Canine heroes starred in dash to save frozen town

A gold rush town was saved 90 years ago today by a relay of dog sleds.

FILE -- In this 1925 file photo, Gunnar Kaasen poses with his original dog team which he drove through a blinding blizzard to deliver life-saving serum Nome, Alaska. Kaasen's lead dog Balto is shown in top row, second from left. In January 1925, sled dog relay teams delivered the serum after a deadly outbreak of diphtheria in the old gold rush town of Nome on the state's wind-pummeled western coast. The 5 ½-day run is detailed in "Icebound," a documentary by New York filmmaker Daniel Anker. The 95-minute film, narrated by actor Patrick Stewart, is opening the Anchorage International Film Festival on Friday, Dec. 6, 2013. (AP Photo, File)

AS GOLD fever swept Alaska at the end of the 19th century, the town of Nome was the most populous in the territory. Then in January 1925 a diphtheria epidemic threatened to all but wipe it off the map unless medicine could be delivered from Anchorage, more than 1000km away.

The desperate race to deliver lifesaving serum to Nome along the Iditarod Trail, which ended successfully 90 years ago today, would inspire one of the great sled races, still run in honour of that event.

Nome is now home to about 2000 people, on the coast of the Bering Sea, just four degrees south of the Arctic Circle. Before the gold rush it was home to a small settlement of the indigenous Inupiaq.

Gold was discovered at Anvil Creek in 1898 near what would become Nome. The influx of people seeking their fortune created a campsite of hundreds of tents unofficially named Anvil City. Within a year the population in the area had reached 10,000.

By 1900 there were more permanent signs of settlement as the camp turned into town. There are several theories as to why it became known as Nome. One of the most plausible is that one of the founders, Norwegian-born prospector Jafet Lindberg, named it after the Nome Valley in Sweden.

At one point the town was taking in 1000 new residents a day. Estimates of the population at its highest suggest more than 20,000 although official census figures registered only 12,488 at its peak.

Once the alluvial gold was exhausted by about 1909 only the serious miners and mining companies able to extract it stayed on. Apart from the mining there wasn’t much to keep people in this place, with winters so harsh they cut off sea access. The population started to dwindle. By the ’20s it was somewhere between 2000 and 3000.

Only the toughest stayed on Nome’s isolation in winter became a particular problem whenever vital supplies were needed.

In the summer of 1924 a diphtheria epidemic hit the town all but exhausting stocks of antitoxin used to treat the disease. When the disease flared up again in December, local physician Dr Curtis Welch ordered more supplies but the serum failed to arrive before the port was cut off by winter ice.

The remaining stocks of serum had expired and Dr Welch was worried that administering expired serum could do more harm than good. The epidemic continued into January 1925 when the doctor sent out a distress call for more antitoxin.

The nearest stocks were in Anchorage but foul weather made it impossible for ships or planes to bring in the much-needed serum. The only route for delivery was over the Iditarod Trail, a route forged by prospectors mostly using ancient trails created by indigenous people, passing through the gold town of Iditarod.

A relay of about 20 dog-sled teams was organised and the serum was shipped out of Anchorage by train on January 26, meeting up with the first team, led by musher Wild Bill Shannon.

The serum was passed from team to team, including legendary Norwegian musher Leonhard Seppala and his lead dog Togo who covered the toughest stretch of about 140km. The final 85km leg of the relay was handled by Gunnar Kaasen and his team led by a black and white Siberian husky named Balto.

The weather had continued to deteriorate but Kaasen persisted. He reached a shelter about 30km from Nome and a message was sent to tell him to wait for the weather to clear. He never received it but decided to push on.

It was a near-fatal decision as a sudden blast of icy wind knocked his sled over. He struggled to right it and to straighten out the dogs and their harnesses. When he looked back at his cargo he noticed the serum was missing. Rummaging through the snow with bare hands he recovered the precious serum and headed on to reach Nome at daybreak on February 2.

Kaasen and his team became part of Alaskan legend. In 1973 a dog-sled race covering parts of the Iditarod Trail was organised as a tribute to the feat of the mushers who delivered the serum.

In 1995 a film based on Balto’s exploits was released, although somehow in the telling the black-and-white husky became a grey wolf-domestic dog hybrid.