The Ernest Oberholtzer Foundation and the Koochiching Museums will launch a new book, “Bound for the Barrens,” at 7 p.m. Thursday at the Ranier Community Building.
The public is invited and the book will be available for purchase.
The book commemorates the centennial of Ernest Oberholtzer’s epic canoe trip with Ojibwa companion Billy Magee. In 1912, Oberholtzer, known as “Ober,” and Magee traveled by rail from Ranier to Winnipeg, where they picked up supplies, then on to La Pas.
There, they started their canoe journey. They paddled through Manitoba, Ontario, and north to the barrens, near the Arctic Circle. They paddled down Hudson’s Bay and back through previously unexplored and unmapped territory. During the trip, they visited native villages and people, photographing those they met, mapping their route and keeping a virtually day-to-day handwritten journal of their adventures. Among the perils of the trip, on their return they were stranded on Lake Winnipeg for many days in November as ice was forming at a rapid pace.
Ober’s journal, in fading notebooks and often difficult to read, has been transcribed and foot-noted by long-time Oberholtzer Foundation board member, Jean Replinger. Replinger has also selected many photographs taken by Ober, some never published before, to illustrate the journal.
“Bound for the Barrens” has already received reviews from Canadian writer and explorer Bob Cockburn, a retired professor from the University of New Brunswick, and in “Che Mun, The Journal of Canadian Wilderness Canoeing.”
Wilderness News, the publication of the Quetico-Superior Foundation, promises excerpts in the fall. The promise of a review has been made by The Canadian Geographic Journal.
A successful book launch was held April 7 at The Loft in Minneapolis with more than 75 attendees.
Replinger, Robin Monahan and Bob Hilke, area resident and Oberholtzer Foundation board member, will present the new book at its launch in Ranier and will welcome questions and comments.
The International Falls Journal will begin publishing a series of columns written by Beth Waterhouse, executive director of the Oberholtzer Foundation, about the journals and Ober’s journey on June 16.
“I thought it would be fun to trace the trip week by week and feel the seasons roll by as I did,” Waterhouse explained.
She said the columns are intended to bring “Bound for the Barrens” to life and help readers feel the gap of 100 years.
“It is also important readers understand that Ober and Billy are two men from extremely different cultures,” Waterhouse noted. “These two cultures working together sends an important message. The men compliment each other and they even save each other’s lives once or twice.”
Waterhouse assured The Journal readers that the book is not necessary to understand her columns, however, she hopes her excerpts will drive readers to the book.
Later in the year, another centennial presentation will be given by Hilke, who was invited and encouraged by Les Oystryk, a retired Canadian conservation officer, to bring pictures and to talk about Ober and Magee’s trip to the natives in the villages Ober had described.
In March, Oystryk and Hilke retraced a large portion of the cross-border and cross-cultural trip. Using a sports utility van and airplane, the men followed the route Ober wrote about. According to the two, they were warmly and eagerly received, sharing pictures and stories of ancestors with many excited descendants of those in Ober’s pictures. Watch for news of this upcoming presentation.
