Kickass Women in History: Ada Blackjack

This month’s Kickass Woman in History is Ada Blackjack, an Inupiat woman who survived two years on Wrangel Island, much of it completely on her own with the notable exception of a cat. Her story exemplifies the brutal choices that impoverished mothers have had to make throughout history in order to care for their children. It’s also a story about resilience and resourcefulness on the part of a woman who would have greatly preferred to stay in town but instead found herself fighting polar bears.

Ada Blackjack and her son, Bennett
Ada Blackjack and her son, Bennett

Ada Delutuk was born near Nome, Alaska in 1898. She was raised in a missionary school and got the basic “Western American Girl Education,” which is to say that she learned how to read a little, write a little, sew, and cook. She had three children with her husband, Jack Blackjack, but they divorced after two of the three children died (there are also accounts that he died or that he ran off – regardless, there she was).

Blackjack did not have traditional survival skills, but she did know how to sew and how to cook, so she was hired by an expedition to Wrangel Island to cook and sew for the men. She had no money and no way to provide care for her remaining son, Bennett, who had tuberculosis, so she placed him in an orphanage and left on the expedition hoping to earn enough money to get him back and to take him to Seattle for treatment. She planned to be gone for one year.

What Blackjack could not have known was that the expedition was mess. The original idea behind it was that four White men and a group of Inupiat men and women would live on Wrangel Island for one year and claim the island for Canada. The expedition was conceived and led by the gloriously named but somewhat awful Vilhjalmur Stefansson. Canada didn’t want Wrangel Island much since it was basically a bleak, cold, constantly windy hellscape. They especially didn’t want Stefansson going anywhere, because he had previously made a trip to the island that ended in disaster. But by golly Stefansson wanted to claim Wrangel Island for SOMEBODY. From Wikipedia:

Stefansson originally wanted to claim Wrangel Island for the Canadian government. However, due to the dangerous outcome from his initial trip to the island, the government refused to assist with the expedition. He then wanted to claim the land forBritain but the British government rejected this claim when it was made by the young men. The raising of the British flag on Wrangel Island, an acknowledged Russian territory, caused an international incident.

Spoiler alert: today Wrangel Island is a Russian nature preserve.

Anyway, Stefansson figured he’d put some white guys on the island and have them be accompanied by many Inupiat people, both male and female, who would establish a permanent colony. Blackjack was not supposed to be the only Inupiat on the trip, and certainly not the only woman. However, between the time that Blackjack was hired and the time they set sail for the island, the idea of the Inupiat colony faded and the party consisted of Blackjack, the cat (Vic), and the four white guys who were between the ages of 19 and 28. Blackjack considered backing out but desperately needed the money so that she could reclaim her son and get him treatment. She decided to stay. The team was left on the island on September 15, 1921. They were promised that a relief ship would come in one year.

The four men, Ada in the middle, and Vic the cat
The team – including Vic, of course.

The team had six months of supplies and were able to hunt and fish during the short summer, so the first year passed without any major physical hardship. Blackjack was terrified of the polar bears on the island and experienced considerable difficult adjusting to the new environment: she cried, couldn’t work, ran away from the camp and had to be carried back so she wouldn’t die of exposure. Eventually, she recovered. Once she did, the men respected how hard she worked and how productive she was.

The relief ship that was supposed to pick them up never arrived (it was blocked by ice). In January 1923 three of the four men decided to try to make it across the ice to Siberia in hopes of getting help. They left Blackjack, Vic the cat, and Lorne Knight, who was sick from scurvy, at the main camp. Knight died six months later. He spent those six months mostly bedridden, and was a huge asshole to Blackjack, constantly ranting that she wasn’t doing enough for him. In fairness to Knight, scurvy is a horrible way to die and I’d probably be an enormous asshole too. Knight died on June 23, 1923.

During this time, Blackjack nursed Knight, kept a journal, and taught herself how to hunt and trap. She built a platform from which she watched for polar bears, which she sometimes had to scare away from camp. She built a small boat. She learned to use the rifle even though she had previously been afraid of it, to hunt seal for herself but especially for Knight, in hopes of treating his scurvy (fresh seal meat is high in Vitamin C). She even learned how to use the camera and, in addition to other pictures, took a selfie. She went from being almost literally immobile with fear at the start of her island stay to being resourceful and courageous.

Blackjack was finally rescued on August 19, 1923. She was at first seen as a hero, then vilified for not saving Knight’s life. She was able to take Bennett to Seattle, where his TB was treated, although he continued to struggle with his heath until he died at the age of 58. She also had a second son, Billy.

For her experience on Wrangle, she was paid less salary than was owed her and didn’t make any money from her brief but intense celebrity. For the rest of her life, she struggled financially. She lived to be 85.

In the words of her son Billy:

I consider my mother, Ada Blackjack, to be one of the most loving mothers in this world and one of the greatest heroines in the history of Arctic exploration. She survived against all odds.

Vic survived and was rescued along with Blackjack. The three men who had headed towards Siberia were never seen again.

Wrangel Island Tundra
Wrangel Island

In addition to my trusty Wikipedia, here are my sources:

Ada Blackjack: A True Story of Survival in the Arctic, by Jennifer Niven

“Ada Blackjack, the Forgotten Sole Survivor of an Odd Arctic Expedition,” by Tessa Hulls, for Atlas Obscura

“Stranded for two years on an Arctic island, this woman miraculously survived by shooting seals,” by Stephanie Buck, from Timeline

“The Inuit Woman Who Survived the Arctic Alone,” by for Outside Online by Kate Siber

And check out this student project!

Comments are Closed

  1. cleo says:

    Thank you Carrie! I love this series.

  2. Hazel says:

    Another woman to introduce to my niece. 🙂

    Thank you, Carrie.

  3. Karen Witkowski says:

    Wow! What a story! I was just worried you were going to say they had to eat the cat.

  4. JILL Q. says:

    That is so amazing.

    On a totally selfish, somewhat related notes, I love seeing a heroine grow in strength and I feel like sometimes with the popularity of kick ass heroines and “competence porn” (which I both enjoy sometimes) we are losing out on these type of stories. it was realistic to be terrified or not know something sometimes and have to rise to the occasion b/c you have no choice. But I see it less. Just my personal preference, not trying to yuck someone’s yum.

  5. Caroline says:

    I’m going to recommend this topic be an episode of the podcast “The Dollop.” They might be two cis white dudes, but they do good work in recognizing the (racist/sexist) weirdness in American history.

  6. Kris Bock says:

    As a child, I loved the book Island of the Blue Dolphins, about a young woman or teenage girl who is abandoned on an island and survives on her own. Off to look up the inspiration for that!

  7. Kris Bock says:

    I’m back! A woman named Juana Maria inspired Island of the Blue Dolphins, an award-winning children’s novel from the last century. Apparently she lived alone on one of the Channel Islands for 18 years and died 7 weeks after they brought her back to the mainland, possibly from eating too many fresh fruits and vegetables. Let this be a lesson to you!

  8. Dorothea says:

    Great story, thanks. (you might want to fix “exhibition” for “expedition” in paragraphs 3 and 4. I got confused)

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  10. greennily says:

    I wish someone would make a movie out of this story!!! This is gold!!!

  11. Karin says:

    I wonder why they brought a cat in the first place, but it’s very lucky that she had Vic for company!

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