THE BIG PINES WORK HORSE- PART 3
En route to the Alaskan interior, the McClellan party first had to cross the Valdez Glacier. During winter and early spring, the glacier's many crevasses were filled with deep snow forming snow bridges. The snow bridges were useful, that is until the snow began to melt. Many crevassed areas soon became impassable, and the snow-covered surface of the glacier was transformed into sheets of slippery white ice that made crossing very hazardous.
For crossing the glacier and a season of prospecting, each man required supplies that were loaded aboard wooden sleds. The supplies included heavy tarpaulin tents, heavy sleeping bags, a sheet metal Yukon stove for warmth and cooking, oil skins, lots of cold weather clothing, cooking utensils, axes, whipsaws for small boat building, and even oil stoves to survive trekking across the glacier itself. The food supplies consisted mainly of hard tack, beans, bacon, flour, rice, and if the miner was lucky, powdered eggs, potatoes, and dried fruit. The individual supplies weighed between 1500 to 2000 pounds! Once the supplies were properly packed, the next chore was trying to find a safe way to traverse a dangerous glacier.
Although the Valdez Glacier slope was not extremely steep, crossing it through ice, fresh fallen snow or even thick and slick melting snow, wasn't going to be an easy task. Fifteen hundred pounds in two hundred pound loads required at least seven trips back and forth to the end of the glacier, which almost seventy miles. Over these many miles, half of the men pulled a 200 pound sled! This was only the 'start' of the crossing. Once the foot of the glacier was reached, this strenuous task had to be repeated for another three hundred and sixty miles while gaining almost a mile in elevation! With storms factored in, a man carrying a light load might have been able to make the summit in two days. However, in this case, it took many of the parties six weeks to two months to lug their supplies across the formidable Valdez Glacier! Page 308 of the Holeski Diary made record of R. F. McClellan's final word on the matter, "This was something like work. "
