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

The inspiration for The Last Alaskans--the eight-part documentary series on Animal Planet Hundreds of hardy people have tried to carve a living in the Alaskan bush, but few have succeeded as consistently as Heimo Korth. Originally from Wisconsin, Heimo traveled to the Arctic wilderness in his feverous twenties. Now, more than four decades later, Heimo lives with his wife approximately two hundred miles from civilization--a sustainable, nomadic life bounded by the migrating caribou, the dangers of swollen rivers, and by the very exigencies of daily existence. 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 forty-four degrees below zero--all the while cultivating the 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 most of us have never imagined: amid encroaching environmental pressures, apart from the herd, and alone in a stunning wilderness that--for now--remains the final frontier.

About the Author :
James Campbell, the author of several books, has written for Outside magazine, National Geographic Adventure, Men's Journal, Audubon, and many other publications. Dan Woren is an American voice actor and Earphones Award-winning narrator. He has worked extensively in animation, video games, and feature films. He is best known for his many roles in anime productions such as Bleach and as the voice of Sub-Zero in the video game Mortal Kombat.

Review :
"[One of] the greatest life-or-death tales ever told." -- "Esquire" "A powerful evocation of a vanishing way of life." -- "Kirkus Reviews" "An icily gripping, intimate profile that stands up well beside Krakauer's classic, and it stands too, as a kind of testament to the rough beauty of improbably wild dreams." -- "Men's Journal" "Campbell makes the case that an increasingly urban America--and its desires for oil, for timber, for neat and packaged wilderness--is killing and, worse, forgetting the frontier we once worshiped." -- "New York Times" "This is a magical book in many ways; it tells of a land that most of us will never see and can't imagine exists in today's material world. Korth may be the last of the true frontiersmen, but Campbell has made certain that he will never be forgotten." -- "Library Journal" "What makes this more than just a profile of a fascinating personality is Campbell's deft weaving of Alaskan history into Korth's tale, showing how the recent influx of developers and ecotourists is making the trapping life 'more of an anachronism with each passing year.'" -- "Publishers Weekly"