Klondike Cockatiel

Come closer children, and I shall reveal to you one of the stories they don't teach in school. This is what history is really about: dreams, and fools, and the times when the two cross paths.

In the early days of the last century, rumor held that great fortunes were to be made by any w ho were hardy enough to go to the great frozen wastes of northern most North America. There were wild stories of gold by the ton, and rubies by the bushel, and mink by the mile.

Eventually these stories filtered into the dry, dull sheep stations near Dubbo, Australia, in the Great Outback, and fueled the dreams of one Fred Smith. He was a swagman of unknown parentage possessed of an interest in easy fortunes that was far larger than his five foot tall, ten stone heavy frame. He lay awake at night and schemed.

Orwell's was the only bar for fifty miles, north, south, or otherwise out of Dubbo. Anyone who needed a beer bad enough to drink there, which was everyone who worked the sheep stations, lived with the patter of Fred's ideas. "Transportation's the thing, mate" was his customary refrain. He had not coined this idea, but had liked the sound of it when an impressively mustachioed stranger had espoused it one night, None of the drinkers paid much attention. No one thought that "Birdie Fred" would ever do anything brave or daring. He could, after all, barely be counted upon to shear a sheep. But he had great plans.

The nick-name came from an infamous episode in which he had drunkenly invested his entire week's pay in a scheme to cross chickens with Gala Cockatoos to create an animal that could tell you when it laid an egg, so as to provide lazy farm hands with more time to drink and sleep. That he knew and loved all types of native Australian birds could not be argued; that he had a brain in his head frequently was.

The final straw came for Fred when his foreman called him a bloody billabong brain in front of all his mates. Since he had just been paid, and had not had time to drink it up, gamble it away, or waste it, he decided on the spot to leave. Fred had been pouring over two newspapers, each several years old, that discussed the difficulties of transporting the riches of the frozen wastes to warmer climates. "The stupid fools don't realize that they need claws to grip the ice," he told himself, neglecting his total ignorance of ice, frozen wastes, transportation, or hard work. He was, in this respect, the equal of most ordinary humans.

At any rate, his studies had led him to the inescapable conclusion that native Australian birds (did I mention that he knew about them?) were the ideal means of transport in far Alaska, he also felt that feathers would make a light-weight protection against the cold. Since he didn't have enough money to book passage and carry many large birds, he also found it necessary to make a small advance loan to himself from his drunken foreman's wallet shortly before he settled on a herd of 3,000 cockatiels, and left Australia.

These birds, as you probably already know, are about six inches of body and six inches of tail, and three feet of cockiness, They are gentle, trusting to a fault, and bite far less intensely than do their cousin Cockatoos. (Which was also a point in their favor, in Fred's mind.) In color they are charcoaled a pale grey, with a few white spots, and have sunburst yellow heads, with harlot orange cheeks, and proportionately large and quizzical crests.

The arrival at a small Eskimo village in early August of 1825 of 3,000 cockatiels and one buffoon was a matter of note to every single person including the women and children. Fred repeated to anyone at the Yuno bar who was stuck for a place to drink beer that Alaska was not so dull as he had expected. Since this was the only saloon in town, fellow patrons here tolerated him and regarded him just had his former companions. They drank and ignored him. But he had great plans.

Fred had not wasted his long sea voyage, and now had a complete set of three thousand tiny leather harnesses, complete with trace bells, all working together so his team of cockatiels could pull the untold wealth of the North to market. It is beyond mere words to describe the scene when "that idjut Australian" first hitched his sled to his jewel-like beasts. There he stood, swathed with layers of furs in six hues, with a quarter mile of chirping and bobbing yellow crests in front of him. The sun shown, the ice glinted, the crowds smiled, and the sled stood absolutely still, in the cruel and chilling wind.

Shaking the reins made the birds try to fly straight up, which didn't work, and they Soon learned to infuriatingly mimic "Giddayup." (They are, after all, kin to parrots) In desperation, Fred sought some seeds to bribe them, but found that since no one had mastered transportation over frozen wastes, no seeds were to be found. A grizzled and amused bystander suggested that he use some oatmeal which was as frozen as everything else there.

The hungry birds did indeed move forward, easily pulling their load, when he scattered some pieces of the solidified Mush. Fred soon had them moving in unison whenever he yelled out "Mush!" with or without food, since cockatiels are not notably smarter than was Fred. A small glitch developed, however, in that this congealed nourishment was almost the only thing around to eat. That meant that several times every day, as he was unloading his fledgling riches, someone would mutter, "What, Mush again?" and the birds of burden would suddenly speed over the permafrost. Fred had not devised a simple stopping command, so he had to spend many hours chasing the sled, usually in maddening circles.

Not one to be daunted by adversity or common sense, Mr. Smith designed beautiful little fur hats to fit the 2,998 heads of his herd to mute their hearing. (A drunken Russian named Ivanovich had stomped two of the animals when he tripped over their reins, though they were totally innocent. Fred had declined to push the point with someone twice his size who also carried a very large knife.) Now, he thought, I have proved my idea, improved my design, and can rapidly become rich and besought by women who weigh less than I do. So on the fateful day of March 1, 1826, when a fur trader wanted to move $2,000 dollars worth of mink and beaver skins to the coast, and offered half the profit to anyone who could go where Angels feared to tread, Fred rushed in.

Soon, piled high, with his team all eagerly jingling their tiny bells, and wearing their hats with holes in the tops for their crests, Fred Smith set out over the one thousand miles of ice, with sunlight scintillating, birds straining, dreams floating, and knowledgeable heads shaking sadly to themselves.

After the first day, the adrenaline wore off, and Fred's thoughts of easy money came a little closer to reality, But still, the team was on its way, they were moving steadily, and in a week Mr. Smith would have the first real part of an endless fortune. Then the wind shifted so that it blew directly head on to the team. It slowed them down, of course, but not too badly, since the birds were fairly low to the ground, They continued to make reasonably good speed.

Then, near dark, Fred's eyes shifted from dull with fatigue to bright with fear, for he saw a great chasm blocking his forward passage.

"Right, Birds!" he shouted, seeking a safe crossing. The team did not respond. Louder he shouted, and yelled and screamed. The wind, combined with their ear muffs, kept them from hearing him. At the last instant, it suddenly dawned on Fred, who should have known much about birds, that they fly, and do not view a drop-off as an obstacle. Were they instinctively right? Could they fly over the gap?

Get real! They plummeted over the edge like tiny sacks of wet mud, and have never been heard from since.

The story almost ends there. Most people would say that the only legacy Fred left was the fact that the Alaskans adopted "Mush" for the dog teams that followed, (Of course it is true. Can you think of any other reason for oatmeal to become a guidance command?) But some of the old timers still tell stories; they say that on cold clear nights the ghosts of the tiny draft-animals can still be seen. That's why the Northern Lights have the yellows and oranges that swirl and ripple they are reflections of the Cockatiels of the Klondike, still out there somewhere seeking the passage to lost dreams.

THE END