Eric Sevareid (1912–1992)

Imagine letting your 17 and 19 year old son and friend, with no experience, paddle a canoe 2,250 miles through two countries to Hudson Bay. That’s exactly what Sevareid chronicles.

The writing is simple and direct. Dialogue is interspersed with narration in just the right proportion to illuminate the team dynamics.

Don’t read this as an instructional guide! Here’s the passage that made me cringe the most:

“The stern man, who must assume the greatest responsibility, would rise to his show more feet as we drifted swiftly toward the leaping white water. He would choose the best route among the rocks, the best line of kicking riffles to follow. He would give his directions and then, paddling with all our might, to get up more speed than the current itself, we would drive the Sans Souci [their canoe] . . . straight at the dashing foam. . . . Your speed must be greater than that of the current, or you will have no leverage to twist and throw the canoe from one angle to another.” (157-8, 159)

I’ve run rapids under full load—it pays to drop in slower than the current for more control. It’s a wonder these boys made it the whole way! Even thought their inexperience shows through it doesn’t detract from the narrative. In fact, their trial-by-fire reminded me of some of the mistakes I’ve made on earlier trips. I applaud these boys for their effort.

The climax of the book is a juxtaposition of the most difficult and isolated part of the river with the most depressed mental state of two river-weary travelers. Sevareid narrated their “great test” with an endearing honesty.

This is a great book to read while you’re waiting for your own next trip. show less

Canoeing with the Cree by Eric Sevareid

My February Non-Fiction Challenge book. This is the story of two boys, Eric Sevareid and Walter Port, aged 17 and 19, who decide that it would be a fun adventure to canoe from Minneapolis, Minnesota to York Factory on Hudson Bay. The book is relatively short and I found it to be gripping as I read it in a single sitting.

I have spent a decent amount of time canoeing and consider myself fairly good at it. So with that foundation, what these kids did was show more insane and borderline suicidal in my opinion and I am in awe of their endurance. I also have serious questions about where these kids parents were because I would lock my child up before they tried something like this.

Fortified with $50 from a Minneapolis paper, they conceive of this idea of starting from Minneapolis, proceeding southwest to the Minnesota river, canoeing northwest until they get to the Red River and then following that river all the way to Winnipeg. From there they crossed Lake Winnipeg (a huge body of water) and then following a series of smaller rivers and lakes back northeast to York Factory on Hudson Bay. Basically, this sort of journey is akin to what the original Voyageurs were doing when they were collecting beaver pelts for Europe (think The Revenant but a little further north and east. To do it, they paddle from eight to ten hours straight every day and when they aren't paddling they are portaging their canoe and supplies over some very rough terrain.

They do the whole trip in an d18 foot canoe. The boys do stop for provisions along the way and manage to get some necessary help like when one has infection and is treated by a kindly doctor. They also do "cheat" on Lake Winnipeg, when after encountering a constant, contrary wind they book a short passage on a lake steamer to complete their trip across Lake Winnipeg. Keep in mind that "Lake" Winnipeg is the size of some small seas being the 11th largest lake on the planet and extending 258 miles north to south. Having paddled on a few larger lakes in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area I can say that the idea that you would even think of venturing on to a lake of that size in an 18 foot canoe is crazy. Did I mention that by the time the boys made it this far north they were in a race against time as everyone they met told them that the waterways were going to freeze over before they made it to Hudson Bay?

By the time the boys depart Lake Winnipeg they are moving into largely uninhabited territory. They encounter a few Cree and the occasional Mountie but mostly they are alone. They are trying to navigate simply by compass and maps (I have done this too and it is really hard). Basically, when they leave the last community for the trip to the Bay they are vanishing into the wilderness with winter starting at any time. A different version of this story would have been that the boys disappear down the river to never be seen again. Certainly no search party would have found them. Shockingly, the boys make it to Hudson Bay alive and in one piece. It is an amazing accomplishment.

There are some portions of the book that sound off to modern ears. The depictions of the Cree are clearly tinged by ideas of the "noble savage" and there are frequent references to "half-breeds." However, there is little racial animus expressed. Mostly there is admiration for the people living in such a harsh and isolated area.

Canoeing with the Cree was a fun read and an engaging adventure. show less

Arnold, who became known during his journalism career as Eric, Sevareid was stirred to adventure during a high school reading of Rudyard Kipling's poem The Feet of the Young Men. His best friend, Walter Porter, also longed to see the world. Together they decided that as soon as high school ended and they graduated they would buy a canoe and paddle from Minneapolis to the Hudson Bay.

It didn't bother them that they didn't have a canoe or experience, or that this particular trip had never been show more done before.

As the forward says:
"Without benefit of motor or radio, and indeed with little in the way of good maps or background information, the young men launched an eighteen-foot canvas canoe at Fort Snelling. .... 2250 miles, sixty portage and fourteen weeks ... Delayed by accidents and weather, they raced against time. ....(as they must arrive) before fall freeze up” (Slightly edited to avoid spoilers)

Woot – if you enjoy stories of wilderness and youthful derring-do adventures, this is a great read. I enjoyed the descriptions of the First Nations and the Metis, although the casual prejudices of the time do show. The book carried me onward to the end. A short book, a quick read and highly recommended. show less

Eric Sevareid (1912 - 1992) was a third generation Norwegian-American born and raised in a small town in northern North Dakota. His book of memoirs Not So Wild a Dream, published in 1947, is mostly about an action-filled 15 year period from high school graduation in 1930 (age 17) to the end of World War II (age 32). During that time Sevareid professionally and personally went through a number of adventures that typify his "Greatest Generation" and events of the world at large.

Sevareid was show more one of the pioneering "Morrow Boys", a team of radio journalists who filed daily radio journalistic pieces from Europe during the war. This allowed him to travel to many places and get up close to the front and fighting. Sevareid is at his best narrating his adventures, the book is episodic and some of the best include: Bombings in London during the Battle of Britain; the plane wreck while going over "the hump" into China; his experiences in Paris during the "phony war" and "Exodus"; the horrors of war on the Italian front; the D-Day invasion and subsequent Battle of the Rhine; the mutiny on-board a Liberty Ship in NY harbor. His accounts of the Great Depression, when he tramped around as a hobo on a train are really excellent, as is his description of a 2500 mile canoe trip, which is covered in more detail in his 1935 book Canoing with the Cree. These two books, written while still a young man, would be his most popular, and last real literary output - although he always considered himself a writer first, most of his later career was on television..

Sevareid was known for writing "think pieces", for example in one transcript, aired late in the war to popular acclaim, he talks about the unknowability of the experience of combat for a soldier, the impossibility of words to describe the immediate and often irrational emotions and thoughts of a soldier. These "think pieces" became a trademark of his later in life as a TV reporter, and Not So Wild a Dream often goes off on a thinking tangent. If there is a theme to the book, Sevareid is seeking the essence and spirit of his time and generation, what we might call the "Zeitgeist", and he often comes very close to capturing the immediate feeling of change. It is why this book is so important as a primary source for documenting the times and his generation. One of the more profound moments for me is when he sees a change in his generations attitude towards war:

"Our own men, whose cult was antimilitarism [in the 1930s students were highly anti-military], whose habit is to identify themselves merely as civilians in different cloths who detested soldiering, now subtly changed. There was a dash and verve about them that I had rarely observed before, and young boys would frankly say: "In Italy all i used to think about was going home. Now I kinda hate to quit before we get to Berlin." It was if they suddenly realized they were soldiers by profession, with the honest desire to complete this masterpiece of their skill down to the last detail."

Sevareid is right, during WWII the American military went from a small and and unpopular enterprise to a large beast that to this day is a major force in American culture, the consequences of which Eisenhower predicted in his military-industrial complex speech. Another area Sevareid muses on is the waning power of Britain and the ascending power of the USA - which given the events post-Cold War and the "Rise of the Rest" of the world, also has a prophetic tone. To get an idea what the US will be like as it becomes less relevant in the world - with the rise of China, India and the rest - one only has to read Sevareid's account of the waning power of Britain in the last chapters of the book.

--Review by Stephen Balbach, via CoolReading (c) 2008 cc-by-nd show less