Into The Wild

Jon Krakauer Cycle 17 Reading Assessment 1-23

Christopher Johnson McCandless was brought up in a prosperous family in Washington D.C.  After graduating high school, he disappeared, donated all $24,000 in savings to charity, ditched his car, burned the rest of his money in his wallet, and wandered around the U.S. looking for experiences.  His decomposed body was found in an abandoned bus in Alaska, in the middle of the bush.

Jim Gallien met Chris on his journey, and he stopped to give Chris a lift.  When Gallien asked what his name was Chris said, “Alex” and left it at that without saying any last names.  Chris pointed on a map where he wanted to head, and a red dashed line pointed all the way from Stampede Trail, forty miles into the bush.  Chris wanted to live of the land and had with him, a .22 caliber rifle and a ten-pound bag of rice.  His family or friends didn’t know what he was up to and he told Gallien that he hasn’t talked to them in over two years.  Gallien dropped off Chris at the trailhead, but before Chris left, he gave him his number, his lunch, and his old rubber boots for Chris to use.  This happened on April 28, 1992 and it was the last time Gallien saw Chris alive.  In 1961 a company was allowed to upgrade the Stampede trail into a passable road.  Workers stayed in three junked buses that had small stoves and a couple of bunks.  In 1963, the project stopped and the company took two buses out of the wilderness but left the third for trappers and hunters in the area to rest in.  The bus is still there and occasionally there would be a visitor, but in early September of 1992, six people in three separate parties visited it on the same afternoon.  Ken Thompson and a couple of his other employees were driving their motor vehicles over the many streams and different terrain.  When they drove through the bush and saw the bus, a hiking couple was standing there.

They said that something bad was in the bus, so Thompson went to check it out.  In it they found Chris McCandless’s body decaying after what looked like having been there for two weeks.  They called the Alaska troopers to helicopter the body away.  During the autopsy, McCandless weighed sixty-seven pounds and most likely died of starvation.  Chris had no identification on him, except for his signature on a note asking for help on the outside of the bus.  Wayne Westerberg gave Chris a lift to the Saco Hot Springs also in Chris’s journey.  Wayne offered Chris a job at the grain elevator and Chris was the hardest worker ever.  Chris’s family life is revealed a little bit more.  His family lives in Virginia, his dad worked for NASA designing satellites, and he had a 3.72 GPA.  Chris also had purchased a used yellow Datsun, which he took on lengthy solo trips across the country.  Chris decided to change his whole name and everything and start new.  He would be called Alexander Supertramp, master of his own destiny.

Amalgam – n. a mixture or blend.

Chris McCandless seems to be the type of person who likes to take risks and experience the wilderness around him.  There probably is a conflict between him and his family since Chris hasn't sent them any letters ever since he left.  He also doesn’t care for the government that much since when he was asked whether he had a hunting license or not he replied, “Hell no.  How I feed myself is none of the government’s business.  Fuck their stupid rules.”  Chris just doesn’t like the way people are so greedy and everything so he wants to go into the wild and see if he can handle it himself.