AKDisciple

STAN BISHOP—A TRUE SOURDOUGH

BECOMING A “DISCIPLE” OF ALASKA

Stan: Then I got a few things together and sent for my mother and my brother and sister to come up and stay a winter up here, through one winter with me before I left Alaska. I figured on going back to California. And by the time we spent one winter here we were so enamored with the country that none of us wanted to go back. So then we got Dad to come up.

Louise: And all you kids are still here!

Stan: Yes. And I was more or less the man of the family then because my dad wasn’t a bit interested in coming to Alaska at that time. So we had a cabin out at Yes Bay and one of the warehouses out there was still in good shape and I fixed that up so the kids could have a swing and stuff like that. And I taught them how to row a boat. And generally speaking we became disciples of Alaska.

Forest Service Campsite and Cabin at Lake McDonald Today

Louise: I’d say you did. So you stayed at Yes Bay that first winter? The winter of ‘31? Stan: I don’t remember which year it was. Probably about the winter of ‘31, I think. For a long time I kept track of years and time and stuff but through the years life became so complicated that I lost track of time ‘cause I didn’t think it was important to spend time worrying about which year it was. [Stan and his family must have stayed at Yes Bay in 1933 after the hatchery closed and the personnel were transferred out, or in 1934 after the hatchery buildings were dismantled.]

At that time I was fighting to hang on, to keep...’course they tell you nowadays you have to do this and that to keep Mother Nature happy, but we were fighting like the very devil to hang on to what we had, to keep Mother Nature from taking it away from us. I’m not worried too much about Mother Nature in this country. If you relax five minutes, why, Mother Nature has already taken over; you get either booted or eased out someway or other. Stuff will grow up around you to where you’ve got to get out.

* * * * * * * * *

1.Introduction	2 Early Years in California	3.Coming to Alaska- Yes Bay	4.Becoming a Disciple of Alaska	5.The Unuk River	6. Keeping the Light On	7.Homestead on the Eulachon River	8. Fur Trapping
9.Home for Thanksgiving	10.Placer Mine on the Unuk	11.Building a Road to Canada	12.Freighting on the Unuk	13.Ketchikan	14. Wartime Work-Ketchikan	15.Port Stewart & Ketchikan Pulp Company	16.Epilogue

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