Esther Birdsall Darling
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d9/Nome_Alaska_01.jpg/220px-Nome_Alaska_01.jpg)
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fc/Scotty_Allan_01.jpg/220px-Scotty_Allan_01.jpg)
Esther Birdsall Darling was an American author and poet; she also opened and ran a sled dog kennel in Alaska.
Biography[]
Darling studied at Mills College and traveled in Europe in her youth. After her marriage in 1907 she moved to Nome, Alaska, where her husband ran a hardware and expedition outfitting business.[1]
She and Scotty Allan established a sled dog kennel in Nome and organized the first long distance dogsled race. Descendants of Baldy, and other dogs from the Darling-Allen Kennel, were purchased by the French military in World War I and transported to Europe where they worked pulling vehicles and carrying messages and cargo. In 1917, the dogs were awarded a military medal, and Darling received it on their behalf.[2][1]
Her books include Baldy of Nome, about a champion sled dog, and a series of followups.[2] She also wrote a poem about Alaska's state flower, the forget-me-not.[3]
In 2009, at the Mushing History Conference, a presentation on Darling was given by Jane Haigh.[4] The Anchorage Museum of History and Art has a picture of her with three sled dogs.[5]
Bibliography[]
- Up in Alaska (1912)
- Baldy of Nome: An Immortal of the Trail (1913)
- Navarre of the North (1930)
- No Boundary Line (1942)
References[]
- ^ Jump up to: a b McDonald-Loomis, Art Sommers, John Knox, and April (October 13, 2015). Early Auburn. Arcadia Publishing. ISBN 9781467132763 – via Google Books.
- ^ Jump up to: a b "Esther Birdsall Darling" (PDF). placercountyhistoricalsociety.org. Retrieved 2021-04-16.
- ^ "Forget-me-not". Alaska.org.
- ^ "Esther Birdsall Darling". 2010 Mushing History Conference.
- ^ "Memoirs of Scotty Allan, includes historical photographs" (PDF). anchoragemuseum.org. August 5, 1994. Retrieved 2021-04-16.
- 20th-century American women writers
- Mills College alumni
- Poets from Alaska
- People from Nome, Alaska
- 20th-century American poets
- American women poets