Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Alaska Elderly father needs some help

My father is 94 years old and legally blind. His life consists of sitting in a lazyboy and watching-listening to PBS type programs. A few years ago, he watched a video about Alaska that he believes was an hour and a half long. He has never visited your beautiful state and never will, but he became fascinated about it through this program. He can't recall what the title was but thinks it was something like " The Alaskan Experience". I would like to buy him this CD but I cannot find anything with this title. He remembers at one point in the program where they talk about running supplies through Canada halfway and then using a barge to complete the trip. He insists, again he is 94 years old and fading fast, that it is not the PBS special about the building of the Alcan Highway, which I also bought for him. Does anyone know of this program and what the title was? Any help would be appreciated. THANKS

Sounds like “Alone In The Wilderness” about Dick Proenneke at Twin Lakes.


https://www.dickproenneke.com/

I don’t think the part about shipping supplies up by barge matches. Still, Proenneke’s story is pretty epic and I’ll bet dad would enjoy it. For a hardcore hunter type, Art Laha’s “No Land for the Timid” is precious footage. It’s pretty bloody, being from a different era, but is still pretty awesome.

Correct. I read too quickly.

It’s not the Pope & Young expedition he’s thinking of is it?

I remember an archery movie that was shown in our local elem school circa 1966 or so that showed an extensive hunt all over Alaska, with many animals taken. The gent that made the film put it on and talked about it afterwards, taking many questions. IIRC, the name was something like "Tiaru." Was a great film and highly impressionable to a young man of 11 wanting to take his 2nd moose with a bow rather than a rifle.

Spent 15 minutes looking online for anything like this and came up with nada. Art might have seen this as I believe this gent took to several schools on the Kenai and in Anchorage...?

I do remember it and several others "Jonico and the Kushtaka" is the only name that comes to mind and it was drama, not a hunt...

I remember another a couple showed... they were dressed to the nines in fur. They got uncomfortable hot!

Although this video is not the one you seek, it is a very interesting PBS video about several people who live and survive out in the Alaska wilderness. I'll bet your father would enjoy it. Take a look.



L.W.

Sorry to hear that dad's eyesight is so limiting. A great cassette tape series called, "Charles Kuralt's America" on Audiobook would certainly help to bring back to life some of what makes America so great. It does contain a segment on Alaska even if it is not what dad seeks. Dad will know Kuralt as soon as he speaks.

There was a documentary called The Alaska Experience made backing the late eighty's. Couldn't find a CD but if you search Amazon it does come up on One of their apps.

Sorrymto hear about your Dad,my Grandfather was the same way,pushing 90,blind,he had his radio and talking books from the Lighthouse for the Blind,he enjoyed them very much,i hope you find the CD for him.

I don't know where you live or anything about your father's condition except thats he is 94 and legally blind. Is he able to fly and climb a couple of steps? The reason I ask is that I am just returning from Alaska. I'm sitting in the Seattle Airport as I write this. My wife and I took a cruise from Vancouver up to Whittier. AK then spent a few days in Denali National Park. Then took a train back to Anchorage. From what I saw, elderly folks with very limited mobility, as well as a few completely blind people, took that trip with no problems. Folks with limited mobility will get wheelchair service thru the airports, priority seating on the planes. Special services on the ship. Help and priority seating on the buses. Somewhere just south of Ketchican someone had a medical emergency and was medivac'd off the ship. So there is a decent medical facility on the ship as well as medical help along the way if necessary. I shared a table at lunch time with a 99 year old woman who wanted to see Alaska before she passed. There was a disabled elderly veteran with stroke-like disabilities that I saw several times that was able to do it. You can take excursions as hard or as easy as you want, or none at all. Just a thought. There may be reasons it can't be done in your dads case. I appreciate that. But very limited mobility and eyesight can be accomodated.

Thank s everyone for the help. I will find a few of these and see how he likes them. The building of the Alcan highway video arrived today.

Many of the old vhs videos are no longer available. “My Alaska” was a great one. “The Alaska Experience “ seems to be one of those.

The shipping supplies sounds sort of like the Klondike gold rush out of skagway. I find that history very fantastic

I can't think of a better one for an outdoorsman. I bought one for my father in law years ago who was an amazing man with skills I only wish I had.

If you have the time to read some Alaskana books to your father, I highly recommend Alaska's Wolf Man and Jim Reardon's Alaska.

Unfortunately they don't appear to be available as audio books.

Description:

The Alaska Experience (1988) VHS, 50:28 Minutes

Meet the native Eskimos, Indians, and Aleuts of Alaska, land of unimaginable beauty. Begin your tour with a cruise through the Inside Passage, home to sea lions, whales, and thousands of birds. First stop is Ketchikan, where you can watch totem poles being carved. Next is Sitka, first capital of the territory, noted for its Russian architecture. At Juneau, visit the Red Dog Saloon, where hordes of gold-seekers caroused in the 1880s. Watch a canoe race and ride a hot air balloon at Anchorage, the state's largers city and financial center. In Fairbanks, tour "Alaskaland" and take a spin on an old steam train and stern-wheeler. After panning for gold in Nome, witness an Inupait tribal ceremony and blanket toss at Kotzebue.

Thanks for doing this for him