1943 Yukon Nuggets
The Overland Telephone
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It began in August of 1942, this little known, yet vital link in the Northwest Service Command's operations. A little more than a year later, overland telephone service was available from the southern United states and Canada all the way to Alaska.
This 2000-mile communications link between Edmonton and Fairbanks was the longest open-line toll circuit in the world. The countless thousands who built this line in 15 months encountered every kind of difficulty.
Bottomless mud or permafrost caused poles to be erected on stone-filled log cribs, some of which are still visible today. Iron-hard or frozen-solid ground had to be blasted with dynamite for post holes. And numerous broad rivers had to be spanned. It is said that more than 60 thousand telephone poles were used between Edmonton and Whitehorse. During that winter of '42-43, temperatures dropped to the minus 70s, and winds in the mountain passes sometimes blew down poles as fast as they were put up. Falling trees sometimes knocked down telephone wires.
This engineering marvel was carried out by the U.S. Army Signal Corps, the Miller Construction company from Indiana, and the Western Electric company of New York. To commemorate the completion of the system, Major General Styer, chief-of-staff of the Army in Washington, talked with Alaskan governor Ernest Gruening on November 20th, 1943.
The line was officially opened to Whitehorse on May 21, 1943, when American War Department officials in Washington talked with Colonel K.B. Bush, then the Northwest Service command's chief-of-staff in Whitehorse.
The telephone line - along with the Alaska Highway and the series of runways known as the Northwest Staging Route - were all vital links to Alaska during those dark days of World War II. Today, much of the original line has been replaced. At various points along the route, however, those old telephone poles and wires can still be seen - a memento of this little-heralded construction feat in the Northwest.
A CKRW Yukon Nugget by Les McLaughlin.
Les McLaughlin
As storyteller, radio man, and music producer, Les proved a passionate preserver of Yukon heritage throughout his life — nowhere more evident than as the author and voice of CKRW’s “Yukon Nuggets,” from its inception until his passing in 2011.
