stefansson-wrangel-09-14-033

October 23, 1923.

Dear Mr. Knight,

This is in reply to your two letters of October 12th.

It is beginning to look a little more as if you might be right about the half-heartedness of Joe Bernard's attempt in 1922. I am very reluctant to believe it and the evidence is not clear as yet. However, as I have just said, there are some indications. I hope we can find truth to the contrary because bitterness can never lessen the feeling of loss. I hope you will be able to keep the resolution, which you express, not to "harbor any grudge." If he was a little slack, he is doubtless in his way as sorry now for it as we are.

I am attaching to this letter a copy of the letter which Lorne wrote me. Either to-day or a little later my secretary will send you a photostat copy of the same letter. When we have a sufficient number of photostats made I shall send you the original.

I should be much gratified if you would in turn send me a copy (if it is not too private) of the letter Lorne wrote his mother June 4th. I am sure you must have been greatly disturbed by the two telegrams which I was compelled to send you yesterday. I am attaching copies of them to this letter in case there may have been some error in transmission.

As I said in the second telegram, you were unfortunately right in the letter you wrote me in England where you suspected Noice of designs to make money from the Wrangel Island story. My associate, Mr. Taylor, had cabled me in London asking whether we might sell the Wrangel story (at that time we expected no tragedy) for $3,000., the money to be used in defraying part of the expenses of the relief expedition. I calbed my approval. This was all I knew when I received your letter in London. I, therefor, considered myself to have two reasons for knowing that Noice would not try to make money out of the story. The first was that my cable had only agreed to the sale of a story for defraying the expenses of the|expedition; and the second reason was that I did not see how anyone would want to capitalize such a tragedy. Had everything been safe and successful, the case might have been different from a sentimental point of view at least. I had also cabled Taylor, who informed Noice, that my idea was that all receipts from newspapers or magazines should go to the relatives of the dead. When Taylor proposed that to the Crawford's they were reluctant to receive any money but favored a memorial. I am very glad that you have independently arrived at the same conclusion, and am especially glad that you have taken up the matter with the various families.

When I landed October 15th, I was astounded to learn

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that Noice not only wanted to make money out of the Wrangel Island story but had actually succeeded in getting (under what we contend were false pretenses, although he denies that) actual possession of the $3,000, shich he refuses to give up. Still more astonishing is the fact that, although Mr. Taylor authorized him to inquire in New York what he could get for a second story and report to us, Noice represented himself as having authority, and delivered it and was about to receive the $1500. for it when I landed, the purchaser up to that time not suspecting that Noice contemplated not passing on the money to us.

There are many other details such as the following: I had instructed my peope that the story must not be sold except through a certain literary agent who knows the value of such things, but this agent had never been consulted. I had also instructed them that English rights must not be offered tor sale since I had already sold them in England, but Noice represented himself as having English rights to sell and did sell them to the purchaser who in turn sold to an English publisher. Thus there are two powerful concerns in England both of whom consider themselves to own the story. There is grave danger of friction there and possibly some very unpleasant lawsuits.

The diary doubtless belongs to the expedition for two reasons: first, by the general rule in such cases, and second because (I am told) Lorne had inscribed on the front page of the diary in his own hand that it was the property of the expedition. I have to say, "I am told" above for Noice has not surrendered the diary to us. That is why I had to wire you last night, for if we have to bring suit to get the diary my lawyers wanted to have all the cards in their hands. They feel sure of getting it anyway but they would be doubly sure if we had your assignment.

Noice asserts that the diary of Ada Blackjack was presented to him by her in Nome to be used as he saw fit (as his private property). We do not know if that is true but hope it is not, for we would like to have her share in some degree at least in the proceeds p unless she voluntarily renounces her share in favor of a projected memorial.

I am not going further into this matter, since we shall doubtless have about it a telegraphic correspondence that will be finished before you receive this letter.

You say Lorne wrote you a letter saying that any money coming to him from our company should go to his mother. He says the same thing in his letter to me and there will, of course, be no complications in that matter.

I come now to the paragraph in your letter where you suggest that I might combine Lorne's diary with the book he wrote and make a whole new book of it. That would certainly be worth considering. In any case the diary will be one of the two or three basis sources of

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information for the book that I have already agreed to write as a history of Wrangel Island. I think as you say, a second book could be written along a different line covering Lorne's career in the North. If we do not get that settled before January we can talk about it when I come out to the Pacific Coast. Ellison-White can tell you when that will be, but I think it is around the middle of January.

As to your suggestion to Noice that he write immediately to the Galles, Maurers and Crawfords - the Maurers and Crawfords were well informed, although I am not sure whether Noice wrote to them. We were much distressed to learn from the Galles that they had received no letter and had been almost wholly in the dark about details for a long time. By a peculiar misfortune a telegram which they sent to the Harvard Club was put unopened into an envelope and mailed to England. It was thus more than two weeks from the time they sent it till I was able to reply by cable. I then cabled Noice urging him to write the Galles immediately, also cabling them that he would do so. Noice told my secretary that he would write.

I know very little. I had a brief conversation with him the day after landing. He had then an attitude that seemed so extraordinary to me that I took it for partial insanity. Since then he has been in hiding, not only from me but from all those of his friends who he knows are my friends also. He has answered neither telegrams nor telephone calls. We know he is at the Waldorf Hotel but he has left instructions to be reported out. The only way to find him would be to waylay him and, of course, that is hardly our place. I am, accordingly, very badly informed even now about various things.

As to the story that Noice has written and which is now being published. I arrived too late to examine it in any case, for most of it had been mailed out. I made some suggestions to him about toning down any very unpleasant features but found him fanatic on the subject of "telling the whole truth whenever necessary." I tried to reason that doing so was seldom necessary. He took an attitude so antagonistic to me that I decided as the less of two evils not to ask to see even those parts of the story which had not been mailed out, for thus I shall be able to say that the last part of it as well as the first was without my knowledge and consent. If I read any of the story and changed even one or two lines, I should be under suspicion of having doctored it. Noice would probably come out with a statement alleging that the story as edited by me was false and would thus create a worse impression than what will now probably be created by the story as written.

I am answering your letter paragraph by paragraph and see by your page 3 that I may have been slightly in error about your idea of a memorial, for there you speak of what may be done by the British Government. The British Government has never, so far as I know, erected memorials even for their greatest heroes among the explorers. Those memorials have always been erected by private subscription. I am afraid, therefore, that we will have to arrange for our memorial in the way I have

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suggested by the proceeds from the diaries and perhaps by public subscription. One trouble about the subscription is going to be, I fear, that the impression created by the Noice story will be so bad as to hamper us in that regard. Still, I sincerely hope I may be wrong. Perhaps after all Noice may have written a better story than I think. When he wrote it he was not feeling particularly resentful against our company, at least on a financial score, for he apparently (although it seems insane) really imagined at that time that he was to have personally the entire literary returns.

I am very grateful for what you did in Seattle to xxxxxx correct wrong impressions about the origin and management of the expedition. I am very glad in that connection that you were so well informed about how everything began. The expedition did not grow out of my mind only but was really a composite product of the ideas of Lorne, Fred Maurer and myself - their eagerness, altruism and desire for adventure.

The proper Toronto address (with reference to your letter which was returned) is A. J. T. Taylor, Combustion Engineering Corporation, Bank of Hamilton Building, Toronto. We did have a shingle on the door while Mr. Taylor was in Vancouver but I suppose he has neglected to put one up in Toronto. The corporation of which he is manager, although large, is also new in Toronto, so you had better never omit "Bank of Hamilton Building."

As I have tried to tell you before, I feel the Wrangel tragedy perhaps more keenly in an indirect way through the relatives than directly through my own loss. I more than appreciate everything you say about Mrs. Knight and Miss Jones.

There are so many debts hanging over my head now, mostly due to the expedition, and there are so many cares and there is so much work, that it will not be possible for me to come West before January, although I wish I could. I appreciate more than I know how to tell you the last two paragraphs of your letter. I shall, of course, arrange to come out to see you when I am in Portland but it will also be a great pleasure if you can come into Portland the day I speak there.

Mr. J. I. Knight, McMinnville, Oregon.