Northwest History. Aviation 8. Contest, United States.

• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 1936
• Subjects: Alaska; ice; Tanana river; Annual Guessing Bee; Nenana; guessing contest; Fairbanks; weather forecasts; thermometer; Nome; Kotzebue; Chena Slough; W. M. Berrigan; pharmacy clerk; Bremerton; Wash.; Jackson Johnson; Nicolas Pykill; Willow creek; United States; Northwest; Pacific > History > 20th century; Aviation; Leland; Pacific
• Online Access: http://content.libraries.wsu.edu/cdm/ref/collection/clipping/id/86667

All Alaska Watching Ice In Tanana River For 20th Annual Guessing Bee. All Alaska Watching Ice In Tanana River For 20th Annual Guessing Bee. By LELAND HANMJM NKNANA, Alaska (IP)—Alaskans--sourdoughs and tenderfeet—are all set for their twentieth annual guessing bee on when the ice will start moving out of the Tanana river The guessing contest, open to all Alaskans,.draws 50,000-or more guesses yearly, it started in 1917, based on a similar guessing contest originating at Fairbanks, 50 miles upstream, in 1904. The stunt is to guess the exact minute the spring breakup will start. Guessers file their prognostications by a specified date, then spend weeks studying the ice, measuring its depth in the center and the "anchor ice" attached to the mud along shore, watching thermometers and weather forecasts, worrying over the wind and the snow or lack of snow. Guesses come in by the thousand from as far away as Nome and Kotzebue. Many file a dozen some day in April or starts moving, To determine the precise minute, a string is attached to a bell and clock. When the ice moves, the bell rings and the olock stops. The ice movement here generally occurs 24 to 48 hours later than in the Tanana river's Chena Slough at Fairbanks, scene of a similar contest. It stopped the clock at 1:32 p.m., last May 15—latest date in the history of the contest. W. M. Berrigan, 38, Fairbanks pharmacy clerk spending his first winter in Alaska, won $61,600. Berrigan formerly lived at Bremerton, Wash. "Chechako (tenderfoot) luck," said some of the old-timers.' In 1934, Jackson Johnson and Nicholas Pykill, who owned the Lucky Spot mine on Willow creek, shared $56,000 by guessing April 30 at 2:07 p. in. They retired to the United States. A study of past performances shows the earliest the ice has moved since 1917 was in 1926 when the clock stopped at 4:03 p. m., April 26. Oldtimers say May 11 is a lucky day—ice moved on that day in 1918. 1920, 1921 and again in 1924.