Thumbnail Sketches from a (nearly) 60 Year Old Part 2B

                                                                        Alaska

I  made my first trek to Alaska in 1972,but the Alaskan spirit got to me long before that initial Northwest Orient flight.It first came through Jack London stories and National Geographic Magazines.
Then November 22,1963 hit,and by 1964 I decided I wanted to become President of the United States.
All the things I had read about Alaska seemed to indicate that Alaska seemed to be full of folks considered "outside the norm". That was me! To that end, by 1966 I was subscribing to the Anchorage Daily News and determining that my" Road to the White House" would begin in Juneau.

1973-I was a student at Alaska Methodist University in Anchorage,a small liberal arts college of about 400 students,but much larger than my 120 student experience at Watkinson.

Alaska of 1973 meant there was no live TV. Programs were aired on a 2 week delay basis,the Anchorage Daily News front page was just as likely if not more likely to carry a story about the Fur Rendezvous dog races, as opposed to a national or international story and KENI AM with Chuck Roberts late night was the only place to hear non Top 40 music.
The campus atmosphere at AMU was quite different than what was taking place on many college campuses in the "Lower 48"..No anti Vietnam protests,no militant student union organization.The only creature blocking buildings might be 3 or 4 Moose on any given occasion. One thing AMU did have in common with just about every other college however: There was LOTS of marijuana.

Seemed like for me in the course of one Northwest Orient flight,I went from the elementary school kid some wanted to beat up to being a noticeable character on campus. After all I had come to Alaska from the East Coast,had been to the big Cities and had attended the big concerts and for many Alaskan students,particularly Native students from the villages,I was the first real live black person they had ever encountered!

Now there will be a time to delve into greater detail,but remember,these are thumbnail sketches,and this is all part of the canvass.

 1973:I get elected to AMU's Student Assembly.The key to that election was using pothead code words in my candidates statement piece published in the campus newspaper.
Despite Alaska's seeming isolation,the outside world seemed present for a day when students who were in the Military were called out of the classroom and into active duty because of the Yom Kippur War. All seven games of 1973 World Series between the New York Mets and Oakland A's is listened to on the radio.One game I remember the announcer describing 80 degrees at Shea Stadium while I'm looking out my dorm room window watching the snow fly.


1974: I meet one of the greatest friends I've had in my life. David Trent. Son of an Army brat. Attended High School in Anchorage.His parents ended up in Kansas City.He turned down Yale University in order to return to Alaska.
The potheads who elected me Student Assemblyman are rewarded by my using Student Activity funds to bring Quicksilver Messenger Service's John Cippolina on campus (see http://rootswriterdaviddaniels.blogspot.com/2011/08/when-john-cipollina-came-to-alaska.html )
Later brought local Anchorage jazz musicians on campus who previously had no other place to play.

 Theater Professor Frank Brink invites me to be part of a play he's written. "Song of the Great Land". Theater had never entered my mind at this point. I was intrigued but ultimately turned the role down due to a kissing scene.(I had never kissed a woman at this point) Song of the Great Land wins awards and tours the country. Did play a role in a Frank Brink radio drama afterwards.

I experiment with mescaline and LSD.Mescaline I enjoyed,Never felt comfortable with acid,though once I remember Charles DeGaulle appearing from my bathroom wall.

Thought I was going to spend the entire summer of 74 with my mom and brothers in Connecticut when I get a call from David Trent. 2 weeks later I'm on a plane to Kansas City.
  Crosby,Stills,Nash,and Young Royals Stadium Kansas City followed by a most memorable road trip. Near marijuana bust at Sweetgrass Montana.. story swaps with Canadian hitchkiker Doug Shand from Winnepeg. There was travelling on the Alcan (mostly dirt road) Highway  3 days of partying with back to the land hippies and retirees in their Winnebagos due to the road being washed out in Fort Nelson B.C
All this topped by a 30 car pileup due to the dust when the road dried up. David and I get the damaged car started despite knowing nothing about cars and the rest of the trip becomes a non stop legal speed addled adventure through some of the most breathtaking scenery put here on this earth.

Richard Nixon's resignation is marked with champagne with Professor Charles Konigsberg.David and I continue the party hopping from one dive bar to another till Gerald Ford is sworn in the next day.

Maybe it was the disillusionment stemming from Watergate,or the belief that my marijuana usage would keep me from the White House,but as a result, I begin to question everything.Came to the conclusion that while I found success in the classroom,I hadn't experienced much in the classroom of life,and perhaps I needed that balance. I then walked away from an A average,grants, scholarships,and a political life that was looking as if was possible to accomplish.
Took a second cross country trip..this time from Connecticut to Alaska via the Trans-Canada Highway. This time with an old high school friend,and this time in the winter.I remember on the Alcan hearing the sounds of a domestic dog being taken apart by a wolf pack.
It was not a good idea to travel the Alcan in 1974 without chains on one's tires.

On New Years Eve I saw a bunch of college age kids go from drunk to sober in a matter of seconds when we realized  the ground below us was not shaking because of the amount of alcohol in our systems.The quake had cracked a wall in my apartment.David suggested afterwards that we go to a ski hill and watch the aftershocks send Anchorage in the sea.

First job I had after leaving AMU was cleaning up an apartment after a man had blown his brains out.Alaskan winters can be dark on many levels.
The brains blown out could have been me a month or so previously,only it was my high school friend pointing a rifle to my head. At this point  cocaine had infiltrated my circle of friends. Ron Buickie,my first college roommate died from an overdose of downers and life seemed as dark as the Alaskan winter

1975 I'm picked up hitchiking by  a man named Richard Twiss. He was a Lakota Sioux from the Rosebud Indian Reservation in South Dakota.He was driving an old vehicle that was serving as a bakery delivery truck. Before coming to Alaska,Richard had been involved in the American Indian Movement takeover of the Interior Department building in Washington DC. Now he was delivering bread to various grocery stores in Anchorage because  he had found Jesus,and now was living in a communal farm called the Lord's Land just outside of Wasilla Alaska. He told me I could find Jesus too and invited me to spend the weekend at the farm. I wasnt so sure about the Jesus trip he was laying on,but a weekend at a Jesus Farm seemed like an alternative to the darkness surrounding my roommates,so I went along..

The Bread of Life Bakery at the time was the only fresh bread bakery in the state of Alaska,and the cinnamon rolls were delicious.
The Lord's Land was a blend of Stephen Gaskin's Farm and old time Revival hour. Was read scripture to by a man as he was cutting up and frying a moose steak.  Church services were most unlike the Methodist services I attended as a child. .Men in everyday clothes,mostly flannel shirts and blue jeans and the women in flowing long dresses. No suits.No traditional hymns but  acoustic guitars leading services,and those services were lively complete fire and brimstone preaching, speaking in tongues and the laying on of hands for healing,and prophecy. After the services,folks loved to hug each other.

2 days later I was living at the Lord's Land.

When one lived at the Lord's Land,one was not merely "saved",but  given over to "Discipleship".
"Discipleship" meant giving up friends,family,"worldly habits" and bank accounts for Jesus. No TV.
It meant living on a $5 a week allowance(which when one wasn't permitted to buy "worldly" music ,go to movies or go into town alone would go a long way) It meant turning one's life direction over to a group of "elders"

A day was filled listening to tapes of Christian Music (imitations of rock with Jesus lyrics) and the teachings of a man named Jim Durkin from Eureka California to whom we were told was an Apostle in the same manner of the Biblical Paul as well as the occasional visit by bears.

The Lord's Land was part of a network of churches called Gospel Outreach. We'd call it G.O.  Started by a group of "Jesus Freaks" in Northern California,it had branches in different parts of the U.S. as well as in Germany and Guatemala.

Sooner or later,those of us living at the Lord's Land were to be "called" to either assist with the established communes across the country or help develop new teams.

By now,the White House dreams were buried, there was going to be no way to recover the grants and scholarships from AMU,and given the alienation created amongst some friends upon my decision to live at the farm,there was no reason for me to remain in Alaska. I told the "elders" that I felt "called" to return to the East Coast and to the G.O. team in Brooklyn New York,and in 1976,hands were layed on me,and I was sent to New York.