Selected as a Reviewers’ Favorite by Anchorage Daily News reviewer David James, December 15, 2024
“The Hope 91 Sled Dog Race challenged mushers with an audacious idea. Gather in Nome and head northward up the coast of Western Alaska to Wales, where Soviet helicopters would pick them and their dogs up, and ferry them over the Bering Strait to Uelen in the Russian Far East. From there they would head south to the port city of Anadyr. That the entire event was organized and launched within about two months made its success seem even more questionable. But succeed it did.” –David A. James, Anchorage Daily News, May 4, 2024
Hope ’91: From Alaska to Russia by Dogteam
Tthe story of this historic race from Nome, Alaska to Anadyr, Chukotka, Russia is a testament to the courage and vision of a handful of Alaskans. Along with their counterparts across the Bering Strait, they saw the value in building a bridge between their countries via a month-long 1,200-mile sled dog race across some of the wildest lands on Earth, and they brought together mushers from Alaska, Canada, Norway, Switzerland, Japan and Chukotka, in an effort to share the skills and knowledge of long distance sled dog racing. Along the way they shared friendships, faced unimaginable perils, and inspired a renewed interest in the ancient sled dog breeding traditions which continues to this day.
Written by Alaskan author Helen Hegener and the Hope ’91 Race media coordinator Sandra Medearis, with illustrations by Alaskan artist and Hope ’91 race judge Jon Van Zyle and photographs by the race photographer Frank Flavin.
The Hope ’91 Sled Dog Race
From Nome, Alaska to Anadyr, Chukotka, Russia, 228 pages, 6” x 9” format, full color on premium paper, indexed, with dozens of color and b/w photos.
$39.95
The race route had the mushers leaving Nome by dog team and traveling to Teller and Wales, Alaska. From Wales they loaded their teams into big orange Russian helicopters for a flight across the Bering Strait to Uelen, and then continued by dogsled through many small villages, through the larger seaport settlement of Provideniya, and finally to Anadyr, the easternmost town in Russia. The total distance was between 1,000 to 1,200 miles.
The mushers in the 1991 race were Scott Cameron (Palmer, Alaska), Nicolai Ettyne (Neshkan, USSR), Kazuo Kojima (Tokyo, Japan), Kate Persons (Sikusuilaq Springs, Alaska), Ketil Reitan (Kaktovik, Alaska), Mary Shields (Fairbanks, Alaska), Peter Thomann (Willow, Alaska), and Frank Turner (Pelly Crossing, Yukon Territory, Canada). Seven Russian mushers also took part in the race.
Selected as a Reviewers’ Favorite by Anchorage Daily News reviewer David James, December, 2024: “In 1991, a year when the Cold War was winding down and hope and optimism prevailed, an exhibition sled dog race took mushers from Nome north to Wales along the Alaska coast, then, after an airplane flight across the Bering Sea, south along Russia’s parallel side from Uelen to Anadyr. Helen Hegener, in typical fashion, fills “The Hope ‘91 Sled Dog Race” with personal reminiscences of participants and extensive illustrations, bringing her story to life. In our present era of increasing darkness, it’s a reminder that, shorn of the ambitions of power- hungry political leaders, people living normal lives are kind and good and, if left to their own devices, will reach out to each other in friendship”
Northern Light Media 