October 19, 1943 — Station 4

In the last twelve days they had laid wire for over 350 miles and were well into the snow areas. One of the snow cats that carried cable moved ahead and reeled out the cable. When the three mile reel was empty the splice crew set up their tent over the end of it while the snow cat operators maneuvered another reel on the play out. While he was doing this, they made the one half of the splice, when the new cable was ready they set to the second half. Usually they were done before the trencher caught up. The trenchers never stopped unless there was a serious problem. The men slept in the back of the moving snow cats when they were off duty. Servicing and fueling of the equipment was carried on while they were stopped to splice a cable or every twelve hours if they did not have a stop for any other reason. The second trencher in each team was used to clear in front and cover the cable behind them where needed.

Jon was supervising the southern cable. McCans was the head of the service platoon. They joked about their job being warmer than the northern cable that was just about one quarter of a mile north of them. The two had been so busy they had hardly exchanged a half dozen words other than that necessary to see the job continued. Generally when one of them had his meal or sleep time, the other was working. Due to a problem with one of the repeaters Jon was eating late this morning when McCans jumped onto and entered the moving Cat. “Hi. You OK?”

“Cold, otherwise OK.”

“Any problems?”

“Nothing now, get your food and some sleep, they promised to call us if anything cropped up.”

“Good. You do any thinking about what I said on the plane?”

“You mean about school, yes.”

“Good, let me tell you about your idea, to heat the cabins, one of our company engineers looked at that and improved on it. We have the equipment with us, you’re going to get to help to install it. You were originally scheduled for Station 4, I think we need you more at Icebox. I applied for the change and you are going along. I want you to oversee the installation. Buford will be staying at Station 4.”

“How does it work?”