Legend of "Tisha" continues

A Valley man is helping protect his grandmother's legacy by distributing a book the legendary woman first published in 1954.

Anne Purdy Hobbs, made famous in the book Tisha wrote and released a book years before Tisha hit the streets. Her grandson, Brian Johnson, recently obtained a new copywrite for Dark Boundary, published the book and has been distributing it around the state.

The task has proven to be much more than Johnson originally thought.

"This winter, I thought I could just pull it all together and have it done in a day or two," Johnson said. "Yeah, right. It took the entire winter."

But it all was worth it. The book is 73 pages -- six fewer than the 1954 original version -- but everything is in the book. The book shrunk in pages after the text was formatted and printed using computers. Plus, the revision allowed Johnson to obtain a copywrite on the text.

"I was surprised to find out the copywrite had run out on the original. Once the copywrite runs out, it becomes public domain and you can't get that copywrite again," Johnson explained. "So we did a revised version, reformatted it and copywrited the story."

The book is similar to Tisha, although it is not about Purdy. Tisha details Purdy's life as a teacher in Chicken, Tetlin and other rural Alaska communities. She adopted 11 Native Alaskan children and raised her family in Chicken. She basically wrote her life's story and talked to Robert Specht, an editor, who took her story and wrote Tisha.

In Dark Boundary, it is Purdy who does the storytelling. The book is about Ole Hanson, a schoolteacher who lived in the village of Eagle, Alaska. It details her life spent in the Gold Rush era in the Yukon River village, when mining was king and change was happening every minute.

The book is an honest view of the way of life at the turn of the century.

"It is funny, it is sad, it is everything," Johnson said. "It's a story about survival and life back then. She touches on some of the racism that was going on back then between the Indians and the white people who were coming there to mine."

Hanson was a friend of Purdy's, and their lives are parallel. Both came to remote villages to teach, and both eventually adopted Native Alaskan children. Both overcame the hardships of the era and carved out a niche in their villages.

Johnson grew up in Chicken with his mother, Marie Clark. At the time, he said he couldn't understand why tour buses would come all the way from the Canadian border, just to stop and see where Tisha taught and lived.

"I was like nine years old, and I didn't fathom the idea that people would come all that way to see where my grandma lived," Johnson said. "I didn't quite grasp how well known she was or how much she touched the lives of people she never met, through the book.

"A lot of people come to Chicken to see what life was like back then, to see how it resembled what was in the book," Johnson said. "They still get four to six tour buses a day in Chicken."

Tisha has sold more than 10 million copies, and is still in publication. Johnson is hoping the public receives Dark Boundary in much the same way, and so far, he has been encouraged.

"I just got home from putting 1,500 miles on the car distributing the book around Alaska," Johnson said. "So far, demand by stores has been great."

Johnson said Dark Boundary has sold more than 750 books since it was officially released on May 31, and he has been working hard to make sure it stays in stock on bookshelves around the state.

"A lot of the stores are eager to carry it for us, which is great," Johnson said. "The response has been good so far."

As part of his 1,500-mile distribution journey, Johnson stopped in Chicken. His family spends a lot of time there, fixing up Purdy's home and doing general maintenance. The tour buses still roll in daily, and his grandma is a big reason why the tiny village of 30 people not only stays on the map, but thrives.

"Grandma was a very personable woman -- she answered all of her own mail and responded to all of the letters," Johnson said.