Ordinary Men Build A Legendary Road
Black Engineers & The ALCAN Highway
Professor Quintard Taylor found our website shortly after it went on line, offered to link to it on his much better know website, Blackpast.org. When Epicenter Press released our book, We Fought the Road, he offered to let us write a perspectives article for his website–a big opportunity to advance our cause. Recently we discovered…
Leonard Larkins is in Alaska People in Alaska did a fundraiser and brought Leonard Larkins and three of his sons up to honor Leonard. Yesterday we received an email with a photo of Leonard Larkins and three of his sons at the Fairbanks Airport. I think we are more excited than he is. In our mind this…
The Path to Leonard Larkins Last week we made our way to New Orleans to meet a second black veteran of the 93rd. The way south took us through the forests and fields of Alabama and the swampland of southern Mississippi—quiet, vaguely impoverished country, hot under the afternoon sun. Towns and places glided by…
The Inland Tlingits have occupied Yukon Territory for time out of mind. For a story about them today go to our blog at this link Meeting the Inland Tlingits
Another unforgettable character in Yukon is Millie Jones. For a story about her on our blog site go here Millie’s First White Men were Black
An unforgettable character in her (or his) own right, Polly of Carcross has a post on our blog. The story of Polly of Carcross
As amazing a character as we’ve run across in our exploration of the stories from the north country, Doug Bell captivated us. His story is on our blog site at Doug Bell on chrisdennis111
The late Heath Twichell, dean of Alaska Highway historians, was our friend and mentor. To read his story follow this link to our blog site. Twichell, Father and Son
WE FOUND ANOTHER FAMILY! Last year Jean Pollard, an Alaska educator who has worked tirelessly to celebrate the black heroes of the Alaska Highway, and a terrific friend of our effort to do the same, helped organize an event in Anchorage to celebrate the memory of those men. Ceylon Mitchell lives in Anchorage. His father helped…
A few weeks ago my email included a nice surprise. Gary Orlando, of Yulee, Florida, found his grandfather’s name, Alfred Cesinger, here on the site and contacted me. A Tech Sgt in the 340th Engineers, Cesinger helped build the ALCAN in 1942. Today my mailbox contained an even nicer surprise—a CD filled with photos and…