Ordinary Men Build A Legendary Road
Black Engineers & The ALCAN Highway
The rapidly expanding Corps of Engineers, activated the 340th Regiment at Vancouver Barracks in March of 1942, ‘seeding it’ with a small cadre of officers from the 18th Combat Engineer Regiment. On March 9, sixty-two enlisted men from Fort Francis E. Warren joined them and in short order several hundred more arrived from Fort Leonard…
The Army activated the segregated 97th Engineer Battalion on June1, 1941 at Camp Blanding, Florida. In November they moved to Eglin Airfield, Florida to construct and maintain roads, bombing ranges and auxiliary landing fields. In early 1942 the urgent Alaska Highway project needed more regiments. The Corps of Engineers, with no white regiments to spare,…
In 1942 the United States Army Corps of Engineers built 1500 miles of pioneer road from Dawson Creek, British, Columbia to Delta Junction, Alaska. They built it through the most difficult geography and climate in North America, and they did it in just 8 months. Christine’s father served in the 93rd General Service Engineering Regiment, one…
Both military and civilian units supported the 93rd and 340th Engineers. They supplied food and clothing, heavy equipment and reconnaissance, transportation over bodies of water and radio communication. Coordinating the efforts of military and civilian specialists in supply, topography, pontoon bridging, and communications was complex. Throw in stevedores, doctors and nurses, bush pilots, and native guides and it is understandable…
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