The Event

Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer

Background - what was in the news at the time ....

"Dying in the Wild, a Hiker Recorded the Terror" in the New York Times on September 13, 1992, on page 31

"Last Sunday a young hiker, stranded by an injury, was found dead at a remote camp in the Alaskan interior. No one is yet certain who he was. But his diary and two notes found at the camp tell a wrenching story of his desperate and progressively futile efforts to survive." Read more .....

"Hiker Identified by Self-Portrait" in New York Times on September 20, 1992, beginning on page 38

"A young hiker who starved to death after he was stranded by injury was identified Friday, two weeks after his body and a diary describing his efforts to survive were found at a remote camp in the Alaskan interior." Read more .....

"End of the Trail" in People Weekly on October 5, 1992, beginning on page 48

"DUSK WAS FALLING WHEN BUTCH Killian called it quits after a day of moose hunting in the Alaska wilderness 100 miles southwest of Fairbanks. Rather than head home that night, Sept. 6, Killian decided to hole up in a derelict bus that had been converted into a shelter for local hunters. But as he stepped into the gloom of the bus, which was outfitted with a table and chairs and a crude stove, a sickening smell hit him. At first he thought that a trapper had left some rotting food. Then he saw a sleeping bag with what appeared to be a lump inside. "I was even thinking of pulling on it," says Killian. "But then I thought, `Something's not right here.' " Read more .....

"Death of an Innocent" in Outside Magazine in the January 1993 issue, beginning on page 38

"James Gallien had driven five miles out of Fairbanks when he spotted the hitchhiker standing in the snow beside the road, thumb raised high, shivering in the gray Alaskan dawn." (Full text on reserve in Trible Library)