The Fan Hitch Volume 2, Number 1  November 1999

Official Newsletter of the Inuit Sled Dog International

Table of Contents

Editorial: 
The Bigger Picture
*
Featured Inuit Dog Owner: 
Paul Landry
*
Book Reviews:
On Thin Ice
Of Dogs and Men
*
Poem: Brave Little Heart
*
Janice Howls: 
Hypothyroid Disease
*
Fan Hitch Contributor Receives Writing Award
*
Expedition News: 
The Thule 2000
*
In My Humble Opinion: 
Traditional Advice
*
Updates:
The Nunavut Quest 2000
Ihe ISDVMA Meeting

Links

ISDI Home Page

Newsletter Home Page

Publisher's Statement

The Fan Hitch, the official publication of the Inuit Sled Dog International, is published about 6 times a year.  It is available to those who do not have access to the world wide web by subscription for $4.50 USD/$8.00 CAD to cover the cost of printing and mailing.  U.S. subscription requests should be sent to Sue Hamilton, Editor, The Fan Hitch, 55 Town Line Road, Harwinton, CT  06791, USA.  Send Canadian and international requests to Geneviève Montcombroux, P.O. Box 206, Inwood, Manitoba, ROC 1PO, Canada. * Contents of The Fan Hitch are protected by international copyright laws.  Neither photos, drawings nor text may be reproduced in any form without written consent.  Please forward these requests to the Editor at qimmiq@snet.net * The Fan Hitch welcomes for publication your letters, stories, comments and suggestions.
Photo credit: Ken Pawson, Admiralty Bay, Antarctica 1949. Number One Team, Yap in lead. 
Brave Little Heart
by Ken Pawson

Tucked away in drawers and cases I have bits of souvenirs, 
Picked up in many places - In many different years. 

Most of them in money are not worth anything. 
But the cheapest of all is priceless for the memories it can bring. 

For, by far the very dearest, though for money it wouldn't sell, 
Is a sledding dog's old harness and his little sledging bell. 

If I hold it but for a minute I see once again it would seem 
The fine little chap pulling it - 'Yap' - leader of Number One Team. 

Now it is quite clean and supple and seldom, if ever gets wet - 
But times in the past it was frozen, smelling only of blubber and sweat. 

For a brave little heart beat within it.  A brave little chest faced the strain 
Of long weary days on the sledge trail, and in memory I see him again. 

Only a dog from a sledge trace - in a show ring he'd never be seen, 
And yet in my heart he'd taken first place, as he did in Number One Team. 

And whenever life's journeying finds me with a heart that's beginning to fail - 
That faded old harness reminds me - 'Slog on to the end of the trail!' 

And when the last lonely ridge is approaching, and the days of this life but a dream, 
I'd be happy to have pull me over - 'Yap', Leader of Number One Team. 
*        *        *

Ken Pawson was born in 1923 in Yorkshire, England. He enrolled in the R.A.F. and served in World War II from 1942 to 1946 as a meteorological observer - Atlantic Transport Command. Trained in surveying at Ordinance Survey and University College, London, England, he served in Antarctica under Dr. Sir Vivian Fuchs from 1948-1950 on a British Expedition (Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey) as a meteorologist and assistant surveyor. He came to Calgary, Alberta, Canada in 1957 and has been part of the Calgary Mountain Rescue since it formed in 1962. Ken and his wife, Jean, have traveled extensively to the Yukon, the Northwest Territories and Nunavut, as well as far away to Australia and the South West Pacific. Always active, he enjoys climbing, skiing, walking and canoeing.
 
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