Drive time

It was dark, after 5 PM that day after Thanksgiving in 1981. I was headed back to Anchorage after using the afternoon to catch up on some work at the office. I left the Matanuska Electric Association headquarters building just before five.

When I got the job in Palmer we had to get a second vehicle. Not being much of a shopper it didn’t take long for me to pick out a bright red 1979 Ford Courier pick up truck. The salesman said it was a three-quarter ton version with a four cylinder engine and a five-speed manual shift gear box. It did have an extended bed.

Driving back and forth to Palmer, I soon learned about small engine vehicles on hills. On a sunny day it would climb southbound Eagle River hill no problem. On a cloudy day, I had to shift down to fourth gear to get up the hill even with an empty bed. It seemed barometric pressure didn’t have to drop much to effect engine performance a lot.

Headed home that Friday I found the Glenn Highway surface was well used snow pack with some bare pavement and icy patches; comfortable driving for an Alaskan winter.

About half way between the Ship Creek Bridge and Muldoon I heard a thud. A flash of white, a moose’s wide open eye, was just outside the windshield a couple of inches above the steering wheel. I swerved left. The left turn got the pickup onto a patch of ice and when I turned back right the truck did a 180, heading back the way I had come. It continued to slide. Off the road it went and began to tilt. I leaned right as far as the seat belt would let me but the truck rolled up onto the driver’s side.

Stunned, I sat and shook a bit; then unfastened the seat belt and stood up on the inside of the driver’s door. I opened the passenger side door over my head. There were two or three cars stopped and a couple of guys asked if I needed help. I said no and climbed out.

The moose had sat down, front legs upright and rear legs folded up under it.

It was off the driving surface next to the road facing the traffic. Soon there were eight to ten people gathered round. The moose continued to sit.

After checking out the truck best I could in the light provided by cars stopped along the Glenn, it seemed to me we could set the truck upright. I asked four or five men to come and help me push it back onto all four wheels. Well, that was easier than I thought it might be. When it landed and did a short bounce, the moose stood up and crossed the highway. I looked the truck over for damage. The front of the hood had a hoof print dent which extended in a narrowing line right back to the hood hinge space right in front of the windshield. Nothing looked broken. I wondered; would it start? It did!

We hadn’t had much snow that year; I thought, maybe I can drive this thing out of here. I tried. No way with this light weight 2-wheel drive pickup was I going to make it up out of the ditch to the highway. But it did appear I could drive parallel to the Glenn. I headed toward Muldoon Road in the ditch.

Back then there was no fence between the frontage road near the Native Heritage Center and the Glenn Highway. Also, the ditch along the Glenn flattened out. I drove toward the intersection of Muldoon and Glenn Highway and was able to drive up onto the frontage road near the Heritage Center. Wow! I was going to make it home. A few days later I noticed the bit of an angle on the left front wheel. Mechanic said it was a bent A-frame and replaced it.

When we moved to Cottonwood Shores Subdivision in the Valley a year later, my youngest son drove the truck daily to school in Anchorage till he graduated. After that it found a home with my eldest son for a couple of years. Before he drove it to the salvage yard I took the seatbelts out to mount in my 1968 Bronco.

Budd Goodyear is a local freelance writer who has had articles and photos included in publications throughout the state. Goodyear moved to Alaska in 1977 with his wife and children, and has worked in the Valley, Anchorage and Palmer. Goodyear contributes historical pieces to the Frontiersman.