Alone in the Wilderness…documentary

If you ever watch something I recommend…please give this short one-hour film a chance.  Someone brought a DVD of this for me to watch around 7 years ago. I thought it was going to be boring. I ended up watching it twice in one sitting. It will draw you in. I watch it at least once every year or two. 

A 50-year-old man named Dick Proenneke is in Twin Lakes Alaska in 1968 and films himself building a retirement cabin. He starts out by staying in a friend’s cabin. He starts gathering wood and making some of the tools he uses as he goes.  This man…is a real man. if he needs a spoon…he starts carving himself out one. He builds this cabin and makes everything including wood hinges for the door. He also made hinges out of his tin containers. He gathers rocks from somewhere down the lake and brings them back… then he starts building his chimney.

He is by himself and sets up the camera everywhere he goes. He goes out fishing when he is hungry and hunting for meat for the winter only taking what he needs. He uses just what he needs and doesn’t take more from nature than he could use. He makes almost everything from scratch. He uses his tin canisters for different things. He buries one and covers for a refrigerator. The only help he receives is a pilot friend who lands every now and again to deliver supplies. He was a master craftsman, to say the least.

He also filmed all the wildlife around. Rams, wolves, bears, birds, and Caribou. He also gets some great shots of the area around Twin Lakes. The snowy mountains were breathtaking. 

It doesn’t sound that special but I have watched it at least 6 more times since the night I watched it twice… sometimes showing it to other people. He makes it look so easy. He filmed enough to have a few more short documentaries which were released but nothing matches that first one. This man made me feel like a mouse, a kid, a beginner, a slouch. He is so talented and tough.

He ended up staying there until 1999 alone and then left to live with his brother at age 82. Dick passed away at 86 in 2003. The cabin is still there and is on the National Register of Historic Places. People come from all over the world to visit it. 

I wish YouTube had the complete documentary but they don’t. I watch modern YouTube videos of people visiting the cabin now. They see his cache in the back, his sled, and all the cabin parts. You see him in 1968 building those items. Like I said earlier, there are more documentaries on him but start with this one. This one is great. I’ve never had someone tell me they were disappointed in it. 

The cabin now

Here is the first 9:34 minutes or so

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Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, Alternative music, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player. Not the slightest bit interested in politics at all.

50 thoughts on “Alone in the Wilderness…documentary”

    1. Thanks for reading Randy…I was enthralled… I had no high hopes for it when I borrowed it…but I was surprised. Building all of that is cool…but living alone there for over 30 years was something.

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  7. I’ve always been fascinated by those who “rough it,” living off the grid and enjoying every minute of being a minimalist. This guy definitely fits that criteria, and I’ll have to check this film out. I could never do that in that climate, although I do think I could be a “tiny house” guy down the road….but it would have to be near a road lol.

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    1. I hear ya… it would be hard to survive in that climate. It’s -32 outside and he said it was toasty in the cabin at 40 degrees…but I guess that would be true compared to outside.

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  8. Here’s something out of left field. Dick is a person who I have high on my respect meter. That is some of the most unforgiving country there is and he made it his backyard. I’ve met a few people like Dick and they are “special” like you say Max. I love the bare bones style of filmmaking also. You don’t have to jazz up this environment. Just take it in. That huge beautiful space and Dick doing what few could do. Great piece Max. I wonder what kind of music he listened to?

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    1. My grandfather was a little like that…built his own house and lived it in it 30 years…but…not in back spaces of Alaska!
      He was talented as hell…he makes it look easy…all the great ones do.
      He seemed like a country – western kinda guy or maybe old blues.

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      1. With all the buffoonery (CB is a reformed buffoon), nonsense, madness that we get bombarded with if we turn on the box, slices like this keep up my hope for human beings. A lot of your grandfathers generation did that. Impressive in it’s own right.
        My neighbor/friend built a log home and a guest A-Frame on his property (35 acres) in Ucluelet on west coast of Vancouver Island. Wild oceanfront. Very beautiful and as wild as you can get. He is no Dick but in the same vein.
        I’m thinking Tex Ritter, Artie Shaw, Glen Miller.

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      2. I dabbled in the buffoonery as well. I haven’t watch live TV is a long time…it’s still 1975 at the Gower Household…at least what I watch from TV.
        I love those A frames…so much that I live in an A Frame…with some additions.
        That sounds about right man.

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    2. (My bro and his wife to me and one daughter on a sentimental journey- I’m a Vancouver Islander, a long ways from home- up and beyond Port Hardy a few years ago. Once you get past Campbell River there aren’t many other folks to be seen out on the roads, just an odd deer scooting over the road or a bear ambling up to the road wondering what in tarnation is this noisy thing on the blacktop ruining his quiet day? That is some wild and lonesome territory out there, God knows how it would be in mid-winter. Snow halfway up your A frame.)

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      1. I’m easily confused obbserve, Are you or is it your Bro who is an Van Isle guy or used to be? The places you’re talking about are just north of me. The bears in my hood have decided to use my yard as a scat dump and I’m in a more populated area but still lots of wild things. North Island is beautiful but again it can get hard if you really want to get into it.

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    3. Sorry CB, I’m good at being confusing, my old school teachers told me so!, often.A brief bio is, older bro born in Vancouver itself, I was born in Port Alice, Pa worked at the mill there, as did everyone. Family moved to Australia when I was six or so. Younger bro born there. After six hot dusty and unhappy years there Pa shipped us off to NZ. Then in 1980 he packed the family off to LA. Older bro has now moved on to whatever is out there over, the rainbow, along with Ma and Pa. Younger bro now in Ohio. I stayed in NZ since I had married by the time Dad did his latest move on down the highway. Yep, been all over the show. Even I’m confused about where I fit in!

      Old funny story; pa went out to the outhouse at Port Alice for a s- lets say a smoke, and a bear came out of the woods and snuffled up to the outhouse, then lumbered back to whatever business he had in the woods. Dad was done s- smoking in the blink of an eye, no constipation that day.

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      1. Enjoyed the history. If it’s worth anything I never really fit. I was always ok with that but even more ok with it now.
        Oh yeah , bear run ins like your Dad had are common here. Mostly Black Bear but still not Winnie the Pooh. Cougars are the scary ones. From my travels I hear NZ is a lot like British Columbia. Like to visit one day.

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    4. Yes, I think I feel a bit out of place, it goes with being a bit rootless I guess. NZ is quite temperate, not overly hot summers, not much in the way of snow, we might get a dumping of snow maybe every 7 years or so at around sea level where most of our population live.

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  9. Reminds me of my grandfather Max. He would work 10 months out of the year and disappear into his cabin way up north according to my Dad. It’s interesting how them old dudes rolled like back than as if I tried that now I would get kicked out of my house lol

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  10. Man, that guy was serious – making his own hinges for doors? I mean… wow. For a flash I thought modern day Thoreau but Thoreau’s Walden Pond was like 2 miles out of town and he’d periodically walk in to have a pint at the pub or have family members bring him meals, so not so similar really. I love nature a lot but no way would I do anything like that.

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    1. IF you ever get a chance to watch it…do. You will see land untouched by man back then for the most part. All he used was hand tools as well…no chainsaws or anything like that. It would be an experience spending one winter there in that cabin…but 30 years? No

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  11. Its good to see how others can live. Not the life for me, but you can appreciate how someone else can do it. Another good change up Max, Ill watch it. (I’m in a bit of a rut, I might try something different too, once the lethargy has left me. But now I’m content doing and writing sweet FA.)

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    1. lol…
      “Snow up to your A-Frame” I had to say something about that…awesome!
      Yea I wonder how many he inspired to do something like this…and then they find out he was a master builder…and they are not.
      I do think you would like like…plus its just an hour.

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  13. Very relaxing to watch him at work, or maybe watching him work made me tired. My older son is interested in these kinds of videos and has his favorites. Have you ever watched, “Alone” which is an ongoing series? He’s got it made compared to the contestants on alone. They start out with 9 items total and get dropped in the wilderness. There’s a good netflix doc called, “Happy People” that I know you would love.

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    1. He was a master builder…in that area…-30 below…thats the part that would be hard for me…he said it was a cozy 40 degrees in the cabin.
      I’ll check those out Lisa….

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  17. I watched some of this on youtube yesterday. It was fascinating, especially the way he made everything himself from scratch. I particularly love the way he did the corners for his cabin!

    The spoon carving reminded me of a custom in Wales of carving what are known as ‘Love Spoons’. It’s still done, but presumably he wasn’t carving it to impress the woman he was making it for (or maybe he was!)

    I love spending periods of time on my own, but I wouldn’t survive that sort of lifestyle particularly not in such a cold environment.

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    1. He makes me feel like a mouse! We watched it again the other day and if he wants something…he just makes it. It would give an ordinary person hopes to be able to survive that…but he was a master builder…as you probably saw.
      I never knew that about the spoons. He carved one out for the pilot’s wife who sent him supplies since they would not take money.

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