The Final Frontiersman: Heimo Korth and His Family, Alone in Alaska's Arctic Wilderness

In The Final Frontiersman, Heimo's cousin James Campbell chronicles the Korth family's amazing experience, their adventures, and the tragedy that continues to shape their lives. With a deft voice and in spectacular, at times unimaginable detail, Campbell invites us into Heimo's heartland and home. The Korths wait patiently for a small plane to deliver their provisions, listen to distant chatter on the radio, and go sledding at 44° below zero -- all the while cultivating their hard-learned survival skills that stand between them and a terrible fate.

Awe-inspiring and memorable, The Final Frontiersman reads like a rustic version of the American Dream and reveals for the first time a life undreamed by most of us: amid encroaching environmental pressures, apart from the herd, and alone in a stunning wilderness that for now, at least, remains the final frontier.

Although this book has one foot in the "wilderness adventure can you believe anyone can survive this" genre (Heimo regularly traps in -50 weather and even jogs in -20 weather), it is also a kind of domestic family saga, almost a "Little House on the Prairie" but the prairie is the Arctic.

Heimo, his wife Edna, and daughters Rhonda and Krin, face near tragedies and real tragedies lost in blizzards, or facing a broken-down snow machine miles from home, or jumping from ice flow to ice flow in desparate hope of making it back to shore, or falling through overflow ice on the river. Remarkably though, the main thing I'll remember about this book is the sense it conveys of Heimo's redemption (lost and alcoholic, he came to Alaska to trap in the 70s, but dried up and built a family there), and of the love and affection of a family who have no one but each other for months on end. This is a real testament to Campbell's skill as a journalist and author.

The adventure and drama of the Arctic keep the reader turning pages like a good mystery but the after-effect is one of love and integrity.


A fascinating look at an impossibly alien lifestyle   April 17, 2005
Debra Hamel (TwitterLit.com)
27 out of 27 found this review helpful

Heimo Korth has lived in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for nearly thirty years, eking out a subsistence living some 250 miles from the nearest road. He moved to Alaska at twenty, eager to escape an abusive father and unwilling to submit to the yoke of a nine-to-five job. For six years Heimo ("HI-mow") lived alone, trapping and hunting and flying out occasionally with bush pilots to sell his furs. But in 1982 Heimo married Edna, whom he met while walrus hunting on St. Lawrence Island, and she followed her husband to the wilderness. They have lived together since in this desolate place where the sun dips below the horizon in November and isn't seen again until January, where temperatures range from a balmy 80 degrees to 50 below. They and their daughters live a semi-nomadic life, moving each spring from one of their three cabins to another so as not to deplete the animal populations in any one area. Every summer they spend six weeks in Fort Yukon, population 750, stocking up on supplies and getting a small taste of civilization.

James Campbell, who happens to be Heimo's cousin, visited the Korths several times beginning in 2002. In telling Heimo's story Campbell juxtaposes descriptions of life in the Arctic--the logistics of carving up a dead moose, the efficient reuse of toilet paper as a firestarter--with stories of Heimo's boyhood in Wisconsin and discussion of the politics of land apportionment in Alaska. The result is a fascinating look at a lifestyle that is impossibly alien yet unexpectedly familiar: Heimo's teenagers tack Britney Spears posters to the walls of their cabin.

One begins reading Campbell's account with incredulity, wondering why anyone would choose to live in such an extreme environment and whether the Korths were wise to raise their children there. But reading the fascinating, sometimes heartrending story of Heimo and Edna's life one comes to respect them and their decisions. We are left hoping that Heimo manages to live out his days as he wishes, growing old in a wilderness few men before him have experienced.

Reviewed by Debra Hamel, author of Trying Neaira: The True Story of a Courtesan's Scandalous Life in Ancient Greece


A Must Read!   August 16, 2004
Lisa87 (Washington, D.C.)
20 out of 20 found this review helpful

This book is so wonderfully written. James Campbell breathes so much life in every word and every paragraph, that it is one of those rare books that is hard to put down. My husband couldn't believe that I would be so taken in by a story about the wilderness.

Yet, the character development; the smooth writing style that describes the trials and hardships; all of the history that I learned made this such a three dimensional and rare treat. If only James Campbell had other books that I could purchase!

I read a ton of books and this is one of the few that I will definitely recommend to everyone that I know.


Welcome To The World Of 40 Below   June 19, 2004
Robert Daniels (fairfield, ia USA)
16 out of 17 found this review helpful

What would you do if it were 40 below and your snowmobile conked out 15 miles from your cabin?

After reading this book you will understand that the answer is simple. You'd die. End of story.

This is the tale of a real world tough guy who at a young age gave himself over to the pursuit of wilderness survival and is about the only one left out there with survival skills of this level.

The author is no wimp either, spending considerable time with Mr. Korth plus doing mega-research on the history of the Alaskan wilderness, which he weaves into the story in an informing, non-boring way.

When I read Into The Wild I somehow thought that the fellow that died just had a few unlucky breaks-like the river rising which trapped him out in that old bus. Wrong. That guy never stood a chance from day one, and this book shows you why.

Like a lot of guys I have always had two fantasies - living in the backwoods of Alaska or living on a remote tropical island. I heartily thank the author for paring my fantasy list down to one - the island.


not girly but you'll love it   June 1, 2004
11 out of 11 found this review helpful

This isn't really my genre but when i started reading this story I couldn't put it down. It is incredibly inspiring and touching. It will touch your life and influence you in a positive way: a little like the book, Seabiscuit. It was educational too. It would be wonderful for children in difficult financial or familial situations to read. I can't stop talking about it and I can't put it down.