Musings

Today I arrived in Watson Lake, in the Yukon Territory. There is an interesting monument here in Watson Lake, called the Sign Post Forest. It has the dubious distinction of being "the largest collection of stolen material in the world". Apparently, in 1942, a homesick US GI was helping build the Alaska Highway. He erected a sign in Watson Lake which pointed the way to his hometown (Danville, Illinois) and listed the mileage.

Since then, the Forest has become a collection for tourists, who erect their own signs, along with their mileages and any other messages they want to leave. The city of Watson Lake has continued to erect new posts to keep up with the demand. As of 2009, there were over 69000 signs in the Forest.

Many of the signs are stolen signs which indicate cities, but some are stolen business signs, some are license plates, and some aren't stolen but rather are created, either formally (i.e., carved professionally with a family's name and their travel dates on it) or informally (handwritten on wood, tooled into a camping plate, etc). I wandered through for over an hour, looking for signs from places I've visited on this trip, and I didn't even cover half of the Forest.

I noticed a few things: first of all, in case you weren't already aware, Texans are super-proud -- there were TONS of Texas signs, from all over the state. Same goes for the folks from Michigan, Wisconsin, and Oregon. And for the Germans, Austrians, Poles, and Czechs, who also had tons and tons of signs erected. Californians and Coloradoans are apparently not very proud, as there were very few signs from those states. (BTW, this is not a scientifically performed study, so don't critique my research methodology!)

One other story, just because it's humorous and I forgot to mention it before. Like I said on my last post, I think the Alaskan natives are hilarious. There's just something about the way they think and speak which cracks me up. I forgot to mention that when I was at the Eskimo Olympics, I had an interesting conversation, with an Athabascan artisan. Here's how it went:

She: Why aren't you wearing your native outfit?

Me (mystified): Ummm, I didn't think I was allowed to....

She: Of course, you're allowed to! You have to enter the regalia competition!

Me (stumbling through my words, and thinking that I cannot enter, since I'm not a native): Oh, I didn't think I was supposed to enter.

She: I can help you! What tribe are you?

Me (not sure how to answer): Oh, I'm not a native...

She: What are you then?

Me: Ummm, I dunno, just Jewish I guess....

She: Oh! We like Jews! They're from Russia! They're God's people too!

(Then she looked at Caroline.)

She: So what are you?

Caroline: Oh, I'm Catholic.

She: Oh, well then, you're just like us....

Too funny. I know that people often confuse me for Greek, or Italian, or gypsy, or Ricki Lake or Monica Lewinsky; I just never in my life expected to be mistaken for an Alaskan Native!