Chapter Two
Click to edit Master subtitle style Which of these sentences is best? A. Carrying nothing but a bag of rice, walking into the wilderness. B. Carrying nothing but a bag of rice, Chris walked into the wilderness. C. Chris walked into the wilderness, carrying nothing but a bag of rice. The Jack London Passage
• Krakauer provides a quote from Jack London's White Fang about the mirthless (joyless) and merciless frozen Northern wilderness.
• This quote sets the tone for the chilling struggle for survival which is about to unfold. Exposition: Setting
• Blazed in the 1930s by an Alaskan miner, (Earl Pilgrim) the Stampede Trail originally led to Pilgrim's mining claims along Stampede Creek. • In the early 1960s, the trail was upgraded by Yutan Construction to an actual roadway meant to allow trucks to haul ore year-round from the mines. • Only 3 years later, the project was scrapped due to the harsh Alaskan conditions. Prime (and Illegal) Hunting
• Moose hunters frequent the area where the bus lies because it is surrounded on three sides by protected wilderness preserves.
• In September of 1992, by coincidence (fate?), three groups of people arrive at the normally deserted bus on the same day. – We know what they will find, but first they have to get there… • At this point in the season, the river is 75 feet across with swift currents. • The daring hunters (Thompson, Samel, and Swanson) drive through one by one, prepared to tow each other out with a strong winch. At the far bank, the hunters park their vehicles and continue on in the ATVs they carry in the back of the trucks. • When they encounter deep ponds flooding the trail, the hunters dynamite the beaver dams and wait for the ponds to drain before proceeding. • Your question should be this: How did McCandless cross all this by himself? Found At Last
• The hunters arrive to find another couple, too nervous to enter the bus. Samel peers inside the bus and spots Chris’s body.
• A hunter from Healy, Alaska, named Butch Killian, arrives on the scene shortly thereafter with a larger ATV, but Killian insists on contacting the State Troopers to evacuate the body. Killian, a volunteer firefighter, drives five miles down the trail until his two-way radio gets a signal. So What?
• What is Krakauer’s purpose in highlighting the difficulty of reaching this area, as well as making radio contact? – The author again shows how even a well-equipped individual could easily come to harm here.
• This ominous tone lays the groundwork for the author's conclusion that McCandless handled himself well, as opposed to being a foolish greenhorn, as his critics contend. More So What…
• Krakauer makes it clear that even a seasoned and well-equipped individual (or even a whole group) must struggle against the dominant force of nature in order to survive.
• This grim tone highlights the harsh realities of this wilderness area, so that the reader will understand how incredible it is that McCandless survived sixteen weeks on sheer determination and ingenuity. Working with Cause and Effect
• So far, in just two chapters, there has been plenty of cause and effect with which to work.
• Unless you have study guide questions, we’ll begin working on a cause and effect exercise much like the one you did for “Wheels of Fortune.”