When the skies rained boxes : Air Force and the Qikiqtani Inuit, 1941-64

WHEN THE SKIES RAINED BOXES: THE AIR FORCE AND THE QIKIQTANI INUIT, 1941-64 The contents of this publication are entirely the responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect the view or opinions of the Munk-Gordon Arctic Security Program and the ArcticNet project on The Emerging Arctic Security Environment. [...] Its first permanent incarnation was Crystal Two, an airbase and weather station at the head of the bay, and a stop on the Crimson Staging Route, the series of bases and depots that the US established (with Canadian approval) to facilitate the transfer of planes and other material from North America to Europe during the Second World War. [...] In the words of Malcolm MacDonald, the British High Commissioner to Canada, the Americans “treated…with indifference the obstacles which Nature – whose sovereignty in the Arctic is even more supreme than that of the Canadian Government – put in their way.”16 The imprint of the Western military was particularly obvious to Inuit drawn to the new settlement. [...] The jump in the price of a carton of cigarettes from $1 to $5 was a source of particularly unhappiness.20 As relations cooled between the West and the Soviet Union at the end of the Second World War, the threat of a transpolar attack on North America became more real. [...] Normally, in the native state, the Eskimo would take off the clothing and hang it up outside in the cold and sleep in a sleeping bag; in the morning the Eskimo would beat out their fur clothing and get rid of the dirt.” Fortunately, in Thomson’s view, better access to medical care at Frobisher helped Inuit to overcome “the health problems created by the change from their native habits and customs.