Indian Creek Chronicles

May 3, 1993
It was an act of bravado that prompted 19-year-old Fromm to leave college and accept a winter job with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game in 1990. His assignment was to check daily on two million salmon eggs planted in a channel between the Selway River and Indian Creek. The nearest road was 40 miles from camp; by mid-November the only access was by snowmobile. Fromm had dreamed of being a ``mountain man''--a la Jim Bridger or Jedidiah Smith--but he was a tenderfoot, hardly prepared to spend seven months alone with his dog Boone in the wilderness. Fromm gives an engaging account of that winter; his job took about 15 minutes a day, so he had to combat loneliness and fill the hours. He learned to hunt, to tan leather, to preserve meat. There were occasional parties with hunting groups, brief visits by the game wardens, a few narrow escapes. A fine tale of adventure and self-sufficiency.