Outdoor adventurer enjoys last frontier

By Caroline Rosacker 

Clifford Judkins, who recently moved to Guttenberg, was born in 1937. He grew up in California and joined the Air Force in 1954. Judkins attended aircraft and engine school in Illinois during his enlistment. 

"I became a jet engine mechanic and was stationed at Castle Air Force Base in California," said Judkins. "It was about 40 miles from where my grandfather's homestead was. My dad was raised there and the family had a cabin there. It made it nice to be so close."

"When I got out of the Air Force I attended Humboldt State University in Arcata, Calif., earning a degree in biology and wildlife management. At the time, Humboldt County was considered the cannabis capital of the world. I never smoked a joint the whole time I was there," he chuckled. 

Alaskan adventure

Judkins would go on to lead an adventuresome life. "I moved to Alaska and utilized my degree in biology and wildlife management and worked for the Department of Fish and Wildlife for a couple of years," commented Judkins. "I was eventually hired by the Department of Health in Anchorage and worked in the environmental department. I advanced to the director and got along well with the Mayor of Anchorage. We had similar interests in the protection of natural resources, and he was very supportive of my work and created the new departments for me to oversee."

On one occasion a loose dog population in Anchorage caused a disturbance. "There were loose dogs everywhere in Anchorage. One dog was bitten by a fox and   tested positive for rabies. We were all set to euthanize any dogs that were running loose. The rabies test ended up being false/positive so we called it off. I took a lot of heat for that project, but in the end people were more respectful of their dog's safety. Anchorage is filled with wildlife that can be dangerous to canines," said Judkins.

Crown Point Lodge

A new mayor with conflicting ideas drove Judkins away from his work with the health department and in to a new adventure. He and his first wife relocated to Crown Point, Alaska, and built the Crown Point Lodge, bar and restaurant. "I built the Crown Point Lodge from the ground up by myself. We ran the lodge for about 10 years. It was located about 100 miles out in the wilderness. We had a good time there," he remembered. 

Destructive incident

In 1986, an unfortunate event involving the railroad that resulted in chemical contamination of the valley put an end to the Crown Point Lodge. "The Alaska railroad  placed an overheated car full of urea-formaldehyde in the valley close to the lodge to cool off," he explained. "It ended up blowing up and engulfed the Crown Point Lodge in an invisible chemical called Hexamethylenetetramine. It was a total loss. We filled a lawsuit but didn't fare out very well. We were asked to quantify everything we lost and inventory everything we owned. They paid for what we could prove we had lost, but no punitive damages. The railroad is owned by the state and was not liable for punitive damages. Because of the highly toxic materials involved, it negatively affected my immune system. My wife and I ended up getting divorced in the middle of it all."

A fresh start

Judkins ended up leaving Alaska and headed for Las Vegas to assist his brother-in-law in construction of his mother in-law's house. He stayed for five years and would meet his current wife, Joann. "Joann was married to my brother-in-law at one time," he noted. "We both enjoyed hiking and camping along the creeks and canyons near Las Vegas."

The couple eventually got married and moved back to Alaska. They bought her ex-husband's portion of their mini-storage business and expanded it. "I decided to retire, but didn't stay that way for very long. I started a building inspection company and became (after lots of late nights studying) certified to do new construction inspections including structural, plumbing, electrical and mechanical. I did inspections for builders. After ten or twelve years I retired again. 

Fishing and hunting 

During Judkins' 60 years in Alaska, moose, caribou, black bear, salmon, and the occasional halibut were the mainstay of the couple's diet. They seldom ate store bought meat. "We built a nice log home in Wasilla, which is 'all I saw' spelled backwards," he said with a smile. "We burned six or eight cords of wood each year. One moose was a whole year's worth of meat when the kids were home. I preferred caribou, so when the kids moved away we hunted that instead. We had an airboat and could get in where others couldn’t. We would spend a week or two camping and hunting 100 miles away from anyone and get our meat."

Judkins built a special rack from native trees to hang field dressed caribou to keep it away from grizzly and black bear. "A couple of caribou would feed us for a year," he said. "When we first started to hunt we used four-wheelers then switched to the airboat." 

A year's worth of caribou meat was left to spoil on an airport tarmac." After one hunt we were close to the airport at Prudhoe Bay. We decided to ship our meat to Anchorage packed in tubs labeled PERISHABLE - KEEP REFRIGERATED. It was clearly labeled – I am not sure how they could have messed up. When we got to the Anchorage airport we found our meat wrapped in plastic sitting on the tarmac in 75 degree temperatures. We could smell it from 50 feet away! That was to have been our meat for a year," he said disappointedly. "Fortunately, a moose appeared in our yard about 10 feet from my shop. Other than that we would have went without meat.  We had some really interesting trips. You could write a story about any one of them. We always took a satellite phone with us. It could be pretty lonesome out there.”

Pilots license

Judkins also has his pilot’s license. “When I built the Crown Point Lodge, we had a gravel airstrip. I got my pilots license for my own recreational use. I had a few interesting experiences,” he shared. “Once I broke the wings on the airplane landing in the trees. Another time I was using full flaps landing on a short runway, and I decided to go around and take another look before landing; I thought I had raised the flaps but I did not engage the flap lever, and when I gave full power to take off the airplane tried to climb straight up. The stall horn was screaming and the airplane was shaking, I was fighting to keep the stick forward I finally saw the extended flaps and raised them up slowly. The plane recovered and I decided to fly home for the day. That was my closest call not coming home.” 

Moose research

When I first went to work for ADF&G, I was assigned to a project to collect specimens and data from newborn moose calves. We would fly out in a helicopter and spot a cow with a new calf. The pilot would fly down and get between the cow and calf, and we (two biologists) would jump out and chase the calf down. The pilot would fly around and try to keep the cow away from us. Mother moose are really maternal and will try to get her calf back. One time I had the calf and the cow got past the helicopter. I held the screaming calf under me, and the cow went right over me. Lucky for me the helicopter came to my rescue!” 

Judkins was later appointed to the State Board of Game. The seven-person board, appointed by the governor, was responsible to the state legislature for management of the state’s wildlife resources. “The Board held public hearings and listened to public comment on proposed regulation dealing with various aspects of hunting. The biologist found that 80% of the moose calves born in some areas were not surviving,” he reported. “They implanted tracking devices in pregnant moose: when they gave birth the device was ejected and sent a radio signal to the biologist who would fly to the site to investigate. They found that as high as 80% of moose calves were taken by bears during their first week of life. That was one of many studies I acted upon while on the Board. I served on the Board for ten years and was the chairman for five years.”  

Raising moose calves

Judkins nursed and raised eight abandoned moose calves while at Crown Point Lodge. “The ADF&G would bring them to me and I would secure and feed them until they could survive on their own in the wild and turn them loose,” he explained. “Willow is their main food. I would grind it up and feed it to them in a bottle. When they got off the bottle I would cut willow and feed it to them. A one-month-old moose will eat a pickup full of willow per day. I nursed one back to health that had a broken leg. I turned it loose in a state park when it was four or five months old. It seemed to do well. The first one I raise was adopted by a wild game farm in California. Two years later we went to visit her, and she ran right over to us and started nuzzling and mewing at us.” 

Judkins would eventually leave Alaska and return to the family cabin located on seven acres at 3000 feet not too far from Yosemite.  “My wife and I went back to the home place. I rebuilt the cabin and got it into usable shape,” he explained. “I eventually sold it to my nephew so we could keep the property in the family. He kind of grew up there as a kid. The wildfires were the problem. We were evacuated numerous times and had fire on the property once. My wife was too nervous so we moved to Guttenberg. When you experience a wildfire coming up the canyon it’s frightening – it moves so fast.”  

The couple purchased a fixer upper to keep Judkins busy during his retirement. “I have to do something so I don’t get old and lazy,” he laughed. “This is the first time in a long time that I have a neighbor I can see. I have no complaints about life - that’s for sure,” he concluded.