Into the Wild meets Helter Skelter in this riveting true story of a modern-day homesteading family in the deepest reaches of the Alaskan wildernessâ??and of the chilling secrets of its maniacal, spellbinding patriarch.
When Papa Pilgrim, his wife, and their fifteen children appeared in the Alaska frontier outpost of McCarthy, their new neighbors saw them as a shining example of the homespun Christian ideal. But behind the family's proud piety and beautiful old-timey music lay Pilgrim's dark past: his strange connection to the Kennedy assassination and a trail of chaos and anguish that followed him from Dallas and New Mexico. Pilgrim soon sparked a tense confrontation with the National Park Service fiercely dividing the community over where a citizenâ??s rights end and the governmentâ??s power begins. As the battle grew more intense, the turmoil in his brood made it increasingly difficult to tell whether his children were messianic followers or hostages in desperate need of rescue.
In this powerful piece of Americana, written with uncommon grace and high drama, veteran Alaska journalist, Tom Kizzia uses his unparalleled access to capture an era-defining clash between environmentalists and pioneers ignited by a mesmerizing sociopath who held a town and a family capt… (más)
I grew up in the rural West, I love it, and I'm glad that other people find inspiration in it, too. But sometimes these places attract quite freaky and dangerous people, and this book is the story of one of the most infamous. Raised among the Dallas elite, the man who came to be known as Papa Pilgrim lived on the road for a long time before meeting his wife and having 15 (!) children. The story starts as the large family shows up in a rural corner of Alaska, near the massive Wrangell-St. Elias National Park known for its glaciers, looking for land.
We learn through Kizzia's story that the family had outstayed their welcome in Mora County, New Mexico--one county north of where I grew up--because they habitually stole from neighbors, broke their fences, and generally disrespected any sense of community or law. This story details the Pilgrim clan arriving and committing the same offenses, and worse, in their new community, as their neighbors get wrapped up in the battles and have to figure out how to defeat a headstrong man that has clear mental health problems.
It's in a lot of ways a tragic story. The book demonstrates, through a years-long narrative, why everyone needs to understand how to live cooperatively within our society, even if they spend most of their time on their own. But I thought the storytelling was clear, and the author included the perspectives of many people to round it out, including the Pilgrim children. ( )
As I walk'd through the wilderness of this world, I lighted on a certain place, where was a Denn; And I laid me down in that place to sleep; And as I slept I dreamed a Dream. I dreamed, and behold I saw a Man cloathed with Raggs, standing in a certain place, with his face from his own House, a Book in his hand, and a great burden upon his back. - John Bunyan, The Pilgrim's Progress, 1678
(Author's Note) In the winter of 2002, a man with the wild gray beard of a biblical prophet showed up in the remote Alaska ghost town of McCarthy with his wife and fourteen children.
(Prologue: Third Month) When the song of the snowmachine had faded down the valley, the sisters got ready to go.
A pair of old trucks crept down the street, pushing deep tracks through the snow.
Into the Wild meets Helter Skelter in this riveting true story of a modern-day homesteading family in the deepest reaches of the Alaskan wildernessâ??and of the chilling secrets of its maniacal, spellbinding patriarch.
When Papa Pilgrim, his wife, and their fifteen children appeared in the Alaska frontier outpost of McCarthy, their new neighbors saw them as a shining example of the homespun Christian ideal. But behind the family's proud piety and beautiful old-timey music lay Pilgrim's dark past: his strange connection to the Kennedy assassination and a trail of chaos and anguish that followed him from Dallas and New Mexico. Pilgrim soon sparked a tense confrontation with the National Park Service fiercely dividing the community over where a citizenâ??s rights end and the governmentâ??s power begins. As the battle grew more intense, the turmoil in his brood made it increasingly difficult to tell whether his children were messianic followers or hostages in desperate need of rescue.
In this powerful piece of Americana, written with uncommon grace and high drama, veteran Alaska journalist, Tom Kizzia uses his unparalleled access to capture an era-defining clash between environmentalists and pioneers ignited by a mesmerizing sociopath who held a town and a family capt
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