Back to Square One: Finding Land for Ellen's Rainbow House

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“Are we going to start building my rainbow house today?” Ellen asked me as we ate breakfast.

            “We’re working on it, Bub,” I answered trying to figure out what I was going to do that day to truly be “working on it.”

            Ellen had no understanding of permafrost, had no idea why clay was going to be difficult and expensive to build on, didn’t know the cost of gravel.  In her mind, houses were built on the ground with wood… clay counted as ground, and we had some pallets made out of wood up at our lot.

            Considering I thought people in Alaska lived in igloos when I was three, Ellen is lightyears ahead of me on the developmental scale.  However, she does hold my feet to the fire in a way that can make for a stressful life at home.

            “Hey dad,” she asked as I pushed her on the swing later that day, “do you have my rainbow house figured out yet?”

            “Not yet, Bub,” the swing squeaked as I pushed out and away.

            “Well, how about my pool then,” she asked about the other back burner project I have begun researching, “are you working on that today?”

            “I’m working on it, Bub,” I said as my brain went to the hurdles that stood before me on that project.

            “Okay.”

            Back in the house, I began calling around, “Hi, I heard you had a lot you were thinking about selling…”

            “Yes, I have a lot up on the hill I would sell,” the voice responded.

            “How much were you wanting for it?”

            The other end answered and I choked on my gum.

            “How much?”

            “What was the asking price,” Myra asked when I got off the phone.

            I whispered it in her ear.

            “Oh my,” she stepped back and stared at me with wide eyes, “well, I guess that one is off the table.”

            We called around some more.  Answers ranged from I decided to keep it to I have decided to give it to my grand-daughter.  Property does not really sell in western Alaska.  Multiple generations traditionally live under one roof, and when it comes time for a new owner, the house or lot gets handed down.  Though Myra grew up in Unalakleet, in a way, we are both kind of transplants there, which makes getting property tough.

            I sent a private message via the modern-day vhf- Facebook, and heard back from another property owner with a negative answer, but more thought bubbles followed showing he was still typing.

            “Try Leonard Brown, he is a heck of a guy, will do right by you, and has property for sale.”

            Leonard Brown is 87 and does not do social media or email.  I tracked down his phone number and it went right to voicemail.

            His grand-daughter does social media and email and so I reached out to her with a private message via Facebook.  She told me when I should call… 87-year-old men have nap schedules she jokingly typed.  Now was an okay time, and so I called him only to go right to his voicemail.

            “Should I text him?” I asked in our chat.

            “Oh, please, no…”

            I chased Leonard around for a couple of days before catching up with him.  He was puttering around his yard getting it ready to plant gardens.  We drove up with him to where he was planning on selling some land and he pointed it out from the road.

            “It is this area here.  I have several acres that I am ready to let go, and could sell you a couple right here if you like.”

            There were spruce and willow and signs of much better buildable soils.

            We came to a tentative agreement and because you cannot go away without shaking hands at the end of a deal when working with a man of his generation, Leonard and I shook on it… pandemic or no pandemic.

            A battle with a borrowed earth auger later that involved replacing a throttle cable with a bike brake cable, and then dragging it out to our test site, Myra earnestly stated, “You’re going to have to find somebody to run this with you.”

            “I have found somebody to run this thing with me,” I smiled as I nodded toward her.

            “Oh, okay.”

            And so, Myra and I danced around a hole while trying to get the hang of a large drill connected to a Honda lawnmower engine.  Down we went to the end of the auger to the point where we were pretty much sitting down on the ground holding the handles.  We pulled it out and I shoved my arm down as far as it would go into the hole and came back with a piece of gravel the size of a golf ball.

            “Good sign,” I smiled.

            We drilled another hole with the same effect.

            “I think we can make this spot work,” Myra and I agreed.

View of the ocean and Besboro Island from our new lot.

            Back at Leonard’s, Ellen ran around the house playing with his great-grand-daughters.

            “You want to pay a third today?” he asked as he put pen to paper.

            “We’ll pay it all today,” we said, completely decided on what we were setting out to do.

            “Oh, oh,” he smiled, “I’ll need to get a new piece of paper.”

            He came back with a new agreement showing us paying in full, “It will make you a good home up there,” he said.

            Leonard is a wealth of historical information and we sat talking airplanes and flying and traplines and land and work.  Given enough coffee and time, we could have talked for hours.

            Later his grand-daughter expressed her gratitude, “Thank you for your patience in working with my grandfather.  We have a saying around here, ‘Leonard’s way is the only way.’”

            “Oh, I think we have a new friend,” I assured her.

            It was hard to get Bub to leave her new buddies.

            “Can’t we stay a little longer?” she whined.

            “We have to go start your rainbow house,” Myra answered.

            Amazingly, getting to the car was not a problem after that.

Bub and Harper, our two grizzly bear cubs, foraging for last year's cranberries up at our new lot.  The willows and spruce are back where the house and garage will be.

Fish and Chips are Great: Reviving the Muktuk Marston Victory Garden in Unalakleet

Eunice Ryan with a giant Unalakleet grown turnip (Photo Courtesy Jeff Erickson)

I looked out the window at our garden beds after reading the headlines from The Wallstreet Journal and New York Times.  Both sources warned of possible food shortages.

            “If this thing truly does go sideways,” I said to Myra without taking my eyes from the small beds, “these gardens aren’t going to be enough to feed us and our neighbors.”

            “We need to plant more food,” was her response.

            Unalakleet, once the self-proclaimed garden capital of the state, is not covered with the crops that used to be seen in every yard anymore.  Granted, we are blessed by what the country gives us-- berries, fish, birds, moose, wild greens, sea mammals, but we import pretty much all of the vegetables we eat.  We pride ourselves on our subsistence lifestyle, but even with that bounty, there are many homes that don’t have food to last more than a couple of weeks.

            People used to have root cellars filled with potatoes and carrots and shelves filled with home-canned vegetables, but the steady supply of fresh produce in the stores has made life easy, and perhaps arguably not as healthy.

            “There is the potato farm,” Myra voiced.  “We could replant the potato farm with enough food to feed the whole community.  Potatoes are pretty easy to plant, easy to maintain, and give a good yield.”

            We began an online chat with some people in town that we thought would be interested in this kind of project.  The Marston Foundation was mentioned due their involvement in agriculture in Unalakleet in the past.

            The Marston Foundation is online (see resource section on the right side of this blog) and I shot off a quick note through their contact page expressing what we were looking at doing and how great it would be to continue Marston’s legacy on his homestead in Unalakleet.  I left my contact information and figured that was that.  According to their website, we were way past the deadline for any grant help.

            A couple hours later and my cell phone rang with an unknown number.

            “This is Blythe Marston with the Marston foundation…”

            I am not really sure how long it took for me to respond.  In all honesty, since reading Muktuk Marston’s book, Men of the Tundra, I’ve been a little bit of a fan.

            “Blythe Marston you said?”

            “Yes, I got your message about planting at my grandfather’s old homestead.  My dad and I are pretty excited about the idea.”

            “Blythe, I have to admit, I am kind of geeking out right now,” I laughed, “your grandfather is a kind of hero of mine.”

            The Marston foundation is named after Major Marvin “Muktuk” Marston, the founder of the Alaska Territorial Guard.  He was a lot of things: driven military leader, pioneer, advocate for native rights, and a strong proponent for agriculture in bush Alaska to name a few.

            One of the chapters in his book is entitled “Fish and Chips is Great,” and it outlined his plan for agriculture as the future of a self-sufficient bush Alaska with Unalakleet being his proving grounds.

            “Well, my dad and I think it is neat idea, and we would like to help you out.  Put together an informal proposal with what you think you will need to make it work, and we’ll bring it to the board.”

Potato field in front of a cache and fish rack full of fish.  Proof that we can truly feed ourselves with effort. (Photo Courtesy of Jeff Erickson)

             And so, the wheels began turning and a meeting of like-minded Unalakletians was called (social distancing was of course observed).

            “I’ve been meaning to till up that field anyway,” Brad voiced.  “I want to level it, and that seemed the best way to do it.  It would be good to put some hours on the camp tractor this summer.”

            Brad is the Bible Camp caretaker with the field that everyone in town refers to as the potato farm.

            “So how big do we go?” I voiced.

            Jeff who remembers working the old potato field piped up, “Do a whole acre.  We can till up enough for an entire acre and if we can find enough seeds to do that much, we plant the whole thing.”

            “I’ll start calling around for seed potatoes and fertilizer,” I offered.  “Would be nice to go an organic route with fertilizer to start rebuilding the soil.  Do I ask for tools?”

            “Go big- tools, water pump, seeds, fertilizer, worst they can do is say no,” Jeff said.

            Jeff’s wife Donna walked in on the already going conversation.

            “What are you guys talking about?” she asked.

            “Planting the potato field with the Marston’s help,” Jeff quickly summarized.

            “Oh, they are such nice people,” Donna said sweetly, “Muktuk’s grand-daughter stayed with us last year.  She is such a nice lady… what was her name again?  Blythe?”

            I sat and listened to Jeff and Donna’s memories of what the field had been when they were kids. 

            “We had to go and work that field as dorm kids at Covenant High,” Donna explained with a grin.  “We dug potatoes, carrots… we would race into the field and down to where the carrots were planted, pulling a handful out,” Donna’s eyes disappeared in her huge smile.  “Dunk them in the river to wash them and bite right in.  Sweetest carrots ever.”

            “This whole town was full of gardens,” Jeff added.

            “We would dig the potatoes,” Donna continued and pack them in sawdust in the basement of the dorms and eat potatoes all winter.  I worked at Brown’s lodge, and he got potatoes from the farm too.  I’d go down in the cellar and dig them out of the saw dust, come up wash them, run them through the French fry cutter… kerchunk,” she made the motion of operating the arm on the cutter, “made the best fries.”

            We adjourned our meeting and I typed up the proposal based off of the prices I was finding for seed and fertilizer online.

            Ms. Marston contacted me with a tentative $5500 for the project dependent upon board approval.  I scrounged around for seed potatoes.

            “I have some,” the voice on the other end of the phone replied, “how many do you need.”

            “1600 pounds,” I answered.

            “Oh boy, I can maybe get you 300.”

            Seems that in light of Covid-19 that our group was not the only one planting potatoes.  Pretty much all of the seed in the state was flying off the shelf.

            I called around finding seed suppliers that could fill part of my order, and it was beginning to look like we were going to have a collection of seed from every potato dealer in the state.

            “I don’t have a lot of variety,” Jeff at Alaska Specialty Crops told me over the phone, “but I can maybe help you… how much do you need?”

            I went through my spiel explaining the project and that we were partnering with the Marstons.  I expected the same answer I had gotten on every other call concerning the ability to fill part of the order.

            “Yeah, as long as you are okay with Yukon Gold and Cal White, I think I can do that,” Jeff responded. 

            “I don’t have the money yet, but Marstons said I could probably get it,” I explained.

            “I’ll put the seed on hold for you for a couple of days.  I respect the Marstons, and their name is good with me. I have done some work with them going out to bush communities for garden consulting and I have talked back and forth with them about bush food access issues.  I get them for a buck a pound… I can deliver them to the airport for you for a buck and a quarter.”

            Calling around for organic fertilizer was a similar experience until reaching a person at Susitna Organics.

            “Yeah, I can deliver a full pallet of bags (60x 20 pound bags) for a little over seven dollars per twenty pounds, but I can sell you a super sack (900 pounds) for $3.33 per twenty pounds delivered to the airport.”

            Blythe wrote me with an update saying we got the go ahead for the $5500 and that I should check with the air carriers to see if they would be willing to donate freight.

            It was a couple day process, but Everts Air Cargo agreed to haul the first 1000 pounds of potato seeds for free and charge us 83 cents a pound for the remaining 600.  Northern Air Cargo agreed to hauling the 900 pounds of compost for free.

            And now, word is getting around town.  People are excited to see the field planted and growing again.  They are excited to work it, learn the skill, teach their kids, be outside, growing food for themselves and their community.

            The goal, when the harvest comes in, is to sell the potatoes at a low price to the consumer… basically just enough to build a little fund to supply seeds, fertilizer, and increase our variety of crops next season.

            Marston dreamed of a self-sufficient, locally grown Unalakleet.  That vision took a short vacation, but with the help of some very generous sponsors seems to be back on course.

           

Beautiful Unalakleet Garden where the church and parsonage stand today (Photo Courtesy Jeff Erickson)