Ken Hansen
Cheechako: someone who is not well-versed in Alaska’s culture or way of life and might not have a good understanding of how to survive a harsh winter. (Alaska Almanac)
Native interpretation of Cheechako
After almost 30 years living on Kodiak Island, our family has seen more than a few “cheechako” episodes. Our own personal cheechako story involved filling the cargo space of our then Jeep Cherokee with dozens of beautiful house plants for the move to Alaska. (We kinda figured the vehicle would ride in the bowels of the cargo ship for the several-day December trip to Kodiak.) Imagine our surprise to see our vehicle had ridden on deck when we met it several days later. Our years of beautiful house plants were now a grotesque mat of gooey coleslaw oozing across the cargo space. I share this as a segue to my High Prairie cheechako story…
I put myself through college by working part-time on a local dairy farm. I did ALL aspects of dairy farm work, including moving a lot of cattle around and building and repairing miles of fence. I thought I had a good feel for cows.
We had not been in our High Prairie home for more than a couple of months when one August evening Deb reported “cows on our back lawn.” Our property backs up on the Columbia Hills, where we are separated from rangeland by a barbed-wire fence.
(A bit of detail may be useful here? Barbed-wire fencing is almost always 4-wires stretched tightly between steel posts, with the wire clipped tightly to the posts by metal-wire clips. After a season in the weather, all metal fence components become rusty.)
I had herded many cattle back into fields, repairing the broken fencing after them. My experience (again…dairy cattle…) was when you got them moving, they would generally retrace their steps back through the downed fence.
This was my expectation and plan as I walked out the back door to get the cattle moving. I learned a valuable lesson about the difference between relatively docile dairy cows and almost wild range cattle…
At my approach, the cattle broke straight up the hill in the now darkness. Imagine my surprise when the lead cow hit the barbed wire fence, rapidly pulling 4 strands of rusty wire along the rusty steel poles, for maybe 5 or 6 posts on each side of the rushing cows. The night sky lit up like July 4th as hundreds of sparks rained down into the dried grass. I instinctively ripped off my shirt, intending to begin beating out many small grass fires. My first thought was “My neighbors are NEVER going to believe how I burned down the neighborhood…”
Only by the grace of God did no fires start!