KOUGEROK SPECIAL

Evening Star, Issue 23123, 24 November 1938, Page 16

KOUGEROK SPECIAL

LOCOMOTIVE CHASES RABBITS I’ve just come back from a “train ride ” that could he possible only in Alaska, where fantastic things are the rule, writes Helen Wilcox, in the New York 1 Herald-Tribune.’ It was a wild 40-mile dash on the “ Kougerok Special ” from Nome to the Gold Creek Mining Camp. The track, a genuine narrow-gauge affair, the t£ coach/ a miniature covered wagon on wheels; and the “ engine power,” seven huge Siberian dogs, each of which had more wolf than canine heritage. The driver, Kaska, was half Russian, half Aleut. He grinned at my look of astonishment. The dogs were howling and barking and straining at the traces. “ Don’t worry, jus’ hang on. We go slow first, but by’m by, you see . . .” At first we rattled .comfortably along the narrow track, the dogs trotting in pleasant unison. We were soon out of sight of the town of Nome. Around us stretched the tundra, flat, treeless, thickly carpeted with fireweed and blue lupine. FULL CRY OYER THE TUNDRA. Suddenly a rabbit crossed the track. And instantly our “engine,” all seven of it, gave a howl of delight, and went in mad pursuit, pulling the coach right off the tracks. Kaska and I were jounced out. Across the tundra went the “ Kougerok Special ” in full cry, the unwieldy coach bumping over the ground. Kaska shouted and cursed. And finally they came back, shamefaced, and tongues dripping. The “ train ” was put on the track again, and we went on. An hour later we came to the brink of a downhill grade, and the dogs stiffened to a stop. Then, without so much as a “ by your leave,” they all jumped aboard! One big silver timber wolf climbed sociably into my and snapped at another who had the same idea. Kaska laughed as he gave the coach a push. “ That’s all right, they always ride downhill. We go 10 miles this way.” The grade was steeper than it looked. We shot downward at a speed that rocked us fro:n side to side. We careered around the hairpin curves and ■ swooshed over bridges that spanned deep canyons. I didn’t think we’d ever make it . . . but we did. And when the “train” finally came to a stop, the dogs barked noisily, leaped down and took their places, and trotted on towards our destination.

Kaska said tliis track was laid during the gold rush about 30 years ago. A small locomotive pulled freight to and from the mining camps along the Kougerok River. But it cost a lot to fuel "the engine, and soon the companies began freighting by water and the train stopped running. Husky dogs, however, have to be fed, even in the summer months when they are not normally working. So the “ dogomotive ” idea was evolved, and has been very successful.

I asked Kaska if the company carried rabbit insurance. He grinned. “ Oh, dose dogs, dey don’t go off the track much . . . jus’ sometimes.”