Marooned in the Arctic

November 30, 2015
Caravantes (The Many Faces of Josephine Baker) describes the survival struggles of an Inuit woman, Ada Blackjack, who traveled as a seamstress on an expedition to Wrangel Island, near Siberia, in the 1920s. Blackjack joined four male explorers on the voyage; excerpt from their journals detail how they regarded “the woman”—largely with a degree of exasperation and puzzlement. Despite greatly missing her son and being terrified of Polar bears, Blackjack settled into her strange new life. When food became scarce, three of the men ventured out to seek help, leaving her with a sick member of the party; after he died, Blackjack kept herself alive, recording her experience on a typewriter before eventually being rescued. Historical photos, contextual sidebars, and extensive source notes round out a fascinating portrait of a young woman who showed strength and fortitude when thrust into a perilous environment. Ages 12–up.

January 15, 2016
Determined to raise money to provide medical care for her tubercular son, 23-year-old Alaska Native Ada Blackjack accompanied four white explorers on an expedition to settle uninhabited Wrangel Island, far off the coast of Alaska, in August 1921. Encouraged by the man who planned the mission--but did not join it--the intrepid group brought along inadequate supplies and demonstrated poor understanding of the peril posed by the island's harsh winter. With supplies nearly gone and a second difficult winter looming, three of the men attempted to hike out over the pack ice but were never seen again. The fourth man, suffering from scurvy, was nursed by Ada but died at winter's end. Ada learned survival techniques and managed until her rescue, two years after the expedition began. Using diaries (including Ada's) and other notes the five explorers left, Caravantes provides a riveting description of their ordeal, but it is the nature of the story more than the telling of it that sustains interest. Prose is occasionally awkward and sometimes repetitious. Among the profusion of fact boxes that interrupt the flow of the narrative are many that relate to it only tangentially. However, these flaws fail to derail the effort. Caravantes explains her use of the term "Eskimo" as based on contemporary usage but fails to specifically identify Blackjack's heritage. Ada's courage in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds makes for a worthy read. (endnotes, black-and-white photos, source information) (Biography. 11-18)

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February 1, 2016

Gr 7 Up-Caravantes provides an account of the ill-fated 1921 Wrangel Island expedition (in which explorers were sent to claim the land for Canada), relying mostly on the notes and journals of Milton Galle, Lorne Knight, Allan Crawford, and Frederick Maurer. Ada Blackjack Johnson accompanied the men, acting as their cook and seamstress to earn money to care for her sick son. Although Johnson is supposed to be the focus of the book, most information on her is from secondary sources, and the few entries from her diary featured are brief and factual. The narrative covers why Vilhjalmur Stefansson sent the expedition to the island and the party's exploration and fight for survival. Johnson is mentioned briefly, with the men stating whether she is acting as expected, behaving strangely, or refusing to work. Their treatment of her was questionable: on one occasion, they tied her to the flagpole for not working. After Johnson's rescue, she was briefly covered in the press but spent the rest of her life in relative obscurity and poverty. Although the author explains why she used the term Eskimo rather than Inuit, she glosses over other issues, such as the flagpole incident, never questioning if the men treated Johnson differently because she wasn't white. Black-and-white photographs, along with diary and newspaper excerpts, are included. Gray boxes of text provide in-depth information on topics. VERDICT This grim account of survival in the Arctic is appropriate for larger libraries looking to expand their history sections.-Tamara Saarinen, Pierce County Library, WA

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