Notorious Bus Finds a Better Home Than the End of the Stampede Trail | Editorials | Newsminer.Com

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6/21/2021 Out of the wild and into history: Notorious bus finds a better home than the end of the Stampede Trail | Editorials | newsminer.com https://www.newsminer.com/opinion/editorials/out-of-the-wild-and-into-history-notorious-bus-finds-a-better-home- than-the/article_bc3b1bec-d0b5-11eb-bbc3-cbe8e8425eb8.html Out of the wild and into history: Notorious bus finds a better home than the end of the Stampede Trail Jun 20, 2021 News-Miner opinion: The Museum of the North is moving to refurbish Fairbanks Transit Bus 142, a rusting, dilapidated hulk made famous by Jon Krakauer’s 1996 book “Into the Wild” and a later movie with the same name, which depicted the starvation death of 24-year-old hapless adventurer Christopher McCandless. The green and white relic is to be the centerpiece of an exhibit slated to open in 2023 that will tell the story of how the 1946 International Harvester K-5 became a global cultural icon with a starring role in an enduringly Alaskan story. Because of the bus’s condition, it will be a daunting task. McCandless in 1992, on a two-year solo journey, crossed the Teklanika River near the decrepit bus, then used for shelter by hunters and hikers, but he could not get back across the river. He died of starvation after living for about 114 days at the bus, which had been dumped on state land near the Denali National Park and Preserve boundary along the Stampede Trail in about 1960. His body was found by moose hunters Sept. 6, 1992. https://www.newsminer.com/opinion/editorials/out-of-the-wild-and-into-history-notorious-bus-finds-a-better-home-than-the/article_bc3b1bec-d0b5-11eb… 1/2 6/21/2021 Out of the wild and into history: Notorious bus finds a better home than the end of the Stampede Trail | Editorials | newsminer.com Over the years there have been scores of rescues and searches for adventurers bound for or from the bus. At least two hikers died trying to cross the Teklanika River near the long abandoned relic that served as a beacon for trekkers from all over the world trying to retrace McCandless’s footsteps. The Alaska Department of Transportation and the Alaska Army National Guard collaborated last year to airlift the bus out of the wild. Denali Borough officials long had wanted the graffiti-covered bus removed because of the deaths, rescues and searches associated with it. McCandless’s death, and the controversy following publication of “Into the Wild,” a controversy that continues even today, is not seen by all Alaskans as a heroic tragedy, but rather a gritty, cautionary tale about what happens to those who venture into Alaska’s wilds unequipped and unprepared. The good news is that the bus has been hauled out of the wilderness. That alone likely will save lives over the coming years. If the exhibit draws people to the museum, and those who view the exhibit when it opens learn from it, well, from where we sit, that is even better news. https://www.newsminer.com/opinion/editorials/out-of-the-wild-and-into-history-notorious-bus-finds-a-better-home-than-the/article_bc3b1bec-d0b5-11eb… 2/2.

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Thoreau As a Mirror for Jon Krakauer's Into the Wild
Thoreau as a Mirror for Jon Krakauer’s Into the Wild José Joaquín Sánchez Vera Faculty of Arts and Education Subject: English Points: 15.0 Supervisor: Magnus Ullén Examiner: Åke Bergvall Date: 7 June 2013 Serial number Abstract To tell the nonfiction biography of Christopher McCandless in Into the Wild Jon Krakauer uses a plethora of references to Henry D. Thoreau. In this thesis I study how Krakauer uses Thoreau while balancing on the fine line that differentiates the historian from the storyteller. Through an analysis of Krakauer‟s use of Thoreau‟s economic ideas, liberal ideas, and view of nature and wilderness I argue that Krakauer blurs a pragmatic understanding of Thoreau and uses techniques of fiction to characterize McCandless as a late Thoreauvian transcendentalist. By doing so, Krakauer explains and defends the protagonist‟s actions from criticism making him appear as a character whose story is exceptional. However, the characterization of the protagonist as a follower of Thoreauvian ideals by means of a partial and romantic interpretation of Thoreau is misleading and does not provide us with a better understanding of the life of McCandless. Moreover, the romantic image of Thoreau advanced by Krakauer reflects Krakauer, or at least his times; particularly, it reflects Krakauer‟s own view of wilderness and his concern for its impending demise. Consequently, I conclude that Krakauer‟s version of McCandless‟s story is perhaps too biased to amount to a strong historical narrative and be considered proper nonfiction. Nevertheless, the romanticized characterization of McCandless aids Krakauer to write a more appealing story.
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Thoreau As an Oblique Mirror: Jon Krakauer's Into the Wild
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