#2 IN THE BEGINNING... UNFORGOTTEN

Anthony Slyvester Wikaryasz was born an identical twin in Alpena, Michigan, just moments before his brother Edmond, in the early 1900's. His parents had come to America through Ellis Island in the late 1800's. Labor was needed in Alpena and farm land was available for homesteading or purchase. An area of Poland where wars back and forth took place was the two family's lot, so they got out when it became a portion of Germany. John and Mary (Hoppe) Wikaryous had fifteen children, Tony being about in the middle with another set of fraternal twins a few pregnancies before him. They attended a rural one room school in Bolton, near the family farm on "Wikaryasz" road. Most roads in that area have Polish-sounding (unpronounceable) names as a tight sense of community and helping each other was a method of survival.

Though the boys did not finish the fifth grade and had very limited reading and writing skills, they were experts at the ways of life in making something out of nothing, bargaining skills, food preservation, first aide, cooking, baking, butchery, mechanics, carpentry, animal care, and all manner of survival skills in a very cold climate. Fishing was their forte as they ended up together in Warroad, Minnesota commercial fishing to sell to Booth Fisheries who supplied large cities like Detroit and Chicago with fresh fish kept on ice. This after they worked in a Ford plant for awhile until they got jobs on a Great Lakes freighter and learned of the Lake of The Woods next to Canada where they could also practice and hone their "Bootlegging" skills, sell White Lightning to the Indians, for fish of course, and also send the better grade stuff to the "boys" in Detroit. No arrests are of record except one for Tony for killing a moose out of season! This did not curtail these type of activities.

Alys Hope (Saurdiff) Vickaryous was born in Warroad Minnesota in November 1910 to Edmond and Licktal Saurdiff whose families had come to Warroad to homestead out of Canada having ancestors who came from an area near the French, Swiz border. Way back when the name was Sourdive and morphed over the years to mother's maiden name spelling.

She was born near the middle of the pack of a family of 14! Pictures show that she was very attractive, both her and her best friend Izzabelle , who married Tony's twin brother Ed, had the "Jackie" look and haircut long before the first lady made it famous. Must have been the French influence! Alys went off to Nursing school in Canada after high school, and tells the story of how she was home for a break before finals to become a licensed RN when she decided to marry Tony VICKARYOUS in 1931 (he had changed his name by then), no record of a legal change has surfaced, and used the money she had saved to go take the test to get married. Her nursing skills were practiced widely, but she never became a Licensed RN.
Her first born child came in May 1932 and was named Rose Marie, but most people just call her "Tiny". In November 1933 sister Geraldine Mary "Gerry" came along. Alys had many brief sayings to explain life, such as "The first baby can come at anytime, all the rest take nine months each!"
Tony and Alys lived on Oak Island way out on Lake of the Woods next to the Canadian border with services coming mostly out of Warroad by boats run by Alys' brother Lawrence who kept special watch on his sister bringing mail,supplies and carrying the fish crop on ice back to the Booth Fisheries plant. The name of his boat was the "Bert Steele" which was still in use by Uncle Lawrence in 1959 when I had my first visit to Oak Island where uncle Ed had remained all those years still fishing and putting up ice in the winter for a living.
My father would often leave mom alone on the island as he went about fishing with his brother and other deck hands. They trapped for furs, tended their stills, traded with the native peoples who were by then mostly friendly and provided additional furs, fish and other products to be sold by the brothers. One Indian family's name was Busche with a bit of French trapper in their blood. "The Busche Boys" as they were known could be tough when in town together and any drinking was going on which was most of the time. They came to the Island often when the men were gone, but never gave Alys any trouble. She was unafraid, polite, treated them as equals, served coffee, tea, home made bread, cinnamon rolls, and would trade home cooked goods for items they would offer. They also knew Erling Floe, a peaceful Norweigan was Alys' best friend, who had thrown three of them ten feet into the air onto a dance hall roof when they tried to take him by surprise one Saturday night. They knew that any harm coming to Alys would be dealt with soon and severely. She noticed with a warm spot in her heart, that no other Indian groups came to Oak Island while she was there and believed the Busche Boys were her own police force!

When Tony returned one day in early April 1935 he announced: "We are allowed one ton of personal belongings with us and we leave the end of April for Alaska. We are going to be farmers in the Matanuska Valley near Anchorage! Make a list, I will estimate the weight, then we will take out the least important items to meet the rule. One still must be on the list. Two fish nets. Two guns. Knives. Ice cutting tools. Wood saws. Axes. One skillet. One stew pot."

Alys said: "Horse shit and Damn! You waltz in here as Mr Wanderlust and tell me without asking that you signed up for such a deal? You have been drinking for sure. We just lost Tonia in February in the hands of our midwife dead with the cord wrapped around her neck three times. And you know how hard that was to accept. I should never have helped you load full boxes of fish on ice during that time! Now you want me to leave a hut on an island visited by Indians who are hostile with some still wearing paint, with no water except to melt the ice, holes in the floor where snakes can come through, an outdoor one hole privy, chop your own wood, carry it in and hope you have enough to last until a storm blows over? "

"God Damit, Tony! How could that Matanuska place be any better? Sounds like an Indian name to me. Are they as friendly as the Busches? They must live in huts in the ground. Log cabins with holes between the logs stuffed with horseshit and straw? Who wants to smell that all the time?' My father made a hurried retreat to his dock and ice house area.

She knew his heart was set on this adventure. She respected his survival skills. She loved the son of a bitch. Maybe leaving Tonia at rest on her grandmother Licktal's grave was best to get over the heartache she felt for violating all she had learned in nursing school about prenatal care. She started the list. Tony could not write. Item #1: One still, including copper tubing.

"How do you spell or say Mat an u ska?" "TO HELL AND BE DAMNED!"