Legendary sprint mushers long will stay household names in Alaska. One of the all-time best was veteran racing champion and veterinarian Roland Lombard. His eight wins in the Anchorage Fur Rendezvous World Championship Sled Dog Race were the most ever until George Attla (10 wins) and, later, Blayne (Buddy) Streeper (11 wins) surpassed him.
Mostly forgotten are those dog-team racers who won one, two, or three big races.
Leo Kriska was one of these lesser-known mushers. His was a life beset with heartache, but you can find his name in the record books if you search hard enough.
He mostly is remembered for a race he chose to miss. His unselfish act of mercy he attempted sidetracked his career.
Here’s some of Leo Kriska’s story.
The year was 1963 when 30-year-old Leo had one of the best racing teams in the world. Leo, from the tiny village of Koyakuk, was a complete unknown when he finished first in the regional Tok Sled Dog Race.
He’d raised some from puppyhood. Others came from a breeder in Kaltag. The team meshed. They possessed stamina, speed and heart.
He’d run dogs all his life, but race fans started noticing this upstart in 1960. His team in 1960 set a one-day record at a regional race in Tok.
Leo put his team to the test on Feb. 26, 1961.
He and his team captured the first-place trophy for the three-day, 75-mile Fur Rendezvous world sled dog racing championship.
It was one of the closer Rondy races in that event’s history. Leo’s team finished the course in five hours, 52 minutes and 10 seconds.
Breathing down his neck was the fan favorite from Massachusetts, Dr. Roland Lombard, who crossed the finish line in five hours, 53 minutes, and 5 seconds.
Leo’s share of the race’s purse was $1,850. Lombard’s consolation purse was $1,500.
Leo was a widower with eight children. He and his wife Mary Katherine Kriska were in Galena in late March of 1962 while Leo conducted some minor repairs on his snow traveler.
Mrs. Kriska was popular with the local women’s club in Koyukuk and was said to make the best home-made ice cream around.
Mrs. Kriska got word that her father back in Koyukuk was ill. She set out on foot for the 40-mile trek, but her husband intercepted her and forbade her to go on her own.
She unwisely refused to wait. Although she wore only a flimsy jacket and boots without snowshoes she again set out on foot in the dark on Feb. 27 about 9 p.m.
When Leo found out the next morning about her departure, he asked pilot Dick Forsgren for assistance. They located his wife face down in the snow on Feb. 28 about 10 a.m.
They rushed her to a doctor in Galena, but she perished after he worked two hours to revive her. The death certificate blamed the death on exposure and fatigue.
The following March of 1963, Leo was regarded as the musher to beat in the Anchorage Rondy. He put every moment into training his team and building their endurance.
But on March 9, his brother Hughey Kriska came in on his dog sled to tell Leo that their friends Franklin and Jane Dayton were in trouble at a trap-line camp near Bishop Mountain.
Mrs. Dayton, seven months pregnant, came down with pneumonia and was in critical condition.
Leo Kriska examined the trail conditions and realized the trail was in bad shape. The weather had warmed and rain turned the surface into sheets of cutting ice.
But if he didn’t go, he feared Mrs. Dayton might face the same dire end that claimed his own wife.
He put the team into their traces and arrived at the trap line. The feet of his prized dog team were cut and bloodied. Leo found Mrs. Dayton in labor. Ten minutes later she gave birth to a premature baby boy. Kriska feared she would be dead on arrival in Koyukuk as he packed her on his sled as he had intended.
With no choice, he and the team raced back over the nasty, crystalized snow. Upon arrival at his hometown, he radioed the Galena Air Force Station for assistance.
The Air Force sent a helicopter with two pilots and medic D. J. Harden to the camp.
The medic administered oxygen to the stricken woman. The rescue crew, after a stop in Galina, departed for Fairbanks.
The baby boy died three days after the rescuers took the woman to St. Joseph Hospital, but Mrs. Dayton’s life was spared.
Leo’s heroic dash meant the end of his prized team. He had to pull out of the upcoming North American Sled Dog Championship in Fairbanks. The dogs never recovered, and although he raced again, Leo never again delivered a team comparable to his ruined team.
In tiny Koyukuk, the town regarded Leo as the hero he was. And the Tundra Times newspaper awarded him its coveted North Star Award for sacrificing his team to save Mrs. Dayton’s life.
Hank Nuwer is an adjunct professor of journalism at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks.