INTERVIEW WITH CHESTER RUSSELL

Date of Interview: February 22, 2003 in Fort Nelson, British Columbia

Interviewer: Earl Brown/Hank Bridgeman
Transcriber: Case Mond

Earl Brown:
...you would have to make a comment to make on that.

Chester Russell:
Hell I would. I would have to make a comment on the Horizon.

Earl Brown:
And I think this is the perfect opportunity to do that. Well, maybe lets go ahead and start there.

Chester Russell:
Okay.

Earl Brown:
You know, Chester, it is dang good to see you here in Fort Nelson... to see you back here in Fort Nelson over 61 years, almost to the date, from the first time that you got here. Can you maybe give us a little run down on how your trip back to Fort Nelson, this time around, panned out. It was a pretty ordinary... (phone rings, interruption, Chester Russell laughs,)

Earl Brown:
I think we should start from the top again.

Chester Russell:
Are you sure now?

Earl Brown:
I’m pretty darn sure.

Chester Russell:
Okay. Can I use your name?

Earl Brown:
Sounds good to me.

Chester Russell:
Okay.

Earl Brown:
We’re having a conversation.

Chester Russell:
Yeah right. Okay, that’s fine. (phone gives “off the hook signal, interruption. Phone to be unplugged, voices in background, Chester Russell laughs.)

Chester Russell:
Okay. Now. You go ahead and we’ll start again.

Earl Brown:
Mr. Chester L. Russell, it is one heck of a pleasure to get a chance to see you back here in Fort Nelson. Back here, almost 61 years to the day (CR: That’s true) that the first time that you made it through the metropolis of Fort Nelson. So, I guess now coming up this time around, here, it was just kind of a fairly standard, routine, trip from your neck of the woods up to ours. Is that right?

Chester Russell:
Yes, that’s right. And we had a little problem there when we left up... on the 20th to come up here. When we got to Canada, well, we didn’t have the right papers to get into Canada, so we had to go back home. And when we got back to Fort Ne... err, to Goose Bay, well, we got there, the pilot on the plane asked us, he said: “Did you have an enjoyable trip? And I told him: “No,” I said, “it was a heartbreaker.” I said: “We got as far as Canada and we couldn’t get through, to go on into Fort Nelson.” Anyway, Mary and I, we went to leave, we started out the door and there was a young lady who stopped us. She said “Just a minute, before you leave, we want to talk to you.” So, anyway, they brought us back in and for about an hour they went through all the papers, and the Horizon plane we was on. After all was said and done, they made arrangements for us to fly back the next day if we wanted to. So, anyway, we managed to get to the bank at nine o’clock in the morning and got our birth certificates and we all got back to the airplane and we flew straight through then to Vancouver. And then Vancouver, everything went fine. The Horizon people, I’ll have to say, they’re all right in my books and I’ve gotta thank them a whole bunch.

Earl Brown:
That is amazing, because, again, you were supposed to be arriving here as a special guest of the Town of Fort Nelson, for the Trappers’ Rendezvous. And you, of course, were gonna get lots of spare time, and have a day to kill...

Chester Russell:
A day to rest. (laughs).

Earl Brown:
A day to rest. And so, as it is, when did you actually arrive in town?

Chester Russell:
Well we finally got here about eight o’clock at night. It was quite interesting. The play that was being, being on was already practically over when we got here but it worked out fine. We had a real lot of fun, lot of laughs.

Earl Brown:
Yeah, actually, we were very fortunate, because what had happened, is the events that were taking place, the first half of the thing, which had nothing to do with the play. We had the cancan girls and the jazz band, and...

Chester Russell:
I love your cancan girls.

Earl Brown:
Aren’t they quite something else?

Chester Russell:
Hey, you bet. (laughs) I may be 82 years old, but they’re still pretty cute.

Earl Brown:
Can’t-can’t disagree with you there the least, Chester!

Earl Brown:
So cause I know that... we were all expecting you and I had asked the audience, I said: “We have a special presentation of ‘Tales of a Catskinner’ and we have a special guest, Mr. Chester Russell, and has anyone seen Mr. Russell?” And when I told them, that you were turned back at the border the day before that you weren’t allowed entry into Canada and they’d shipped you back to Goose Bay, I’ll tell you, it was just breaking their hearts. And then when we found out that, by the good cooperation of the people of Horizon who managed to go ahead and fly you back and fly you back again...

Chester Russell:
That’s right, and no charges. They wasn’t supposed to fly us to Vancouver to start with. They was only supposed to fly us to Portland, and they flew us on through to Vancouver, no charges. And I’ll tell you, I take my hat off to them, although I’m not a... (interruption, about microphone?) Oh oh, I’m rattling at them.

Hank Bridgeman (background voice):
It’s not bad, It’s just... a little rattle.

Chester Russell:
Anyway, It was something that they... we really appreciated what they’d done.

Earl Brown:
Yeah, It was excellent. Because I know that... I was telling people a story about you not being able to get there on time, I was able to go ahead and say: “We’re sure hoping that plane gets here on time.” And then all of a sudden, from the back of the hall, you said: “Yup, a little late, but we made’r.” Well, you could have brought the house down.

Chester Russell:
Yeah, that was interesting. And, the mounted policeman that was there. When he was coming up the stairs there, I said: “Oh, my God, what have I got myself into now?” (laughs)

Earl Brown:
We... (unintelligible) complete with all the red serge and all...

Chester Russell:
He had it all.

Earl Brown:
Well, it sure is great to have you back here 61 years later.

Chester Russell:
Thank you, thank you.

Earl Brown:
And, of course, part of the reason we want to talk to you now, is you’ve got a few tales to tell... Tales from a Catskinner.

Chester Russell:
There’s a few left yet. But I want someone to know that I’m not... no officer, I’m just a plain old private. I finally ended up with a T5 rating, which is equivalent to the corporal.

Earl Brown:
Okay. And that was, again, you can’t build a road or fight an army if you only got officers. You need those guys with the T5 rating and the privates and so forth.

Chester Russell:
(laughs) that’s right.

Earl Brown:
So, how the heck did you get here, in Dawson Creek or on the Alaska Highway scene, to start with?

Chester Russell:
Well, let’s start up and... back in California there, Fort Ord California. I was in the 13th Infantry... I guess it was... well, it was a division. And they pulled us out of that and transferred me over to the 35th Engineers, which is combat engineers. And when we got there they had winter clothes scattered out there and everybody was going through them to pick up... see what would fit. They had some heavy clothes, and we knew then that something was up. So, anyway, they made up the train, which was a freight train, with all our equipment, supplies. And we started out and we went through, up in through Idaho, come into Kingsgate, into Canada there, at Kingsgate, and then we went over to Edmonton. And there at Edmonton there, we had to do a layover there, they had to do a lot of transferring. I thought it was a narrow gauge railroad that went into... into Dawson Creek, but it wasn’t. It was a narrow... the rail itself was narrow.

Earl Brown:
Okay, so it was standard gauge but just...

Chester Russell:
Yeah. They had us taking the... break up the train, break up the equipment because it was too heavy. Anyway, they let the G.I.s get on the passenger train and the freight come later. Just as we got into Dawson Creek, I can remember one, one a big curve there.

Earl Brown:
Oh yeah?

Chester Russell:
And... Anyway... What I guess with about the first one that come in there, they turned over a couple of the cars and dumped the equipment on the side over there. I can remember that. There’s something else too I’d like to say, I don’t know if it’s true or not, but, when we got into Dawson Creek, there was only one elevator there. That’s all, that’s all there was, just one elevator. And I’ve seen, for the last 50 years, I’ve seen Dawson Creek with half a dozen elevators, grain elevators. And I don’t know... I don’t think I was that blind there. (laughs) Well, anyway, I don’t think them pictures is Dawson Creek, is what I’m trying to say. But now, I don’t know.

Earl Brown:
Or least, assuming they were Dawson Creek, they weren’t shot at the time that you guys arrived in ‘42. (CR: That’s right) I think they would have been there a little bit afterwards.

Chester Russell:
They’re not there now.

Earl Brown:
The elevators have come down all over the place.

Chester Russell:
Okay. Now, that wouldn’t... In Dawson Creek it hasn’t.

Earl Brown:
That’s the nice thing about it, isn’t it.

Chester Russell:
It’s still there. (laughs)

Earl Brown:
It’s still there and they have gone ahead and preserved that there (CR: That’s right) and made it into an art gallery (CR: That’s right) . And, boy, is it ever in a terrific spot (CR: That’s right) . Did you have a chance to go and to see the highway building construction material they’ve got in the gallery there?

Chester Russell:
I went in there the one time, in went in, but... we was kind of rushed for time. We was trying to get up here.

Earl Brown:
Okay, now, of course, once you got to Dawson Creek, well then what?

Chester Russell:
Now, we got to Dawson Creek and we didn’t slow down. They marched us right through Dawson Creek there, right in... load us up and took us to Fort St. John. That’s where our camp was set up. And then from there, they moved us on in to Fort Nelson. That was done over that trail that was built by the civilians. They put the airstrip in. It was for the bunch of planes to flying in to Alaska there. And that’s what we went in on. And we went in on that winter trail there before the thaw.

Earl Brown:
That’s right, because if it would have thawed... You arrived in Dawson Creek, when?

Chester Russell:
It was in... That would probably have been, the time we got all squared away there, it was like, maybe the 15th of April, 1942. I don’t know for sure, but it was in that area. And then when, and then when it come Easter Sunday, then we started the winter trail... not the winter trail but the highway. That was started on Easter Sunday.

Earl Brown:
So basically there was different regiments whose job it was to go ahead and build certain portions of the road. (CR: That’s right, that’s right) And so your outfit, basically, you job was to get the heck out of Dawson Creek, (CR: That’s right) get on the basic necessities on the winter trail, get set up here in Fort Nelson, (CR: That’s right), and then start building...

Chester Russell:
before the thaw.

Earl Brown:
Before the thaw.

Chester Russell:
After the thaw, then we was stuck in there. We had our own... all of our frozen meat and everything was... in fact, I drove one of the trucks with a fellow name of Morton. It was a single axle truck. That’s all we had, was single axle trucks. Then we moved all our stuff in here... I don’t know what they were thinking about our food. They had all that frozen meat and stuff. They tried to build an ice house to, to keep it. As soon as thaw came, all that melted right along with it. All the meat spoilt. Then we got pretty hungry there at times. We was eating pancakes all the time. It even got down to the point one time, we had to take the wrappings of the hard candies and melt it down for sugar. That is also told in the trailblazers book they wrote, and that is the God’s truth.

Earl Brown:
Like I say, once you were there, you guys were absolutely on your own. (CR: That’s right) You didn’t have people to come along and say: “Oh, can we take your order please.”

Chester Russell:
That’s right. And also, we didn’t get our mail everyday either. They brought mail in by plane and dumped it. They couldn’t land because everything was so muddy, so they just dumped it out, hit the ground, and some of it we got, some of it we didn’t.

Earl Brown:
I’ll be darned. In fact, looking through your book, Tales of a Catskinner, it’s great because the one thing it’s got is Lieutenant John Gerhart’s personal log...

Chester Russell:
Personal, that’s true.

Earl Brown:
So it says here, March the 10th, was when you left Fort Ord. (CR: Yup) You arrived in Dawson Creek, 11 a.m. (CR: Yup) on March the 16th. (CR: That’s right) On March the 16th, you headed for Fort St. John. (CR: Uh, huh). You were in Dawson Creek for six hours. (CR: That’s about... that’s about the truth.) And then you left for Fort Nelson on the 19th of March and got there on the 20th.

Chester Russell:
That’s the way it was. And I’d like to say that, if it wasn’t for John Gerhart... He was my neighbor, and he passed away last year on me. And uh, but if it hadn’t been for him and his daily records, we couldn't have... the book wouldn’t have been too interesting. Also, the map that was in it, was the first map that was mapped of the highway... of the Alcan, was a first. John Gerhart, now also, when we built the Coal River Bridge there, they flew him in with a squad of men. I think they were 14 men and one medic. And they flew him in with all the equipment and they built the bridge before, I think even before we got to the hot springs. I think that was... I think he had... He had it all finished, all except for putting the planks on the deck. And that bridge, in the winter of... spring of ‘43, it stood the, it stood the spring thaw. That bridge and the one across the Liard River, was the only two bridges that stood, at that time, in the spring thaw of ‘43.

Earl Brown:
There was one brutal amount of ice going out there and they would rip stuff out like match sticks.

Chester Russell:
That’s right. It done damage to the Coal River Bridge, but it didn’t put it out to where they couldn’t use it.

Earl Brown:
I guess the weather thing. When you guys arrived in Dawson Creek and Fort St. John, was the clothing and the gear and the equipment that you had... did it do the job for you?

Chester Russell:
Yeah, it... That big heavy parka we had, it was awkward and on. We had these mittens. We didn’t have no gloves, we just had these leather mittens. The doggone things had a split in the palm of the hand. Like, when on the tractors, if something fell off and knocked a pin out or something, we’d reach down or get our fingers to that [dead gum crack] and that and grab a hold of that, whatever it was and you couldn’t [turn loose] a darn thing. To this day, the end of my fingers from my joints out , or if I get a cold weather, I can’t take it. It just makes me wanna cry (laughs).

Earl Brown:
And that goes back to your days building, working on the Alaska Highway, (CR: That’s right) it was so heavy. Your job was what, then, exactly.

Chester Russell:
I was just a catskinner. Catskinner was a tractor, it was the operator. But I was not no catskinner coming I come up here, I guarantee you. I never saw... I’d never had saw no D8. I was a cowboy. I was only interested... I was a young kid and I was interested in rodeo in which... I was pretty proud of myself. I had saved a kid from getting killed, or getting hurt... and also the cow. Anyway, I had all bullfighting in California that I wanted in amateur rodeos. But I was no good, don’t misunderstand me. I was just in my apprentice. But my friend, Slim Pickins, who was Lou Slinly, he went on and married... well, he’d done great, he’d done all right, but he still said he’d rather be home and milking cows. (laughs).

Earl Brown:
I’ll be darned.

Chester Russell:
I’d like to tell you something about that. When we, when we left Fort Ord... We left Fort Ord and we built, the,pioneered the highway, this is all living in tents. We’d never lived in a building, never lived in a building, of any kind, from the time we left Fort Ord till we finished... well we finished the highway, the Alaskan Highway, and then after we got that done, they sent me back with a fellow, officer Lueber. He wanted me to... asked me if I wanted to go back to Dawson Creek. I asked him “why?” and he said “Well, we got two tractors down there, two new D8s and we want to bring them up. And we need four of them, he says. And after him I said: “Well, who... who do you wanna... who’s gonna go?” He said: “You go pick’em.” And I, why he’d done that to me, I don’t know. We was pretty close. All he had to do all day long was stand around and look at us. He was our... he was the one who was always looking after us.

Earl Brown:
...your immediate officer?

Chester Russell:
Right. So anyway, we went ahead and picked out three other fellows. One of them was George Windham, and Cecil Elleston, and Willard Larston. I don’t know where George Windham is. I think he might have got killed in Europe, but I’m not sure. And Elleston, he would not have nothing to do with the army. We tried to get him to come to the reunion but he wouldn’t. One time we took... When we built that winter trail to Fort Simpson, we was there and that trapper was coming out, and Cecil asked him, wondering where he was going. He said was going to Dawson Creek. So anyway, he said...

Earl Brown:
So if I get this right here, you were going to Fort Simpson, the trapper is going to Dawson Creek, we got a few miles, don’t we.

Chester Russell:
Yes we have. We got a bunch. So anyway, he asked him, “When are you coming back” and he said “in a couple of months.” He said, “if I gave you twenty dollars, would you bring me back a case of whiskey?” He said “yeah. I’ll bring you back a case of whiskey.” So anyway, just the three of us was there, the trapper and the two of us, so anyway. To get back to my story, after it was all said and done, I called him one time, we had a reunion, we drank all his whiskey. He didn’t get no whiskey.

Earl Brown:
So the trapper showed up with the whiskey...?

Chester Russell:
Yeah, and Cecil ended up in the hospital here at Fort Nelson. They’d set up a hospital here when... it was a black people, the black fellows had it. So, anyway, Cecil was there and, we felt, was pretty lucky in them warm tents. So anyway, we drank his whiskey. So anyway, when we had a reunion I tried to get him to go. I was gonna buy him his whiskey back. He would never come to the reunion.
But anyway, you know, with my story, when we built that... We went out to try and built that winter trail to Fort Simpson. We didn’t get it done. We couldn’t get across the river or something. So anyway, we got that done and come back to Fort Nelson. And the company and our outfit was on the Liard River. And there was a ten-wheeler truck Studebaker sitting there with a load of gas, and this officer come to me and asks me, and says: “Would you mind taking that truck and driving it up to the Liard River.” (coughs, “excuse me”) But, he said: “They’re out of gas up there and they need this gas right away.” I told him, I said: “Well, I’ve never drove a Studebaker ten-wheeler before, but I guess I can do it.” He said “Well Sergeant Grocke is gonna go with you.” And I said: “Well, okay.” So we got an old tent and we throw it up on top and we rolled out sleeping bag in it and our belongings. We started out. We got up the road about... Oh, I don’t know... maybe a couple of hours or so , and I ask Grocke if he’d like to drive. He said: “I can’t drive.” He said “I never drove a car before in my life!” And he was from New York! And here I was stuck with that thing, going up there, and imagine, you’re only going about five or ten miles an hour. So anyway, finally we got to the, we got up the Liard River. We got up there and they unloaded the sleeping bags. And that was in... I know, maybe... I guess... maybe even about right now, in February. I don’t know for sure but it was along about that time. So anyway, they rolled this sleeping bag of mine in an old Quonset hut. And of all that time, that was the first building that I slept in, in all that time.

Earl Brown:
So you were on a year-long, a year-and-a-half-long camping trip.

Chester Russell:
That’s right. (laughs) That was a long camping trip. And I tell you what, I never brought it up, but do you ever imagine how stinky them dam sleeping bags was. We didn’t have no laundry up there. (laughs).

Earl Brown:
I imagine you guys would have been pretty ripened without the laundry there.

Chester Russell:
Oh boy, One thing about it, we was lucky, we had two liners in it. And we sleep in one for a while, and then we take, pull that liner out and we sleep in the other one for while. Then we turn then wrong side out and sleep in them for a while. (laughs) that’s the way we did it.

Earl Brown:
It was a long time between wash days and so forth?

Chester Russell:
That’s right. There was no laundry.

Earl Brown:
Now, you were talking about driving on the... operating the cats. Were these cats that they had you running, were they the absolutely top-notch technologically number one, or the run-of-the-mill, or... how was your cats?

Chester Russell:
The D8 tractor was... cat... as far as I’m concerned, was one of the only tractors at that time that could have done that job. Now don’t misunderstand me. International tractors and the AC tractors are good tractors, but the starting system on them was started with batteries. But the old D8, you got up there between the radiator and the dozer blade and you crank that starter engine to start the diesel.

Earl Brown:
So you had a gas engine that... you started the gas engine and then that gas engine started the diesel. (CR: That’s right, that’s right) And that was the only piece of equipment that was so equipped?

Chester Russell:
Yeah. And I mean, it was the only piece of equipment that you could... like the old saying, you could take a piece of baling wire and you could make it work. But we didn’t have no baling wire, so we used the tent ropes.

Earl Brown:
Tent ropes. (laughs). I’ll be darned. How did the stuff last? Did you have any breakdowns along the way? Were they reliable?

Chester Russell:
The only trouble that we had with that tractor was the tracks. The rollers would get stuck and they wouldn’t turn and they’d get a flat spot on them. But, the fellow... we had a crew, that’s all they’d done, dug mud and sticks and stumps and stuff out off the tracks to keep them working. The final drives, the final drive bearing, was the only trouble we really ever had with that cat. As far as I was... the engines was... never had... just minor, minor things. We had one fellow, he was shipped in, he had later... His name was Trachsel. He was a little guy, and I mean little.

Earl Brown:
You’re talking Company F little.

Chester Russell:
I think he was even lower than that. (laughs) Well, he was, really, he was a top-notch mechanic. In fact, if you looked at that picture, the company picture I have in my book, I think you can spot him in the middle of there. There’s know one there. (laughs). So, anyway, but eh... it was something. And you know we had another deal. I’ve never told it and I couldn’t tell it in front of John Gerhart. On them tractors, they’d leak oil into the housing and the gearboxes there, and it would get on the brake lining. And if it got on that brake lining, you couldn’t turn them. They would just... wouldn’t turn. So we finally found a plug, underneath that tractor. You’d take it out and drain that, drain that old oil out. Then you hold your foot down on the brake till you get it good and hot and burn that all the oil off, and then you had brakes again. Well that went on and finally we’d throw the plugs and plumb away. And one time, I’m gonna tell this now, but I really shouldn’t, I guess, but... I was working on this tractor, doggone thing. The brakes was all... wasn’t right.... so... anyway, I was underneath the tractor working on it but I... taking it out of gear and pull the master clutch back... And I was under there and pretty quick, the damn thing throttle and... wide open. And let out a beller and I come out of from under that old tractor and it was also Gerhart who was sitting up there. And thank God he didn’t start it up and run over me. He asked me that... He felt that... I think he knew it was me. He asked me a couple of different times if I remember, you know, and I told him: “No.”

Earl Brown:
You had no recollection of that [?] until he passed away.

Chester Russell:
When he brought it up... when he brought it up...

Earl Brown:
You felt guilty as sin?

Chester Russell:
I knew... I remember... I brought it back to him. It’s a wonder he didn’t run over me. (laughs) He never got on no more tractors though, I don’t think.

Earl Brown:
So again, like I said, when you started... You didn’t... you had a rodeo background. You weren’t a heavy equipment operator...

Chester Russell:
I’d never even seen a D8 before.

Earl Brown:
What kind of abuse did you guys put that equipment through while you were learning how to operate that stuff?

Chester Russell:
Well, one thing: cables. Cables was ruined every day, practically. But we had to knock that off because we were running out of cables for the dozers, and that was no good, so.

Earl Brown:
You had to smarten up...

Chester Russell:
We had to smarten up.

Earl Brown:
[sprig it up and fly right].

Chester Russell:
That’s right. And we had another problem too there, with the air filters on that D8. The fellows, they’d change the oil in the oil pan, but they wouldn’t... there was some plates up in there that got all froze up and the tractors was burning up oil and they went... they’d had no... they’d had no power. But, finally King, he brought the thawing torch over there one day and turned, put it on to thaw it out and caught the tractor on fire and parts started falling out off it. And after that, she was in good shape.

Earl Brown:
Once you got rid of all these spare parts you didn’t need...

Chester Russell:
(laughs) Well, we put them back in. We put them back in, but we knew they had to come out of there once in a while, clean them.

Earl Brown:
How tough was it to go ahead when you were making this highway... Like I say, you basically had some notches to follow from the topographical battalion...

Chester Russell:
That’s right.

Earl Brown:
Now did you have a quota, like you had to make so many miles a day?

Chester Russell:
No no no no no. You know, I hear these people talking about ten miles a day... I don’t think so. I mean, maybe some of the other outfits did, but I don’t think any of the 35th Engineers ever did ten miles a day. We made maybe, maybe five miles, I think. There’s one time there in that muskeg and stuff, we went pretty good. I’ll tell you about the officer. We had a new officer come in there, and Derdorf, he was a B Company man, and he got all irritated because this guy was telling him where to go and how to go and lower blade, raise the blade, and all that monkey business. Anyway, we got there... I pulled up alongside him with my tractor. I asked him: “Derdorf, what’s the matter?” I says: “My God, we got these small trees here, we should be going like heck. “Ah,” he says, “that damned officer up in front of me he won’t get out of our road.” I said: “Why don’t you start on and I go along with you. I’ll shift into higher gear and we’ll run him down the brush.” Anyway, we did, we run him off down the brush there for quite a ways and after we got it down there, Derdorf he raised his hand up to stop. We got off the tractor. We went down there, and, he was standing there panting. He’d had it. He couldn’t turn around to tell us to stop because if he did he’d run into a tree, and if he’d run into a tree he knew we were gonna run over him. Anyway, Derdorf told him: “Sir, I think you are off the trail.” (laughs)
I’ve never seen him no more, but I tried to accuse the man. In fact, I got a letter from him in my, in my deal there. And I accused him of it and he said “No, it wasn’t me.”

Earl Brown:
I’ll be darned. So once you got rid of the officers, [CR: We made time] to get them out of the road, you made time.

Chester Russell:
We made time. You bet ya, we got with it.

Earl Brown:
So, you started off here from Fort Nelson? (CR: Yep) and, maybe describe the progress as you went from here because you had the Kledo River to cross (CR: Yep), and you had the Steamboat Mountain to climb, and going up through the area around Stone Mountain Park and so forth. (CR: Yep) Gosh.

Chester Russell:
It was tough. But, you know, before we started... when we first started out in April. We started out, I don’t know, but you fly around here in this country, you should see a swath down there some place where we went out in there and turned around and come back, we started over again.

Earl Brown:
So you original run out off Fort Nelson...

Chester Russell:
wasn’t.... It was like that run up here. I had to go back.

Earl Brown:
This isn’t gonna do her. We’ll try it again.

Chester Russell:
That’s right.

Earl Brown:
You loose a little time but then you hit the road there.

Chester Russell:
That’s right.

Earl Brown:
But the one thing that I always was amazed at, you got some big, heavy pieces of equipment (CR: Yep) and you’ve got an awful lot of bodies of water that you have to get that equipment across. Is this floating equipment stuff or what?

Chester Russell:
Yeah, well that there... when I got to the Liard River, we had to put... we had six old pontoons with the... They tell me that there was 15 horse outboard engines on them, but I think there was five horse, truthfully. I don’t think there was... I think there was six five-horse engines. There’s a man on each barge. And we put the tractors on... when we first put the tractor on, we had the dozer on it, and we about sunk it. So we had to turn around and back off, and we took the dozer blade off, and we got back on it, and they...

Earl Brown:
So let’s see if I understand this. What you do is, you line up six barges...

Chester Russell:
Tie them together, clamp them together.

Earl Brown:
Clamped them together. (CR: Yep) Than you lay planking down. (CR: Yep, yep) Then you drive the caterpillar over top of that and try to get all five of these guys on these barges (CR: Six, all six...) all six of these guys here to, in unison, get you from one side of the river to the other side without sinking the show.

Chester Russell:
That’s right. And that... you know, we really had a lot of life jackets and stuff to save us in case we... (laughs) All that [?] greasy coveralls.

Earl Brown:
You fell in and you were gone.

Chester Russell:
Yeah, that was all she wrote. But fortunately, I don’t think anyone did.

Earl Brown:
I was gonna say: did you loose any guys?

Chester Russell:
I don’t think so. I don’t...

Earl Brown:
Not crossing rivers, anyhow.

Chester Russell:
No... the only one I know we lost was Moore when he got hit in the head there walking too close to a tractor. A limb hit him and caused blood... blood clots.

Earl Brown:
Yeah, what the heck happened there. (CR: Well...) I understand you ended up participating into some (CR: Operation) kind of roadside brain surgery. (CR: That’s right, that’s right.) Let’s hear your story.

Chester Russell:
Well, you know, we didn’t have no hospital up here. We were stuck in there, they couldn’t get to it. No... I guess there was no plane... well, it didn’t have time. I mean, he would have been dead if they’d tried to haul him out... get him out. So this Dr. Stotts, he finally got up there where we had him on... he was up in the brush up there.

Earl Brown:
So this was north of Fort Nelson?

Chester Russell:
Yeah, yeah. So anyway, then we got up there. He was laying there. It’d had been a burn through there. Anyway, he looked at him. He opened his right eye, and the thing was... like it was... the man was dead. Then he opened his left eye and it was clear. So then he told us, he said: “Well fellows, Moore’s got a blood clot of the brain.” So anyway, when... he explained to us, he says: “You see this eye here is clear” He says: “Now this means that the blood clot is on the left side of his head.” So anyway, he said “If you fellows will help me, and get some a brace and bit and we’ll operate on him and see if we can save his life because we don’t have time to get him out. If we wait, he’s gonna die.” So, anyway, we went and got a brace and bit and he took and.... drilled three holes in it, in a triangle...

Earl Brown:
In the guy’s skull.

Chester Russell:
in his skull. And they worked on him, and everything went fine. We went on about our business, we went on... trucking up the road. And we’d get the word every day or so, we get the word on how Moore was doing. Finally, a few days later, they had a... they told us that Moore is gonna die because he had fluid on his lungs and they had no way to get it off. And Officer Ammon told Dr. Stotts, he says: “Why can’t we rig up one of these [?] air compressor and suck that fluid off his lungs.”

Earl Brown:
You’re talking a great big heavy piece of equipment...

Chester Russell:
I’m talking about one that’s on its wheels.

Earl Brown:
And this is what you’re using as a portable fluid lung drainage [?]

Chester Russell:
That’s right. So anyway, it did the job. And we had him... he was live. He was doing well. We even got to go back and he was sitting up and he was doing fine. And the doctor... then he got word that the big shots come in there and ordered them to take him out, fly him out. And doc...

Earl Brown:
You guys managed to save the day by saving him.

Chester Russell:
You know, one thing about this country you should know: there’s no infection. Did you know that?

Earl Brown:
I’ve never thought of it.

Chester Russell:
Well, there’s no infection in this country. You could get dinged up and think you’re gonna bleed to death. You’d be so damned dirty you won’t. (laughs) But it... there’s no infection. So anyway, Dr. Stotts told us this. He says: “Don’t worry about infection because there’s none.” So anyway, so they flew him out. Dr. Stotts told us that they was gonna court martial him for making the operation. And... But anyway, he says: “If they fly him out, he’ll die.” And he died about three hours out of Seattle.
But, anyway, I... you know, it sounds like really a terrible story, but... When we was over there in Europe, my platoon sergeant, and Clyde... Clyde [Howell] and J.D. [Howell] was two brothers. And when we... we went in there hit Omaha Beach. well we... we had to hold a pocket of Germans on the Brest Peninsula. And while we was there, this officer of the day, he was our company commander. He wanted us to... He wanted to work on some mines, some German mines they had there and they had some tripwires on them. But anyway, this Sherry and J.D. was working on one, and it blowed up and it killed J.D. and it blew... blew Sherry all to pieces. But, anyway, I went and got my old canvas cotton, I had a rope through it, I used to stretch it out in the back of the truck and made a hammock out of it. We used that for a stretcher and we got it out. And when those in had a... a reunion in Indianapolis, and Sherry was there, and they’d taken 16 inches of his guts out and put him back together. And to this day, I think, he is still alive. He was from North Carolina. Now that... that kind of operations, I can’t take, I can’t take. But with Moore, I don’t know, it didn’t seem that bad really.

Earl Brown:
Now, well that’s quite the story...

Chester Russell:
Yeah, but I don’t like to talk about that, that Europe over there, so much hell. We had... While we was there, we had five battle stories. The Battle of the Bulge, the Rhine, and all that monkey business. Just because somebody wants to rule the world, I guess, I don’t know. I don’t know why people can’t be happy dammit!

Earl Brown:
It makes good sense to me.

Chester Russell:
I’ would say get happy right now! (laughs).

Earl Brown:
Did you get any special awards or commendations for your Alaska Highway construction?

Chester Russell:
You gotta be kidding. That war with them Japs over there, and with the Germans coming up. You know, they really hadn’t really got with it yet. They didn’t know we was in here doing anything, really. I mean, we were peons. We were the peons playing in the mud.

Earl Brown:
So there was no extra glory that went to the guys of the 341st...

Chester Russell:
No, no, not that I know of. They had a whoopsidoo above Whitehorse there, when they completed the road up there.

Earl Brown:
Oh, that Soldier Summit?

Chester Russell:
Soldier Summit. But there... at Contact Creek there... I don’t think it was... I never seen no bands, or nothing... Maybe there was, I mean, I wasn’t there all the time.

Earl Brown:
I know that all my life I’ve known about Contact Creek where the crew from the south met the other crew and so forth, there. You’re the only guy I know off who was actually there on the scene. Let’s hear it in your words what actually happened at Contact Creek.

Chester Russell:
We met. We met...

Earl Brown:
Okay, so...

Chester Russell:
(laughs) That was about the size of it. We were just tickled to death. We were gonna get to go home.

Earl Brown:
You guys had finished your job...

Chester Russell:
Wrong, wrong!

Earl Brown:
Wrong!

Chester Russell:
Nah, we ended up that we’d done nothing. We eh... We went over and... Well, first we pioneered the winter trail to Fort Simpson. And then when we got that... They have me a furlough home after we finished that, from Liard River. I went home with a civilian on a civilian truck. He was scared. I was... really didn’t know what I was getting myself into now there. Not kinda like now. (laughs) First thing he done, he’d dug out a fifth of whiskey. And I thought: “Oh my God, what have I got done to me now?” Then he poured it in the gas tank. And I thought: “Wow, what’s all this about?” So then I asked him: “How come you to do that?” And he said: “That’s to keep the water from plugging up the carburetor.”

Earl Brown:
Okay, so if you don’t have really good gas (CR: That’s right) He was using that for... I’ve heard of whiskey called antifreeze and that’s exactly what he was doing!

Chester Russell:
That’s right. So anyway, I rode to Dawson Creek with him and then I got the train and went home. I come back... After I got back, then it got kinda a little bit rough for me. I kinda took a day or two too long.

Earl Brown:
Chester, say it ain't so!

Chester Russell:
I was down in Edmonton, a little bit drunk. Not anything to where I couldn’t.... I knew where I was at and what I was doing, but... Somebody yelled at me. I turned around to see who it was. It was Mike Miletich. At that time, now he was a Major then.

Earl Brown:
So he was the captain that you were working for up in this area.

Chester Russell:
Right. Now when we finished the... pioneering the Simpson Road, well then he made Major. So anyway, he yelled at me. Like I say, we was close friends. He really liked to talk about the [Sinalteen] Valley, where I was born and raised. He was back on the East Coast. So anyway, instead of... He had two other officers with him. I don’t remember who there were, but... they had lots of, lots of stuff on their shoulders. I didn’t pay no attention to that, being half drunk. I just went up to him. I shook his hand. I didn’t even salute him.

Earl Brown:
You were a private shaking hands with a major, that gotta go over really good!

Chester Russell:
After that, things got a little rough for me (laughs). Anyway, Then we finally... when we come back, I finally got to the... I took my own sweet time from Dawson Creek up to the Liard River where the company was supposed to be. But at that time they had moved, they’d been up... went up on the pipeline road, the one that goes to the Norman Wells.

Earl Brown:
Oh, up to the Canal Highway, from Johnsons’s Crossing, up there.

Chester Russell:
Yeah. So anyway, they was up there, so I hitchhiked a ride up there. And I got there... where they dumped me off there, there was two of them [wannagen sleds]... in fact, there was three. There were officers in one, and there was two back down on a... kinda outta the road... quite a ways outta the road. So anyway, this fellow told me... “Why don’t you...” I was pooped, I was... I’d had it. He said: “Why don’t you go down there and get one of them bunks and take a nap rest. I went in there and I stayed for about a week.

Earl Brown:
You had a whole rest for about a week...

Chester Russell:
Yeah, so... Anyway, one time nature called. I had to go outside, and when I did, Mike Miletich spotted me. Anyways...

Earl Brown:
This is after the handshaking...

Chester Russell:
Oh yeah, he was handshaking my hind end. (laughs) So anyway, he said “How long have you been here?” I said “Oh, I’ve been here about a week. “He said “Why didn’t you check in.” I said “Well, no one told me to.” Like I say, things got a little [?]. Then he put on me on a tractor and I went... had to go and get a couple of tractors out of the brush which was broke down. Couldn’t do that. So he had an old air compressor I had to pull to the sawmill. And I started down a road that I had never been down at before...

Earl Brown:
That’s the Canal Highway we were talking. The Canal Pipeline.

Chester Russell:
Yeah right, so I’m puttering along and it didn’t go... Throttle is vibrating down to an idle and not pull it back. Finally I tied the darn thing back. Had it locked wide open and I was going... and all of a sudden, oopsie, here come a left-hand sharp turn. Down the hill I went with that thing, aside ways and sliding and... I couldn’t take my hands off of the swing clutches because if I did, I’d have went over the bank. I was able to keep the thing on the road. But my poor old air compressor was trying to pass me all the time, and I got down at the bottom... here was a truck getting ready to come up the road. He backed down. So, finally I got down there and I stopped and I sat there a long time, waiting for someone to go up the road on the other side in case a truck was coming down, cause there wasn’t room for a truck and a tractor. So anyway, I got to the top of the road there and I get up, I went on up. Just as I got up there, I had to make a turn, and I hit a chuch hole, and darn it, I looked back and here my air compressor had come off of the two front wheels and it was going down the canyon. So I took the two front wheels up to the sawmill. They was irritated, they was mad... They, you know... ranting and raving... cussing, and... So I went back and got a wannagen sled and went to finally caught up with my company. (laughs) It was fun!

Earl Brown:
Gosh, Chester, it sounds like a picnic.

Chester Russell:
Yeah, it was just a picnic. Twenty-two-year-old kid up there.

Earl Brown:
I seen that one book called: This Was No Freakin’ Picnic. That kind of describes a lot of what you’re here about.

Chester Russell:
Well, that’s about true. I read that book.

Earl Brown:
Yeah? What did you think?

Chester Russell:
Well, you know, civilians... You know the... When we built that road up there, civilians, they were whining and crying about their wages. The people from the United States they was getting more money than the Canadians was, and oh, God... And here we was, doing all the dirty work, and we was only getting 21 to 35 dollars a month, and they were making that in one day.

Earl Brown:
So you guys were making 70 cents a day, basically?

Chester Russell:
Yeah, right. And I’ll tell you, That... I think that hurt me worse than anything on the whole job, was that.

Earl Brown:
So, you guys would go ahead and would look death right in the eye building this highway, getting your 70 cents for a day’s worth of work, 21 dollars a month. And then the other guys would come in and they’d be making 20 dollars a day?

Chester Russell:
Yeah. And you know too... the sawmill I’m talking about. They sawed up the lumber and... Now they was living in tents, and it was cold. It was colder probably than it is out here right. now. So anyway, anyway, they was cutting these boards. And the civilians were building cook shacks and shacks to stay in, and they would be living in tents. And if you were lucky, if you were in one of them cook shacks at dinner time, they’d put you in the line but they might feed you.

Earl Brown:
I’ll be darned.

Chester Russell:
Yeah, they might feed you there.

Earl Brown:
You mentioning the cold. How cold was it.

Chester Russell:
When I took that truck up there, to... with the gas. When I got up there, the next morning when I woke up, it was 74 below zero. And that... John Gerhart’s records there, I think, has it in the book.

Earl Brown:
He was making very thorough notes there and documents that’s the temperature that you were looking at. (CR: Yup) I’ll be darned. And of course, it wasn’t exactly...

Chester Russell:
When I was going up there, it was like 60. And that... that old [?], I told him, I said you had to hang it... I says, “You make damn sure them matches stay dry because we might have to build a fire.” We had lots of gas, but I didn’t want to get them matches wet.

Earl Brown:
That’s for darn... I’m glad you mention that. I see here in John Gerhart’s notes, January the 5th, you were at a mess hall, built a road to the Liard Hot Springs and built a bath house, on the 19th, it was 63 below Fahrenheit, and on the 20th, it dropped down to -75.

Chester Russell:
Yeah. And you know, talking about that, I’d like to tell you that the book of the trailblazers...

Earl Brown:
Alcan Trailblazers, yeah.

Chester Russell:
I can’t verify it, but that picture in that, of the cabin, it’s a log cabin, I’m pretty sure that that was the log cabin that was at the hot springs.

Earl Brown:
I’ll be darned.

Chester Russell:
But I don’t know, I can’t... And there was also I wished... They were got, there was four poles up there, about 12 feet, where they put their stuff, their meat and stuff to keep the bears, I guess, out off them. I know one time, someone asked: “I wonder what that is for.” I says: “Oh that is, when a guy dies here, they can’t bury him, the ground is too hard, so they put him up there till thaw time, till the thaw.

Earl Brown:
You wouldn’t bullshit a guy now, would you?

Chester Russell:
(laughs) It’s true.

Earl Brown:
I know that I enjoy immensely getting the chance to go and soak in those old hot springs these days. Did you get much hot springs time, or what was it like?

Chester Russell:
No, we didn’t... not really... We just kept going. They didn’t mean nothing to us. We just kept going. [I had long about then] when I dropped that tree on old [Hovey]. I was working that big old spruce tree there and I broke it off at the stump. And Hovey was standing there, he was behind me. I’d stopped there. I was just holding it there and keep it from falling, and look around to see where that Hovey was. He was standing in the... right behind me, in the... behind the tractor. And I motioned for him: “Get out, you know... Get outta the road.” And he smoked a big old crooked stem pipe. He took a big old puff on it and he gave me the old thing: “Go ahead,” you know. I said “Okay,” so I just pulled the master clutch back, kicked it up, jumped off the tractor. That big old spruce tree come over... Just the end of it, just popped him right on top of the head, knocked him down. He got up and he was going around like an old gimpy... kind a... he was wimpy, you know.

Earl Brown:
Sure, you knocked him silly.

Chester Russell:
So anyway, finally I went over, and I asked him, I said: “Are you all right, Captain Hovey?” “Yeah, I’m all right, but... I bit the stem out of my pipe.” (laughs) Anyway, we laughed about that. I told, at a reunion one time, I told the story about operating on Moore. And after I got... Mary was there with me... After we got through, I told him, I said... Hovey was the one that wanted me to tell the story... So after I got all through, I told Ho... about... Hovey standing there and letting me hit him on the head with a tree. (laughs)

Earl Brown:
I’ll be darned.

Chester Russell:
Yeah, it was something.

Earl Brown:
You had mentioned a couple of times the fact that, not only was it your outfit there, and you mentioned also some of the other... the black troops and so forth, the 95th, the 93th, the 97th. Did you have much encounter with any of the other regiments along the way.

Chester Russell:
We didn’t have any, any. Not until... The only time we had was when we hit the one... the Contact Creek. You know there’s something that always got me, Earl. Not that it makes any difference. These black fellows, they had... I don’t understand it. They couldn’t vote. But they drafted them. And then they stick them in here, something like this, but they was where they could get supplies. Not... Maybe the supplies wouldn’t be there to get, but they could get supplies.

Earl Brown:
That was the guys... the 97th....

Chester Russell:
97th, and Dawson Creek, Whitehorse, and then the civilians up at... there was civilians up at Anchorage. They was coming towards the 18th. But uh, I get... It irritates me. If you’re gonna tell something, try to tell it right, you know.

Earl Brown:
Tell the whole story...

Chester Russell:
Forget about the exaggerating or anything. Just tell it like it was. That’s... what the hell. (laughs)

Earl Brown:
Just like I say, yeah, with your stuff there, there was no supply line.

Chester Russell:
There was no supply line.

Earl Brown:
If you didn’t eat what you had brought in with you... or something happened to it, you were on... Well what the heck did you do when you ran out of rations. Did you go ahead and catch stuff off the land?

Chester Russell:
I’ll tell you what I did. I wrote my mother, a letter. And I told my mother, I says: “I need my bean shooter, and I want some fishing hook... gear. Not any... All I want is hooks and some line.” And I says... And by golly, the letter got through. Usually they censor all this stuff, but it got through. And it wasn’t too long... we wasn’t not too far up... from here, when I got this package. It was about like that (holds up hand chin-high). And it was full of Sun... not Sun Maid... Well, I guess, maybe it was Sun Maid Raisins, but they was rai... plums and raisins. And in that box was black gnat flies, grey hackle flies, and some string. And also my 38-6 shooter and with it goes a 100 rounds of ammunition. And when they called my name to get that, I went out and I said “Oh baby. We’re gonna eat now.” So anyway, I took it in and... we was sleeping on canvas cots yet, so we weren’t too far up here (thumbs over his right shoulder). So anyway, I just took it... opened it up and I just dumped it out in the middle of my sleeping bag. I told the guys, I says, “here” I says “have some raisins.” Boy, I’ll tell you, it wasn’t long they was gone. But I had my fishing gear and my 38. So, the only thing I ever killed was a goose. I did shoot a goose, accidentally.

Earl Brown:
Accidentally, you shot a goose?

Chester Russell:
Accidentally.

Earl Brown:
Well, how did that goose taste?

Chester Russell:
Well, I’ll tell you, the taste of that goose was really great. We didn’t know what to do with it. Gabe and I, they was a fellow who worked with me on the tractor. Actually, he was a catskinner, to start with. So anyway, he was with me, and we let a cook, a night cook, cook it for us, cook the goose for us cause we couldn’t feed everybody with one poor old goose. So anyway, the next day, after we’d been working all day, we come back and that damn thing had cooked all night and all that day, and... we went up and find this cook, and “Hey, where’s the goose?” “Oh my God,” he says. “Still in the oven.” (laughs) It was, it was nothing but charcoal. (laughs).

Earl Brown:
So he really cooked your goose on that one?

Chester Russell:
I’ll tell you, we was about to cook his goose too. (laughs).

Earl Brown:
I’ll be danged.

Chester Russell:
Yeah, well, anyway, I think that’s about... Also, after that, I let Lawrence [Loften], he was one of the trail boys. The way they worked that, after they went through and marked the road, then we had the fellows come behind them and mark the... mark for the tractors. Loften, was one of them and he was a good... he was my friend... anyway, I let him pack my gun, my old pistol. One day, he took that pistol and held his finger up against that cylinder. He was gonna really shoot grouse within them old spruce trees. We had quite a few of them. But he was holding that, he was holding that finger up against that, that cylinder on that, and... when he fired it, the lead shaved... off of that bullet, just about cut his finger off. (laughs) In that book, there’s a picture of him with an old rag wrapped around his finger. (laughs) He never packed a gun anymore after that. He said, that was enough of that monkey business.

Earl Brown:
We’re ready to roll there, so...

Chester Russell:
Okay.

Earl Brown:
One of the stories, I remember, you had... Of course, you guys were fighting in the bush, but a whole bunch of you come down with yellow jaundice. Now how the heck did that happen?

Chester Russell:
When we had the yellow jaundice, that was caused from vaccinations... I’m not real sure but I think it was the valet fever... No, yellow fever.

Earl Brown:
Yellow fever.

Chester Russell:
yellow fever shots. And not having no hospital up here to be able to go to, we just had to sweat it out. But I did learn something here, just the other day. It was kinda interesting. This officer, McCarthy...

Earl Brown:
Oh, Colonel McCarthy?

Chester Russell:
Yes. I was talking to his wife, here, about two weeks ago, and she was telling me about how he come down with the yellow jaundice, and they kept him in a tent, all that time. I guess we could have stayed in a tent too, but it was too boring for us, so we went back to the tractor and we went to work.

Earl Brown:
So you said, I’m sick here with yellow jaundice but, damn it, we got a road to build so let’s get at her?

Chester Russell:
That’s right. That’s right. You were just as sick on the tractors as you was sitting around. The only thing we did while we was sick, we did chase a bear up the tree, with the rope on him. And John Gerhart, he got... crawled a tree next to it, and took a picture of it. And then the damn thing jumped out of the tree and... when it took off, it was supposed to go out in the bush, but it went down through the camp, and went through one of the tents. It scared a couple of guys to death before it went on through. (laughs) So...

Earl Brown:
So what happened is, the bear come charging through the camp, went in one door and out the... made his own (CR: Made his own...) door on the other side?

Chester Russell:
Right out the back. (laughs)

Earl Brown:
And there was two guys in the tent...?

Chester Russell:
Two guys laying on... Two laying... There was two of them in there laying on the cot. They couldn’t believe it.

Earl Brown:
Did you have a lot of encounters with bears and the wild animals?

Chester Russell:
There was no wild animals. We... The first... This is something I don’t understand. On the Fourth of July, we was at Summit Lake. And the fellows had taken a... I don’t know if they took my old pistol or what, but they went up on the hill... the snow line, and they killed a couple of them sheep. And that was the first fresh meat we’ve had since the meat spoilt. But the Fourth of July, according to the records, we wasn’t there yet, on the Forth of July. But my God, I was. (laughs).

Earl Brown:
Okay, well maybe they just wasn’t finished catching up to you there?

Chester Russell:
Maybe I was running ahead of them with the cat, I don’t know.

Earl Brown:
So you had some sheep meat to there for the Fourth of July, and that was you first meat you had for at least three months.

Chester Russell:
Well, yeah, two months anyway. More than that, yeah.

Earl Brown:
I remember seeing in your book that you seem to have some not bad luck with that batch of fishing line and hooks and so forth.

Chester Russell:
Done pretty good, didn’t I? (laughs)

Earl Brown:
You sure as heck did!

Chester Russell:
Yeah, I don’t think you could do it today, though. I don’t think you could do it today. No, that... them grayling, they love them black gnat flies and that grey heckle. My mother sent the right ones, I’ll guarantee you.

Earl Brown:
Well, bless mothers, eh!

Chester Russell:
Well you know, eh... that picture in there where the three of us went up and took pictures of the Smith River Falls, on Smith River, that was a... that was something else too. That... Jim Roberts, and the other fellow, his name was Crump, and... I threw that black gnat on the fly and the water was just swirling in there, and I didn’t think nothing of it. I didn’t think I’d hurt or lose it, so, anyway, I threw it in there and the water just swirled around in there. I went to get my hook... we went on up above and took pictures of the falls there, which is nothing but beautiful. I mean, they’re... there’s nothing... just, they’re beautiful. I went to get my line, and the doggone thing was hung up. I couldn’t get it... get it lose. And Jim Roberts told me, he says: “You’re goddangit... you’re damn lucky,” he says. “Damn fool,” he says, “you put it in there, you knew you was gonna lose it.” About that time it come loose and I started pulling on it. And here’s I dolly varden trapped me. I had that sucker in there and I pull him right up to the bank, and... he come off the hook. And, God I told Crumpy to “jump on it!” And Crumpy jumped, straddled that sucker. That was one fish story... We caught a 31-inch dolly varden.

Earl Brown:
You could have ended up riding that fish home...!

Chester Russell:
Crump, Crump, if he hadn’t straddled him, we [?] went home with a fish story.

Earl Brown:
Well I’ll be damn... You got the pictures to prove it.

Chester Russell:
Yes, we have.

Earl Brown:
A 31-inch dolly varden there!

Chester Russell:
We’d sure’d have liked to weigh it but we didn’t have no scales.

Earl Brown:
But how did it taste?

Chester Russell:
They was all good. They was excellent. In fact, I’ll tell you something, Earl. I think that was a big help to our curing our yellow jaundice, that fresh fish. Now, whether it was or not, I don’t know, but, it sure, I think, it helped us. We was down... getting pretty skinny about that time. We were a sick bunch of guys that day. Yup.

Earl Brown:
Now, when you guys were building this highway, this was a lot of time to be on the road and mess around. How did you sort of go ahead and burn off some steam or operate the relaxation time? Or was any relaxation time?

Chester Russell:
There was no relaxation. The only relaxation was fishing. We’d go down to the river and something, and fish. It was work all the time, and... You know, Earl, I gotta tell you something. There was no liquor. The only liquor we had up there was the time we went back to get the new tractors and brought the 11 cases of whiskey back with us That was bad news.

Earl Brown:
Sounds like a bunch of young G.I.s with 11 cases of whiskey, it’s got “bad news” written all over it.

Chester Russell:
We got as far as, as far as Fort St. John and George, he decided he wanted to go find himself a sweetiepie at the hospital. They had the hospital tent there. They ended up taking his appendix out there.

Earl Brown:
(laughs) Them sweetiepies at the hospital were doing business.

Chester Russell:
It got serious. So, anyway, that time, and the time that we had the whiskey from the dog sled, that brought it... up on... that was the only liquor that we had. And, I’ll tell you, the whole thing, it ran on an even keel. I’ve never seen a fight amongst the fellows, all the time. And as far as the fellows losing their mind, we had one fellow that lost his mind when we first went up... And we... he... We couldn’t get out, so he stayed with us. And I don’t know... I don’t know when they moved him out, but... We had one fellow, that’s all. But, yeah, that... it was an even keel. And everybody that was... like us... we was running cats. We was doing our thing, and the other fellows doing the culverts and the bridges, and... We never looked back. We just kept going.

Earl Brown:
Pedal to the metal. We’ve got a road to build. Let’s get her done.

Chester Russell:
That’s right. And it was all done with hand tools. There was no chain saws. Well, we did have chains for old... and later in the time, we had the old two-man chain saw, but they wasn’t used that much. In fact, I can tell a tale. I mean, I don’t know if it’s true or not, but I’m pretty near positive it is, about them guys that was cutting trees for the piling for the Liard River, crossing the Liard River. They had this... Well, it was... hang on, I won’t mention his name, but anyway... (laughs) he was staying at the camp when... in the mornings, drinking coffee, and they’re sending the crew to cut trees. And, anyway, they could’ve... what it all boiled down to, they could’ve went out at noon time, after it warmed up, and got all the trees they needed. It didn’t take long. The trees are small. But anyway, they got disgusted then and so they went out one day there and they notched... O God, I don’t know they said how many trees they had notched. And they let this guy get in... this officer, get right in the middle, and then they all start yelling: “Timber!” (laughs) And, after that, after that, he was... the fellows didn’t go out quite so early in the morning. (laughs)

Earl Brown:
Is that right? (laughs) You guys play hard, don’t you?

Chester Russell:
Hey, we had... we had these officers over the barrel. They couldn’t court-martial us. They couldn’t get us in any worse than what we was already in. And I tell you something else too, they weren’t too sure we weren’t gonna go to Europe. So they had to be pretty good. And they was. They was a good bunch of guys. Yup.

Earl Brown:
Boy oh boy. One other thing is, one of the stories I remember from your book there, is, there was the mighty Sergeant King, and his way of dealing with things you had to be watching for. Can you tell that story again.

Chester Russell:
Yeah, that was in Dawson Creek when I first come up. I don’t know how come, how come he had an old 45 he packed on his hip. No one else... I don’t... maybe, I guess, the officers did, I don’t know, but. He was a master sergeant of the motor pool. So anyway, we was out at Dawson Creek and this fellow there, one of the civilians there, come up and told King, he says: “You better watch that eh... you better watch that muskeg, there. It’ll get you.” And old King, he did return, he padded his... padded that old 45 and says: “That’s all right.” He says: “I’ve got my 45.” (laughs)

Earl Brown:
He was not afraid of nothing!

Chester Russell:
He wasn’t afraid of nothing. That old 45. That’s just how stupid we was! We didn’t know nothing. We was just a bunch of dummies up there, but we learned!

Earl Brown:
Boy, I’ll... did you ever learn...!

Chester Russell:
Yeah. And we haven’t forgotten. Sixty-one years later, I haven’t forgotten (laughs)

Earl Brown:
You have some great stories and so forth to tell us. Do you have any regrets?

Chester Russell:
No. You know, I, I really don’t, and I’ll tell you why.

Earl Brown:
Okay.

Chester Russell:
Alaska come to be a state of the United States. And with Canada, keeping the road open, making a highway out of it where people like us... like myself, I ain’t got nothing. I only got less than $1,000 a month on my retirement. We can drive this road... Well we could. Now the price of gas now is going so sky-high, but it’ll come back down, but... you can come up here and enjoy yourself. And, really enjoy yourself, the addings of the highway. And if it weren’t for Canada doing that, the people of Canada, the work would’ve been... it just went back to brush and the time would all have been wasted. And I appreciate the Canadian people for keeping the highway... making a highway out of it. And I think it’s wonderful. But I’m gonna tell you something. If I had to do this again... Like I say, I wouldn’t give a million... a million dollars. I said I wouldn’t take a million dollars for my experience, but I wouldn’t give a red cent to go through it again. And that’s about the truth.

Earl Brown:
(laughs) That’s pretty darn good. So, the last time... when was the last time you actually were up here to drive the highway? That was what? Four or five years ago...?

Chester Russell:
Oh gosh, I don’t know, what... Well, it was when I brought... brought my editor.

Earl Brown:
Yeah, we’ve got to give Joe some credit.

Chester Russell:
We oughta give Joe a little credit. He wouldn’t believe my stories. He thought I was lying... or exaggerating, not lying.

Earl Brown:
You wouldn’t do that, would you Chester?

Chester Russell:
No, not me. I will not exaggerate. I won’t do it. If you can’t tell the truth, the hell with it, don’t even say nothing. Well anyway, he was... after I wrote the script to a fellow friend of mine, Earl Brown, I was gonna give it to him just to kinda... Thought it would be nice, and also for maybe the family. We were gonna make half a dozen books, maybe. Joe was gonna put the thing together. But, he didn’t believe me, so I brought him up here. The girls, Mary and her sister, told us: “You and Joe just go up there and show him.” So I did. I brought him up here. We started Dawson Creek, and we took it just step by step, all the old, part of the road we couldn’t do, and... We got up to the Muncho Lake. I told him, I say: “We went over the top of the mountain there and we couldn’t go around the edge.” He said: “You didn’t go over the top of that mountain.” And I said: “Hell, I didn’t!” So anyway, there was a floatplane down at the lodge there. So anyway, I told him, I said “I’ll tell you what,” I says. “You take my camera and I’ll buy the tickets and you go... you just go... let them take you up and...

Earl Brown:
Give you the bird’s eye view.

Chester Russell:
Get a bird’s eye view of that road. So anyway, I got down there and they wouldn’t take him up unless he paid for two. So they... we had to pay for two passengers...

Earl Brown:
So why didn’t you go?

Chester Russell:
I wasn’t about to go up in that damn float plane.

Earl Brown:
(laughs)

Chester Russell:
So anyway, they flew up and Joe got the pictures, and... that convinced him that... Well it really didn’t really convince him that much so he could tell. He had to crawl the mountain and go up and see for himself.

Earl Brown:
And isn’t it amazing that up there, here almost sixty years later... well, I guess it would’ve been fifty-some years later then, there’s still well-defined tracks from the cats and the equipment that were going over the top.

Chester Russell:
Well, it’s hard to say them was ours, but they’ve been there for a lot of years because it’s all washed out. They’re only four feet or five feet wide. So yeah, it is, but... so anyway, I made a believer of Joe. When we got home he decided that we would make a book. So, then, we got that all done. So here I got this script all wrote. Nobody could read it, except me. Misspelled words and all, so... I had my friend Mary. I dictated it to her, and it turned out to be The Trails of the Catskinner.

Earl Brown:
There’s The Tales of a Catskinner. (CR: That’s it.) Here’s the first original copy. (CR holds up book) You haven’t even seen the new... (CR: (coughs)) You haven’t even seen the new cover yet, the new one.

Chester Russell:
No, that’s eh... Now I’ll tell you, if somebody had told me eight years ago, ten years ago, that I was gonna write a book, pioneering the Alaskan Highway, I’d have told him, they had to be out of their mind.

Earl Brown:
(laughs) That’s good stuff, there. Is there anything from your Alaska Highway adventures and your experiences and the time you spent in the North that you were able to use in later years in life. You didn’t go on to be a catskinner, I would imagine?

Chester Russell:
Yes, I did. Yes, I did. I wouldn’t... I guess I wouldn’t have... I guess I was still a catskinner. But yeah, in the wintertime... I was a commercial fisherman. And in the wintertime, instead of fishing, I would go out and we’d level land. We used a 12-yard carry-all, with a... little [?] carry-all. Practically the same ones we had here. Only, I had a 18 International. And, for that work, it was quite a... it was a good tractor. International is number one, as far as I’m... I could take that 18 and you could have a D8, and I could move more dirt than you could. It moved faster.

Earl Brown:
A diesel, a darn good piece of machinery. But it wouldn’t have been the right tool to have on the Alaska Highway.

Chester Russell:
No, that starting system on that started on gas, the same as... the same as... but you didn’t crank it. You had a level you had to shove down and then start it. You had to keep batteries in it. And up there... You had to get away from maintenance. Because we didn’t have no way to... We didn’t have no shops up here. We didn’t have helicopters to run stuff back and forth. It’d sure have been nice to have some. We could’ve might even went up and went honkytonking down at Dawson Creek a time or two.

Earl Brown:
If they send you back tomorrow to go ahead and build this Alaska Highway. Would you do anything different if you were a young whippersnapper?

Chester Russell:
Well, you know. I don’t know what you would do different, truthfully. I mean, under them conditions. You take this equipment you got today, actually with the helicopters and this big heavy equipment. But I’m not too sure that with this big heavy equipment they got today, that they could eh... would stand up to this muskeg.

Earl Brown:
I suppose you get the stuff too heavy?

Chester Russell:
Too heavy. Yeah. And that old D8 was just about too heavy. We got them all stuck there one time, except one. And it was sitting on a knoll. It could have gone any direction, it would have been stuck too.

Earl Brown:
So you had a whole bunch of D8s all hooked up to each other, all stuck...

Chester Russell:
No no. No no. They were just... scattered here and there. Stuck. Just stuck. (laughs) But the D4s we had up here and the R4s. The D4 was a diesel, small diesel tractor, and the R4. Now, the 340th, when they started pioneering the road from Whitehorse to us, that’s all they had. That’s in eh... So, that was no good. I mean, they just... mud, mud would get in the tracks and they just, they didn’t have it just didn’t work. In fact, I think if you’d go up the road here, a mile or two up, maybe you find one.

Earl Brown:
It powered out there, eh?

Chester Russell:
It was stuck... it was stuck...

Earl Brown:
In the muskeg.

Chester Russell:
In the mud there. I think if you had a deal and go there, you might find it. I don’t know. I wouldn’t... I don’t know. Sixty years later, can they hang me? (laughs)

Earl Brown:
I think the statute of limitations is up on it.

Chester Russell:
Okay, Well. I think so.

Earl Brown:
You had a chance to go in and take in the play last night.

Chester Russell:
Yes.

Earl Brown:
What did you think of it?

Chester Russell:
I thought that was pretty cute. I thought that was pretty cute.

Earl Brown:
Did they go ahead and capture the spirit of the event?

Chester Russell:
I’ll tell you what. When that young fellow was marching there... You know, when we went in the... drafted into the army, the first thing they told us, if you go over the hill, or desert the army, you’ll get the... you can... they can give you the firing squad. If you desert the army you’ll get the firing squad. If they want to, I mean... And for them... hey, that man, he was Chester Russell right (laughs) He was stepping just exactly. Yeah, I was no soldier, I’ll guarantee you. I just was drafted in the army and then... did my duty. That’s what it all boil down to. They sent me up here, in fact Earl, I don’t know, probably, I doubt if I even know where Fort Nelson was. If it hadn’t been... They sent me up here.

Earl Brown:
Yeah. Well I’ll tell you. Fort Nelson is sure glad that 61 years ago that you had a chance to find yourself stationed here in this neck of the woods for a year and a half. Out of a young man’s life, a year and a half’s time.

Chester Russell:
Yeah. It was... We had... I don’t know, half... how many [?]... I guess...I don’t know how many...? It was 18 months in Europe and it was 18 months up here. And then whatever time, but... I’ll tell you, it wasn’t my cup of tea, I’ll guarantee you. But, like I say, what are you gonna do.

Earl Brown:
You... What’s you’re attitude on life. How to... go ahead and... A recipe for a happy life.

Chester Russell:
Well, you know there’s one thing that the good Lord gave us. That... You oughta make a little switch on it, and that’s jealousy. People get jealous of one another. When you are young. After you get my age: hell with it. You know, it don’t make no difference. But it does to some of them. But take this bunch we got in Washington D.C. and that bunch over in Germany and France and... You know, it... They need to... I don’t know why they can’t be happy. Why can’t we... Why can’t we just... You’re only here for a short time. I’ll guarantee you, it’s gone fast. Why we just can’t be happy, enjoy life, and... just... I don’t know. Everybody’s gotta be doing something, irritating somebody, poking them with a damn stick. I get fed up with Mary and she gets fed up with me because I’m giving a cussing on the television all the time. We got the... I’m gonna.... (laughs)

Earl Brown:
In other words, I think I hear you say: relax and be happy.

Chester Russell:
Relax and... Yeah, what the hell. It’s like... Believe it or not, I was married for 34 years. I had a wonderful wife. She was... I never... I loved her very much and still do. But it got to the point where... She had a boy. He was three years old when we got married. His name was Bobby. And eh... Till he was, eh... 14 years maybe, if someone would’ve come to me and say “I’ll give you a million dollars for him,” I wouldn’t have took it. But over the years, as he got older, we sent him... he was classified as a genius in architect. And, we sent him to a place in San Francisco. And he come home with a plaque, big plaque: champion pool player. It irritated me.

Earl Brown:
(laughs)

Chester Russell:
So anyway, my wife and I, we separated. We split everything down the middle, and... But like I say, I still love her. I ain’t got no... She’s a hard worker. But dammit, I... If you can’t be happy... Mary and I are friends. We’ve been friends for 20 years now, and we want to keep it that way.

Hank Bridgeman:
One more question. You talked about winter. You said it was like 75 below.

Chester Russell:
(Strains to listen) I can’t hear.

Earl Brown:
When we were talking about winter, when you had 75 below.

Chester Russell:
Uhuh. (nods)

Hank Bridgeman:
Could you talk just a little bit about... How did you survive in that? I mean that’s cold. You were living in tents, right?

Chester Russell:
No, we was in the... we was up on the Liard River when that happened. But you were talking about surviving that. That... When we was there... When I pulled in... I don’t remember night or morning or middle of the night or middle of the morning... I don’t... When we pulled in, there was a truck loaded with gas, and they put me... I went up and got my sleeping bag, cause I’d had it, driving all that hours. And they put me in that Quonset hut. When I woke up the next day... I was right sleeping by a big old 50-gallon barrel. I just rolled up, my bag out, right next to that hot stove. Anyway, the next day, there was five fellows, colored fellows, come from the lake, eh...

Earl Brown:
Watson Lake?

Chester Russell:
Yeah, Watson, Watson Lake. Three of them was in the truck, in the front, and the two in the back was froze to death. That’s just how close we’d come to getting our Waterloo.

Earl Brown:
She was that brutal... (unintelligible, Chester talks over him)

Chester Russell:
It was about 65 when we pulled in there. And that morning it got down to 74. Yeah. But it...

Earl Brown:
How did you guys manage to keep your hands warm, and your equipment moving and so forth?

Chester Russell:
Well, it just... I think the whole way we did it, we was just a bunch of kids.

Earl Brown:
You didn’t know it and were smart enough to stop?

Chester Russell:
We didn’t know that. You hit it right on the head. (laughs)

Earl Brown:
You didn’t believe that you couldn’t so you just did.

Chester Russell:
You know the one thing I’d like to say about them old D8s. In fact, we had them canvas, you know, when we were doing that eh... that Fort Simpson Road. We had them canvases and they had... it went over the hood, and then it’d come back. When you’re knocking on all them old trees, all that snow up there would come down and run down and would get in there and would get your clothes soaking wet, clear to your skin. And as long as you was on a tractor, that was fine. But as soon as you stepped out in that 40 or 50-below zero weather, just like that, you’re old pants and clothes would just froze stiff, like they’re hanging on a clothes line. (laughs) And it burned. It really burned.

Earl Brown:
And you found that the cold weather is much more agreeable these days, right?

Chester Russell:
Oh, I don’t know. I don’t think so. I don’t think so. I ain’t gonna stick around here very long, I’ll guarantee you. I’d like to come and visit my good friends Earl and all the folks, but I’m not gonna live here. Nope, too cold.

Earl Brown:
I remember some... What was the story that you had there about the... starting... giving your heater a little help starting to... to cook the wood and so forth there. You somehow had a little way of helping or accelerating it a little faster.

Chester Russell:
Oh, that... fire extinguisher?

Earl Brown:
Yeah.

Chester Russell:
Yeah, that was a fire extinguisher they used to... they had them on all the trucks. It was a... [pyrene] that was used in them. And what this pyrene was... If you shot it on something... I don’t think they use it anymore, but... it kills the oxygen. And which... the fire won’t burn if there’s no oxygen. It come in a little... about so long (motions size), and it had a handle on it, you pump. And you take that... we filled it up with gas we used for starting the stove in the morning. So anyway, we had that thing and we’d take... we’d be in bed, and all you had to do was just take your arms and stick them out and squirt a little gas in there and throw a match in there. And after a while, you’d get up and it’d be nice and cozy, you know.

Earl Brown:
Sure.

Chester Russell:
But there was one morning there, the guys in another tent had a problem with a fire. They’d come around and grabbed my fire extinguisher, went over there to put the fire out... They really had a bonfire. (laughs)

Earl Brown:...spraying gas all over their...

Chester Russell:
And that... We had another deal with that. Mike Miletich, my friend, he got a irritated about that. He didn’t want me to have no more fire... fire extinguisher with gas in them, and... We found another empty one, filled it up with gas, but we kept it hid. We didn’t leave it out in plain sight. (laughs)

Earl Brown:
You rascal you.

Chester Russell:
Yeah. But by God, I’ll tell you, it worked. Have you ever tried to... No, living up here, you don’t know how to burn green, green wood.

Earl Brown:
I choose not to if I had my choice.

Chester Russell:
Yeah, but that’s all we had. Go out and cut a tree down, saw the damn thing up and try to burn it. (laughs)

Earl Brown:
Pretty amazing there. Chester, it has been a just an absolute treat to have had a chance to talk to you about some of these [?] about working on the highway, one of many... What did you call yourself? One pea in the pod, or something like that?

Chester Russell:
Yeah, just a pea in a pod. Just a... Just an old private, pea in the pod. Oh boy, yeah. That’s all history.

Earl Brown:
Well it’s sure great to have a part of history come alive here in Fort Nelson.

Chester Russell:
I hope that... I don’t think I’m exaggerating or lying about it. People today... it’s hard to make people today to believe that.

Earl Brown:
It’s a good thing you had your camera and took so many pictures.

Chester Russell:
Yeah, and the only way we got them pictures back was with eh... with my friend... [Flambo]. His father was the one that developed them for us. We wouldn’t... There was not... This is something that I can’t understand. All up and down... up that Skagway and Dawson Creek, they got all these pictures about us pioneering the Alaskan Highway. We couldn’t even send... If we’d send a picture roll of film home, they confiscated them.

Earl Brown:
They were all classified information.

Chester Russell:
Yeah. And I lost eh... I had mine in a, my film, in an old cake pan. They turned the [dead gum] trailer over and it floated off down the river. That’s how come I got the pictures from Flambo. He gave me... He was a catskinner. He was the one that turned the trailer over.

Earl Brown:
He was the catskinner who dumped over the [thumb] and all your, and all your pictures and clothing down the river?

Chester Russell:
That old cake pan made a good boat. It’s probably still floating. But anyway it eh... Yeah... And then eh... It’s a... I don’t know... But I think, there’s so much... I’ve listened to this stuff for 50 years, about what’s happened, like the 97th. Even the 18th, see. The 18th, they were supposed to be... we thought they was coming towards us, all the time. But they weren’t. They was going...

Earl Brown:
They was heading north.

Chester Russell:
They was heading north. And if you see on that, on that book, Trailblazers, they got that, under that deal there, 18th. The 35th and the 18th. It’s not true. And like, in my book, they got Paul Semble there... my editor, I had to talk to him about that, but they got him as a colonel. He was a major. So... But outside of that, that’s about the size of it. But I don’t know why... they keep showing all these old pictures over... One time they had a... Somebody made a movie of it. And I’ll tell you, if that wasn’t sickening to me. (coughs) That was back in the 50s I think.

Earl Brown:
Yes, I think I’ve seen foot... heard of that building the Alaska Highway propaganda thing.

Chester Russell:
See, there was no... Absolutely, there was no man like this young fellow sitting right here with his camera up here in Fort Nelson. (referring to Hank Bridgeman If he was, he’s a damn fool. He’d have been home some place. But there wasn’t. There was no, no kinda movie cameras. This old cameras like we had were box cameras.

Earl Brown:
Chester, I hope that you enjoy your visit back to Fort Nelson. I know Fort Nelson is sure enjoying your visit...

Chester Russell:
I’m enjoying it very much. I enjoyed it last night. That was fun. That was fun. And I’ll tell you, that Cynthia, when she wrote... called me up and wanna know if it was all right for her to make a play of it, I’ll tell you, Why not? You know, why not? Go ahead. I don’t care. So anyway, that’s...

Earl Brown:
Then you had a chance to see what she did with it. She put them together pretty good, eh?

Chester Russell:
Yeah, I think she’d done a wonderful job. And I’m sorry I didn’t get to meet April (Moi), but...

Earl Brown:
Well maybe we can bring you back when it’s not...

Chester Russell:
(interrupts) Well, wait a minute now, wait a minute here. Look, let’s... Don’t get carried away here.

Hank Bridgeman:
We’ll bring you back when the movie...

Chester Russell:
Eheh, Well, I don’t know about that. Once in a while, she’ll get that finger, you know, doing something, you know. I gotta duck, you know. (laughs)

Earl Brown:
You know what I think would be a good idea, right now, Chester?

Chester Russell:
What’s that, get something to eat?

Earl Brown:
I don’t think you had a chance to try out some of the bannock that they make down at the trapper’s cabin as part of the Rendezvous.

Chester Russell:
I think that’d be a good idea.

 
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