Story and Elder Voices series referenced earlier.
Margaret’s grandmother is the one exception to the rule that all the characters are real. I made her up, but stinkweed tea was a real Inupiaq remedy used for all kinds of ailments, as Cheryl Ann Wood explains in The Plants of My People on the Alaska Native Knowledge Network: ankn.uaf.edu/ANCR/Inupiaq/plantsofmypeople/plantfiles/charigik.html.
Chapter 4
I invented the scene in which Seppala’s wife, Constance, picks Sigrid up from school, but it is true that the Seppalas had an eight-year-old daughter called Sigrid, and the schools in Nome did close, so it is very likely that parents from outlying settlements would have been asked to go pick up their children.
The advice in the flyer that Nurse Morgan hands out quotes the notice that appeared in the Nome Nugget— including the part about using mild soap. Based on this, I imagined the scene in which Constance and Sigrid go to the stores and find that they are all out of soap (but the names of the stores and other places mentioned in Nome are all real). And although I made up the scene where Balto barks to warn the little girls of the infection at the Rynnings house, Mr. Rynnings really was the schoolteacher, and he and his family were among the first cases of diphtheria.
Chapter 5
The conversation between Seppala and Kaasen in the dog barn comes from my imagination. However, the details of the airplane-versus-dog debate are all based in fact, and the arguments on the subject among politicians and newspapermen are well documented—see, for example, Steve Moyer’s piece for the November/December 2013 issue of Humanities magazine, “Dog vs. Airplane”: neh.gov/humanities/2013/novemberdecember/feature/dog-vs-airplane.
I thought it very probable that the two dog mushers would have discussed these issues as they prepared Seppala’s team for the relay mission.
Chapter 6
The very first plan for the Serum Run was to have just one driver and his team bring the serum all the way from Nenana to meet Seppala in Nulato, but it was soon decided that a relay of many teams for the first half of the journey would be faster. For the sake of simplicity, I skipped over this earlier version of the dog-team plan.
Chapter 7
I have imagined the post-office inspector’s dialogue with Bill Shannon’s wife, but it is recorded that she was there to see him off, and the stories of her adventures—such as the Mount McKinley trip—are based in fact, according to the January 1, 2008, article “The Mysterious Disappearance of Wild Bill Shannon” by Tom Walker on Mushing.com: mushing.com/mysterious-disappearance-wild-bill-shannon.
Anna Shannon seems to have been quite a character!
Chapter 9
It is true that Ruby was famous for dogsled racing and, according to The Race to Nome, Dixie once won the Ruby Derby. It is not known, however, whether Prince came in second.
Several reports, including The Race to Nome, say that George Nollner was singing an Athabascan love song when he arrived. It’s not recorded that this was specifically to keep the dogs’ spirits up, but I thought that this was very likely. In the words of one of the most famous early dogsled racing champions, Scotty Allan (as quoted in Alaskan Sled Dog Tales), “Dogs are the most intuitive creatures alive. They take the disposition of their driver. That is why I never let my dogs know that I am tired. At the end of the day … I sing to the little chaps and whistle, so they always reach the end of the trail with their tails up and waving.”
Charlie Evans really did borrow two dogs to lead his team, although I couldn’t find a reason why, so I invented the torn claw as a likely possibility.
The Cruelest Miles reports that Evans’s mother died when he was just five years old, and also refers to an Athabascan legend about the northern lights guiding the way to heaven. Although “heaven” is a Christian rather than an Athabascan concept, it is likely that Charlie Evans would have known stories from both cultures. With this in mind, I imagined Charlie’s thoughts about one of the “guiding spirits” being his mother.
Chapter 11
I have invented the meeting between Togo and Star at the Bluff roadhouse. Although Star and her musher, Ed Rohn, did not take part in the first Serum Run, they did in fact run the final stage of the second, less well-known relay shortly afterward (see chapter 20). This makes Star a dogsled hero too—which is why I wanted her to make at least a brief appearance in this story. Since Ed Rohn was a mail driver who ran this route, I thought it was very possible that Star and the team were stopping over at Bluff when Seppala and Togo passed through.
Fritz was co–lead dog with Togo (although some sources suggest that it was another dog, Scotty). It is not actually recorded that Fritz disliked sea ice, but since it is only Togo who is mentioned as being in charge over the sea ice, it seems likely that Fritz was not so accomplished or confident in this area.
Chapter 12
The names of the dogs in the Traeger’s store team have not been reported, as far as I can find, so I gave the lead dog the name Peg. The scene where Victor Anagick, the store clerk, throws all the groceries off the sled is not recorded either—but since this was a busy delivery team, something like this sort of last-minute change of plan must have taken place.
I also invented the name for Myles Gonangnan’s lead dog, Suka, as I couldn’t find a reference to the names of this dog team either. I chose Suka, since the Alaska Native Language Center lists it as both an Inupiaq word for “fast” and a typical name for dogs: uaf.edu/anlc/languages-move/inupiaq.php.
Chapter 13
As amazing as it seems, Seppala and Ivanoff really did almost literally bump into each other near Shaktoolik, and I’ve based the details of their encounter closely on records of Seppala’s own account, although the actual dialogue is imagined.
Chapter 14
I invented the scene where young Sigrid Seppala wakes in the night and hears the storm outside—but I felt sure that as his daughter, she would have been both worried about and proud of her father in this way. It may be that Sigrid did go on to develop a sore throat that day. On January 31, 1925, the Nome Nugget includes her in its list of diphtheria patients. Happily, however, it must have been a mild case, as it’s not mentioned in most accounts, and we know that Sigrid lived into old age.
Chapter 16
The scene in the hospital in Nome is imagined, based on what was happening at this point: growing patient numbers in the ward and many home visits, all with the storm raging around them. It is true that the Serum Run was halted because of the storm, and the message Dr. Welch begins to write in this chapter uses the actual words of the telegram that he sent to Washington, DC.
Chapter 17
Kaasen’s team did run past Port Safety, and the sled did tip over, causing the serum to fall out, just as described in this chapter. The only detail of the crash that is not recorded as fact is the rope tangling around Fox’s neck. Getting caught up in tangled lines can be a common hazard for sled dogs. For example, in a 1987 interview, veteran dog musher Effie Kokrine remembers stopping in a race to help another musher. Her dogs had become tangled and one of them was caught up in the tow line: jukebox.uaf.edu/interviews/2293.
Chapter 19
“Damn fine dog.” These have been widely reported as Kaasen’s actual words.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Writing a book is a team effort. I am enormously grateful to Laura Godwin for offering me the opportunity to retell this remarkable story. I would especially like to thank editor Karen Sherman for her eagle-eyed attention to detail, which has saved me from dangling modifiers and disastrous mix-ups alike; sensitivity reader Debby Edwardson, who so graciously corrected my misunderstandings and provided a wealth of helpful information; and Solomon Hughes, whose evocative artwork has brought the Serum Run to life on the page. My thanks also go to assistant editor Kortney Nash for keeping the team on track, and to everyone behind the scenes who has been involved in the design and production of this book. I owe a huge debt of gratitude to my agent, Jenny Savill, who has been at my side since the first step of my writing journey, and finally, of course, to my family—my team.
AUTHOR
Helen Moss grew up in the beautiful rolling countryside of Worcestershire, England, and a remote corner of Saudi Arabia. Helen now lives in a village near Cambridge, England, with her computer scientist husband, two sons, plus some dogs and hens. When she’s not writing, she likes walking in the countryside with the dogs, running (without the dogs, who just trip her), climbing up and then skiing down mountains, and reading, of course.
Visit her online at helenmoss.org.uk, or sign up for email updates here.
INTERIOR ILLUSTRATOR
Solomon Hughes studied graphic design at Pratt Institute in his hometown of Brooklyn, New York. At age eight, his work was displayed in the Guggenheim, and at seventeen, the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He looks at works from the past and present to expand his skills and craft. Solomon lives at home with his parents, two sisters, two turtles, and one puppy.
Visit him online at designinhues.com/solomonhughes, or sign up for email updates here.
Text copyright © 2023 by Helen Moss
Interior illustrations copyright © 2023 by Solomon Hughes
