FACED BLINDNESS
SAM OLSEN WAITED FOR BLIND.
NESS TO ENGULF HIM AT
LONELY POST
Alone in a lighthouse, cut off from
his fellowmen on the one side by the
frozen wilderness of Alaska and on
the other by the treacherous waters
of the Bering sea, Sam Olsen, light
house tender of Cape Sarichef, lought
an heroic battle with blindness. His
story is told by Capt. C. L. Higen,
of the lighthouse tender Heather,
now in Seattle harbor.
Olsen took the post at Sarichef af
ter years of active service on the
sea. Age was creeping up on him and
the heavy work on board ship was
beginning to tell. But he loved the
sea. It was his life, the only one he
knew.
When he was stationed at Sarichef
as lighthouse keeper he was well
content He was relieved of heavy
duty and yet could still hear the roar
and see the swell of th sea.
Keepers on Job Three Years
Lighthouse keepers in Alaska stay at
their posts for three years at a
stretch. After that time they are giv
en a one-year vacation on pay. The
tenders bring supplies to last several
months, and once a month the mail
boat passes.
Olsen was busy guarding his great
beacon light, regulating fog whistles
and doing the necessary cooking and
washing.
Thru the long evenings he read.
It was a habit that grew*. He read
the publishers’ catalogs regularly,
and sent for books that. took his
fancy. Often it took a year to com
plete his order. But slowly, from a
few books, his library grew until it
filled many shelves.
Winter, cruel and merciless in the
great northland, had closed in on the
lighthouse wrhen Olsen, reading by
lamplight, noticed that the printing
was becoming dim and blurred. He
fought, he says for days against the
growing conviction that he was go
ing blind.
But the light grew dimmer and fin
ally it became impossible for him to
read at all. There was no possible
help from outside. The mail boat
came, and with it a ray of hope. But
the heavy seas would not permit a
landing, and it passed on, knowing
nothing of the tragedy alone against
the darkness. Five times Olsen watch
ed the mail boat come and go.
After a few months it was all that
the old man could do to perform his
simple duties. Thru the remaining
hours he could only sit and think of j
the years ahead. Years that would j
be just one long night. Years when i
| books would be but the skeletons of
I one-time friends.
! “I wonder that I didn’t end it all,”
I he told the men that finally brought
j him out. “It would have been easy,
j Easier than thinking.'
J “But a man never knows how
much he cares about living until he
thinks about dying. I had just a bit
of hope that I would get out before
my eyes were gone. It wasn’t much
but it kept me going until the spring
came, and with it the tender.”
The tender brought Olsen to Seat
tle, where an eye specialist told him
that with proper care he would see
and read again.
“After an escape like that a fellow
would never again take a chance cn
cutting himself off from the rest of
the world,” remarked a bystander.
“But you haven’t heard the rest of
Olsen’s story,” said the officer.
“The specialist treated his eyes and
fixed him up with glasses. Then, as
soon as he was fit again, he left for
his old post. He wanted his sea and
his books, and he confided to me that
£ he preferred to live alone.
I “ ‘I can’t stay here,’ he said, ‘Se
I; attle’s too lonesome for me. I don’t
II like seeing people and not having
I them speak to me. I’m going back
to my lighthouse.’ ”
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I
Just a Few of the
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