WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.740 Picture the map of North America in your head. 00:00:02.740 --> 00:00:04.740 I want you to go all the way up to the top left 00:00:04.740 --> 00:00:07.860 corner, the late 19th century. Right. We are 00:00:07.860 --> 00:00:11.380 talking about the vast, totally frozen frontier 00:00:11.380 --> 00:00:14.080 of the territory of Alaska. You have 20 ,000 00:00:14.080 --> 00:00:17.500 miles of coastline. It is rugged, dangerous, 00:00:18.199 --> 00:00:20.800 absolutely freezing. And there is essentially 00:00:20.800 --> 00:00:24.260 zero government presence. None at all. No police, 00:00:24.420 --> 00:00:28.629 no courts, no hospitals, just ice. ocean and 00:00:28.629 --> 00:00:30.989 these whalers operating with total impunity. 00:00:31.250 --> 00:00:34.130 It was the literal definition of a lawless frontier. 00:00:34.270 --> 00:00:36.090 I mean, once you crossed into the arctic circles, 00:00:36.509 --> 00:00:38.090 civilization was just a rumor. The U .S. had 00:00:38.090 --> 00:00:40.649 purchased this massive landmass, but they had 00:00:40.649 --> 00:00:43.090 almost no way to actually govern it. Except for 00:00:43.090 --> 00:00:45.740 one very specific exception. There was one man 00:00:45.740 --> 00:00:47.880 on one ship who basically was the government 00:00:47.880 --> 00:00:50.359 out there. He was the judge, the doctor, the 00:00:50.359 --> 00:00:52.960 policeman, the Postal Service and the savior 00:00:52.960 --> 00:00:55.840 for an entire region. They called him hell roaring 00:00:55.840 --> 00:00:58.719 Mike. Captain Michael A. Healy, a massive legend 00:00:58.719 --> 00:01:02.039 in maritime history. And today we are going to 00:01:02.039 --> 00:01:04.700 unpack the story of Captain Healy for you. But 00:01:04.700 --> 00:01:07.420 this is not just some standard sea story about. 00:01:07.560 --> 00:01:09.459 dodging icebergs. The more I looked at our source 00:01:09.459 --> 00:01:11.439 material, we're basing this deep dive on the 00:01:11.439 --> 00:01:13.719 Wikipedia biography of Michael A. Healy, the 00:01:13.719 --> 00:01:16.599 more I realized this is really a story about 00:01:16.599 --> 00:01:19.159 identity. Oh, absolutely. Because on the surface, 00:01:19.379 --> 00:01:21.879 you know, he is this legendary tough as nails 00:01:21.879 --> 00:01:25.680 sea captain. But underneath that, there is a 00:01:25.680 --> 00:01:29.000 secret that he kept hidden his entire career, 00:01:29.599 --> 00:01:31.579 a secret that if it got out would have ended 00:01:31.579 --> 00:01:34.500 absolutely everything for him. That is the crux 00:01:34.500 --> 00:01:36.939 of it. We're looking at a man who was born into 00:01:36.939 --> 00:01:39.920 slavery in Georgia, yet he somehow managed to 00:01:39.920 --> 00:01:42.480 navigate the really rigid racial hierarchies 00:01:42.480 --> 00:01:45.599 of the 19th century to become the absolute authority 00:01:45.599 --> 00:01:48.319 in the American Arctic. It's wild. He is recognized 00:01:48.319 --> 00:01:50.519 now as the first African American to command 00:01:50.519 --> 00:01:53.079 a US government ship. But during his life, that 00:01:53.079 --> 00:01:55.359 part of his identity was a fiercely guarded secret. 00:01:55.799 --> 00:01:57.939 It creates this incredible tension throughout 00:01:57.939 --> 00:02:00.769 his whole life. So for our mission today, we 00:02:00.769 --> 00:02:03.750 are going to explore how a man born enslaved 00:02:03.750 --> 00:02:06.590 becomes the king of the Arctic. And to understand 00:02:06.590 --> 00:02:09.050 that trajectory, we can't start out on a boat. 00:02:09.349 --> 00:02:11.110 No, we have to start in Jones County, Georgia. 00:02:11.349 --> 00:02:15.469 It's 1839. Deep South, plantation country. And 00:02:15.469 --> 00:02:18.650 the family dynamic here is, well, it reads almost 00:02:18.650 --> 00:02:21.150 like a Gothic novel. You have Michael Morris 00:02:21.150 --> 00:02:23.539 Healy. An Irish immigrant who becomes a really 00:02:23.539 --> 00:02:25.740 successful planter. He has about 1500 acres. 00:02:26.139 --> 00:02:28.300 And then you have Mary Eliza Smith. Who was an 00:02:28.300 --> 00:02:30.819 enslaved woman of mixed race. And this is the 00:02:30.819 --> 00:02:33.599 crucial legal context we have to impart impartially 00:02:33.599 --> 00:02:35.580 based on the records. She was owned by Michael 00:02:35.580 --> 00:02:38.300 Morris Healy. She was his legal property. Right. 00:02:38.580 --> 00:02:40.479 Which brings us to the Pardis principle mentioned 00:02:40.479 --> 00:02:43.139 in the source. This is the legal doctrine that 00:02:43.139 --> 00:02:45.639 defined the lives of so many people in this era. 00:02:45.840 --> 00:02:48.139 Exactly. Pardis sequitur ventrum. It basically 00:02:48.139 --> 00:02:50.699 means that which is brought forth follows the 00:02:50.699 --> 00:02:53.419 room. So the legal status of the child was determined 00:02:53.419 --> 00:02:56.020 entirely by the legal status of the mother. Even 00:02:56.020 --> 00:02:58.460 though their father was a wealthy, white Irish 00:02:58.460 --> 00:03:00.840 planter, Michael and his siblings were legally 00:03:00.840 --> 00:03:04.139 born as slaves. Which is just a terrifying starting 00:03:04.139 --> 00:03:06.979 position in life. But the father, Michael Morris 00:03:06.979 --> 00:03:09.900 Healy, he does something that really deviates 00:03:09.900 --> 00:03:13.020 from the norm for a man who owned 49 slaves. 00:03:13.699 --> 00:03:16.439 He doesn't treat them as property. He acknowledges 00:03:16.439 --> 00:03:19.039 them as his children, and he really wants them 00:03:19.039 --> 00:03:21.340 educated. Which was illegal in Georgia at the 00:03:21.340 --> 00:03:23.340 time. You could not educate enslaved children. 00:03:24.039 --> 00:03:26.099 But he has the means and he has the ambition, 00:03:26.240 --> 00:03:28.360 so he sends them north. And this is where the 00:03:28.360 --> 00:03:30.759 story gets pretty staggering. We aren't just 00:03:30.759 --> 00:03:32.740 talking about Michael achieving success here. 00:03:32.879 --> 00:03:35.379 The source material outlines what they call the 00:03:35.379 --> 00:03:38.039 Healy achievement across the entire family. These 00:03:38.039 --> 00:03:40.240 siblings didn't just survive being sent north, 00:03:40.680 --> 00:03:42.719 they reached the absolute pinnacle of their fields. 00:03:43.039 --> 00:03:45.800 It really is a who's who of 19th century achievers. 00:03:45.900 --> 00:03:48.199 I mean, you have James Healy. He becomes the 00:03:48.199 --> 00:03:50.340 first U .S. Catholic African -American bishop. 00:03:50.719 --> 00:03:53.099 The bishop of Portland, Maine. A bishop in the 00:03:53.099 --> 00:03:56.349 1800s. And then there's Patrick. Yeah, Patrick 00:03:56.349 --> 00:03:58.449 Healy becomes the first African -American to 00:03:58.449 --> 00:04:01.030 earn a PhD, and he eventually becomes the president 00:04:01.030 --> 00:04:03.310 of Georgetown University. That just blows my 00:04:03.310 --> 00:04:06.050 mind. The president of Georgetown was a man born 00:04:06.050 --> 00:04:09.330 into slavery, passing as white in the post -Civil 00:04:09.330 --> 00:04:12.250 War era. And you also have Eliza, who becomes 00:04:12.250 --> 00:04:15.729 a mother superior in Abbess. It is an incredible 00:04:15.729 --> 00:04:18.089 family dynasty, but then... And you have Michael. 00:04:18.389 --> 00:04:21.329 Right. You have Michael, the black sheep of the 00:04:21.329 --> 00:04:23.920 family... The total rebel. He just didn't fit 00:04:23.920 --> 00:04:26.720 that scholarly religious mold that his siblings 00:04:26.720 --> 00:04:28.759 did. He was sent to the Holy Cross school like 00:04:28.759 --> 00:04:31.199 his brothers, but he was completely unhappy. 00:04:31.360 --> 00:04:33.720 He was rebellious. They even shipped him off 00:04:33.720 --> 00:04:35.860 to a seminary in France at one point, and he 00:04:35.860 --> 00:04:39.839 just wasn't having it. Finally, in 1855, at age 00:04:39.839 --> 00:04:43.220 15, he runs away. He runs away to sea. It sounds 00:04:43.220 --> 00:04:45.480 exactly like a cliche from an old boy's adventure 00:04:45.480 --> 00:04:48.240 book, but he actually did it. He signed on as 00:04:48.240 --> 00:04:51.660 a cabin boy on the Clipper Jumna. And that decision 00:04:51.660 --> 00:04:54.240 probably saved him from a life he was totally 00:04:54.240 --> 00:04:57.180 unsuited for. He spends the next decade really 00:04:57.180 --> 00:05:00.000 learning the ropes of the maritime world, working 00:05:00.000 --> 00:05:02.779 his way up on merchant vessels. He learned navigation, 00:05:03.040 --> 00:05:04.939 he learned leadership, and he learned how to 00:05:04.939 --> 00:05:08.240 survive in the absolute worst conditions. So 00:05:08.240 --> 00:05:10.180 let's fast forward through the Civil War era. 00:05:11.199 --> 00:05:14.540 Healy is out at sea for a lot of it, but in 1864 00:05:14.540 --> 00:05:17.800 he returns to Boston. And this is the major pivot 00:05:17.800 --> 00:05:20.709 point in the biography. He applies for a commission 00:05:20.709 --> 00:05:23.329 in the Revenue Cutter Service. The Revenue Cutter 00:05:23.329 --> 00:05:25.970 Service, for context, is the direct predecessor 00:05:25.970 --> 00:05:29.209 to the modern Coast Guard. It was the armed maritime 00:05:29.209 --> 00:05:31.470 law enforcement service of the United States. 00:05:31.769 --> 00:05:34.230 And here is the detail from the notes that really 00:05:34.230 --> 00:05:37.230 stuck with me. Michael Healy is accepted as a 00:05:37.230 --> 00:05:41.110 third lieutenant in March 1865. And the signature 00:05:41.110 --> 00:05:44.149 on his commission, it is Abraham Lincoln. Signed 00:05:44.149 --> 00:05:46.230 just a month before Lincoln was assassinated. 00:05:46.310 --> 00:05:49.160 So on paper... Michael Healy becomes the first 00:05:49.160 --> 00:05:51.240 African -American commissioned officer in the 00:05:51.240 --> 00:05:53.379 service. But we have to really lean into this 00:05:53.379 --> 00:05:56.519 for you to understand the stakes. The service 00:05:56.519 --> 00:05:59.300 didn't actually know that, did they? No. The 00:05:59.300 --> 00:06:01.420 historical evidence strongly suggests they had 00:06:01.420 --> 00:06:04.680 absolutely no idea. This brings us to the reality 00:06:04.680 --> 00:06:07.910 of passing. Michael and his siblings identified 00:06:07.910 --> 00:06:10.990 publicly as white Irish Catholics. They were 00:06:10.990 --> 00:06:13.930 of mixed ancestry, predominantly European in 00:06:13.930 --> 00:06:16.689 appearance, and when they moved north, they assimilated 00:06:16.689 --> 00:06:20.149 into the Irish community. The source explicitly 00:06:20.149 --> 00:06:22.670 notes his African -American ancestry was not 00:06:22.670 --> 00:06:25.189 generally known during his career. We have to 00:06:25.189 --> 00:06:26.850 look at what's on the line here. This is not 00:06:26.850 --> 00:06:30.029 just about omitting a tiny detail on an application 00:06:30.029 --> 00:06:33.569 form. In 1865, under the racial laws of the time, 00:06:33.970 --> 00:06:35.810 if the Revenue Cutter Service discovered his 00:06:35.810 --> 00:06:38.189 mother was enslaved, he wouldn't just be denied 00:06:38.189 --> 00:06:40.569 a commission. No. He would likely be discharged, 00:06:41.149 --> 00:06:44.399 socially ostracized. or much worse. Absolutely. 00:06:44.660 --> 00:06:47.060 His entire career, his command, his livelihood, 00:06:47.160 --> 00:06:49.639 it all rested on maintaining that secret. And 00:06:49.639 --> 00:06:52.379 you have to wonder how much that shaped the persona 00:06:52.379 --> 00:06:54.800 he later adopted because when you are living 00:06:54.800 --> 00:06:57.139 with a secret that could destroy you, you often 00:06:57.139 --> 00:06:59.000 overcompensate. That makes a lot of sense. You 00:06:59.000 --> 00:07:01.000 become the most competent, the most undeniable 00:07:01.000 --> 00:07:03.540 person in the room so that no one even dares 00:07:03.540 --> 00:07:05.899 to question your background. Right. If I'm the 00:07:05.899 --> 00:07:08.519 toughest, scariest, most effective captain in 00:07:08.519 --> 00:07:11.000 the entire fleet, nobody's going to go digging 00:07:11.000 --> 00:07:13.060 into my birth record. in Jones County, Georgia. 00:07:13.600 --> 00:07:16.120 Precisely. And history ended up handing him the 00:07:16.120 --> 00:07:20.180 perfect stage for that persona. 1867. The U .S. 00:07:20.180 --> 00:07:24.060 buys Alaska. Seward's Folly. The giant ice box 00:07:24.060 --> 00:07:25.959 that everyone thought was a total waste of money. 00:07:26.000 --> 00:07:28.339 Until they realized it was absolutely full of 00:07:28.339 --> 00:07:31.300 resources. But for the revenue cutter service... 00:07:31.100 --> 00:07:34.600 It was a logistical nightmare. They had to patrol 00:07:34.600 --> 00:07:37.759 a coastline longer than the entire Atlantic seaboard 00:07:37.759 --> 00:07:41.360 with almost no infrastructure. Healy heads west. 00:07:41.579 --> 00:07:43.959 He serves on the Reliance and the Active, and 00:07:43.959 --> 00:07:46.300 he learns the very specific skills needed for 00:07:46.300 --> 00:07:48.259 Arctic navigation. And this is where he learns 00:07:48.259 --> 00:07:50.420 from the whaling masters, right? Yes. Well, on 00:07:50.420 --> 00:07:52.259 the Active out of New Bedford, he studied the 00:07:52.259 --> 00:07:54.220 whaling fleets. He learned how they operated, 00:07:54.339 --> 00:07:56.920 where they went, the dangers they faced. That 00:07:56.920 --> 00:07:58.839 knowledge became his superpower when he returned 00:07:58.839 --> 00:08:01.649 to Alaska. He wasn't just a government man. He 00:08:01.649 --> 00:08:03.310 understood the commercial traffic he was supposed 00:08:03.310 --> 00:08:05.129 to be policing. So let's talk about the hardware 00:08:05.129 --> 00:08:07.370 for a second. Because you can't be the king of 00:08:07.370 --> 00:08:09.970 the Arctic without a throne. He eventually takes 00:08:09.970 --> 00:08:12.189 command of the Corwin and then the famous bear. 00:08:12.670 --> 00:08:15.860 And the bear was not just any ship. No, the USRC 00:08:15.860 --> 00:08:18.319 bear is legendary. You have to understand, in 00:08:18.319 --> 00:08:20.519 the late 19th century, this was the absolute 00:08:20.519 --> 00:08:23.379 apex of maritime technology for polar regions. 00:08:23.800 --> 00:08:26.120 It wasn't made of steel. Steel gets brittle in 00:08:26.120 --> 00:08:28.339 that kind of extreme cold, and it can shatter 00:08:28.339 --> 00:08:30.800 on impact with the ice. It's cracks like glass. 00:08:31.139 --> 00:08:34.519 Exactly. So the bear had a hull made of six -inch 00:08:34.519 --> 00:08:37.720 thick oak planks. It was reinforced with steel 00:08:37.720 --> 00:08:40.379 plating only at the bow. It was literally designed 00:08:40.379 --> 00:08:42.720 to ride up onto the ice and crush it with the 00:08:42.720 --> 00:08:45.240 ship's own weight. It was a proto icebreaker. 00:08:45.559 --> 00:08:48.019 It's basically a floating battering ram. A battering 00:08:48.019 --> 00:08:50.799 ram that was also a home. For Healy to command 00:08:50.799 --> 00:08:53.059 this specific vessel meant he was commanding 00:08:53.059 --> 00:08:56.000 the single most capable asset the United States 00:08:56.000 --> 00:08:58.360 possessed in the Northern Hemisphere. And he 00:08:58.360 --> 00:09:00.580 used it to become Hail Roaring Mike. Let's unpack 00:09:00.580 --> 00:09:02.659 that nickname because it wasn't just because 00:09:02.659 --> 00:09:04.820 he had a loud voice on deck. It was the total 00:09:04.820 --> 00:09:07.360 package. He was an incredibly demanding commander. 00:09:07.820 --> 00:09:10.559 He expected absolute perfection from his crew. 00:09:10.960 --> 00:09:13.639 You have to remember, the Arctic is entirely 00:09:13.639 --> 00:09:17.539 unforgiving. A loose line, a slow response, a 00:09:17.539 --> 00:09:20.759 navigational error, people die. So he was hard 00:09:20.759 --> 00:09:23.379 on his junior officers. The sources say most 00:09:23.379 --> 00:09:25.639 of them found him extremely difficult to deal 00:09:25.639 --> 00:09:27.700 with. And the source is also pretty clear about 00:09:27.700 --> 00:09:30.590 his relationship with alcohol. Yes, he had a 00:09:30.590 --> 00:09:32.710 very well -known reputation as a hard drinker. 00:09:32.889 --> 00:09:35.110 So hell -roaring really referred to his volume, 00:09:35.610 --> 00:09:38.370 his temper, his intensity, and his drinking. 00:09:38.570 --> 00:09:41.250 But here is the paradox that makes him so fascinating. 00:09:41.990 --> 00:09:44.250 While his junior officers were terrified of him, 00:09:44.690 --> 00:09:47.049 the Native Alaskans respected him immensely. 00:09:47.289 --> 00:09:50.519 They called his ship Healy's Fire Canoe. He was 00:09:50.519 --> 00:09:52.580 the law, but he was a consistent law. He actually 00:09:52.580 --> 00:09:54.700 had a standing order for his crew regarding the 00:09:54.700 --> 00:09:57.259 native population. He said, never make a promise 00:09:57.259 --> 00:09:59.480 to a native you do not intend to keep to the 00:09:59.480 --> 00:10:01.299 letter. That shows a level of integrity that 00:10:01.299 --> 00:10:03.600 was pretty rare for government officials dealing 00:10:03.600 --> 00:10:06.340 with indigenous populations in that era. It really 00:10:06.340 --> 00:10:09.190 does. He viewed them as his responsibility. The 00:10:09.190 --> 00:10:11.529 Revenue Cutter Service was the only federal presence 00:10:11.529 --> 00:10:14.889 up there. Healy enforced liquor laws, he protected 00:10:14.889 --> 00:10:17.450 seals and whales from poachers, he delivered 00:10:17.450 --> 00:10:20.269 the mail, brought medicine, and acted as a judge. 00:10:21.029 --> 00:10:23.429 If there was a crime committed in a remote village, 00:10:23.850 --> 00:10:26.210 Healy was the one who sailed in and held the 00:10:26.210 --> 00:10:29.210 trial. But we can't sanitize him either. We talked 00:10:29.210 --> 00:10:30.769 about the drinking, but we also have to talk 00:10:30.769 --> 00:10:33.470 about the brutality. The source mentions the 00:10:33.470 --> 00:10:36.870 Estrella incident in 1889. This is where the 00:10:36.870 --> 00:10:39.490 hell -roaring persona gets pretty dark. Right. 00:10:39.990 --> 00:10:41.750 There were actual charges of cruelty brought 00:10:41.750 --> 00:10:44.110 against Healy. It stemmed from an incident on 00:10:44.110 --> 00:10:46.570 a whaling ship called the Estrella. Basically, 00:10:46.769 --> 00:10:49.269 Healy had a seaman triced up. For those of us 00:10:49.269 --> 00:10:51.389 who don't know 19th century maritime torture 00:10:51.389 --> 00:10:54.210 terms, what does triced up actually mean? It 00:10:54.210 --> 00:10:56.509 is a severe form of punishment. You handcuff 00:10:56.509 --> 00:10:59.250 a person's hands behind their back, run a line 00:10:59.250 --> 00:11:01.250 through the handcuffs, and hoist them up until 00:11:01.250 --> 00:11:03.850 their toes are barely touching the deck. Wow. 00:11:04.029 --> 00:11:06.909 It's excruciating. It dislocates shoulders. It 00:11:06.909 --> 00:11:09.350 cuts off circulation. It sounds medieval. It 00:11:09.350 --> 00:11:12.610 was barbaric by modern standards, but Healy defended 00:11:12.610 --> 00:11:15.889 it vigorously. He argued that it was absolutely 00:11:15.889 --> 00:11:19.090 necessary to quell a mutiny. And again, we have 00:11:19.090 --> 00:11:21.789 to pull back and look at the map. They are thousands 00:11:21.789 --> 00:11:24.750 of miles from the nearest court or jail. If you 00:11:24.750 --> 00:11:26.990 lose control of a ship in the Arctic, the ice 00:11:26.990 --> 00:11:30.070 crushes you or you freeze to death. So his argument 00:11:30.070 --> 00:11:33.019 was basically I am the only thing standing between 00:11:33.019 --> 00:11:36.899 order and certain death. Exactly. He viewed that 00:11:36.899 --> 00:11:39.039 tracing up as an existential necessity to keep 00:11:39.039 --> 00:11:41.480 the hierarchy intact. And I think this connects 00:11:41.480 --> 00:11:44.080 right back to his secret identity. Oh, interesting. 00:11:44.179 --> 00:11:46.740 How so? Think about it. If he allows a mutiny, 00:11:46.779 --> 00:11:48.740 if he shows weakness, if he loses control of 00:11:48.740 --> 00:11:51.980 the situation, he faces a court martial. And 00:11:51.980 --> 00:11:54.360 in a court martial, his entire background gets 00:11:54.360 --> 00:11:56.620 scrutinized. He couldn't afford to be anything 00:11:56.620 --> 00:11:59.519 less than absolute iron. That adds such a heavy 00:11:59.519 --> 00:12:01.799 layer of psychological context to his actions. 00:12:02.360 --> 00:12:04.820 He eventually dodged those cruelty charges, largely 00:12:04.820 --> 00:12:06.519 because the commercial whaling captains backed 00:12:06.519 --> 00:12:08.320 him up. They knew exactly how hard the crews 00:12:08.320 --> 00:12:10.539 were to manage out there, but he couldn't dodge 00:12:10.539 --> 00:12:14.000 the alcohol forever. No, that was his personal 00:12:14.000 --> 00:12:17.600 demon. There was a specific incident involving 00:12:17.600 --> 00:12:20.240 a Captain Shepard. Shepard was the skipper of 00:12:20.240 --> 00:12:23.809 another cutter, the Rush. Healy paid a routine 00:12:23.809 --> 00:12:26.230 courtesy call to Shepard's ship, but he showed 00:12:26.230 --> 00:12:29.029 up completely intoxicated. Which is a massive 00:12:29.029 --> 00:12:31.129 breach of naval etiquette. It's humiliating. 00:12:31.389 --> 00:12:33.909 And it got worse because shortly after that incident, 00:12:34.409 --> 00:12:36.970 Shepard was actually promoted to Chief of the 00:12:36.970 --> 00:12:40.840 Revenue Cutter Bureau. Oh, no. Yes. Essentially, 00:12:41.220 --> 00:12:43.720 the guy he embarrassed himself in front of became 00:12:43.720 --> 00:12:46.059 Healy's ultimate boss. Talk about a nightmare 00:12:46.059 --> 00:12:48.259 scenario. Shepherd wrote him a formal letter 00:12:48.259 --> 00:12:50.039 basically saying, look, if you can't control 00:12:50.039 --> 00:12:52.000 the drinking, you are going to lose your command. 00:12:52.080 --> 00:12:54.000 And this is where we see a real crack in the 00:12:54.000 --> 00:12:56.360 armor. How did hell -roaring Mike respond to 00:12:56.360 --> 00:12:58.139 that? Did he rage against it? No, he didn't. 00:12:58.159 --> 00:13:00.240 He wrote an apology. And it is actually quite 00:13:00.240 --> 00:13:02.860 moving to read. He pledged, quote, never to touch 00:13:02.860 --> 00:13:06.059 intoxicants again. And his reason, he said, one 00:13:06.059 --> 00:13:07.909 thing I will hate, and that is to give up. my 00:13:07.909 --> 00:13:10.450 command of the bear. I love the ship. I love 00:13:10.450 --> 00:13:14.429 the ship. That really humanizes him. It shows 00:13:14.429 --> 00:13:16.549 that the bear wasn't just a job for him. It was 00:13:16.549 --> 00:13:19.409 his identity. It was the one place where he was 00:13:19.409 --> 00:13:22.529 the absolute master of his own destiny, completely 00:13:22.529 --> 00:13:25.149 regardless of his birth. The Arctic was the one 00:13:25.149 --> 00:13:27.470 place where his merit and his skill mattered 00:13:27.470 --> 00:13:29.649 more than his history. And that brings us to 00:13:29.649 --> 00:13:31.529 the other side of his legacy, because we have 00:13:31.529 --> 00:13:33.990 talked about the strict discipline and the drinking, 00:13:33.990 --> 00:13:36.809 but we really have to talk about the humanitarian 00:13:36.809 --> 00:13:39.700 work. He wasn't just punishing sailors, he was 00:13:39.700 --> 00:13:43.500 engineering survival for thousands of people. 00:13:43.860 --> 00:13:45.419 This is the part of the source material that 00:13:45.419 --> 00:13:47.659 surprised me the most, the reindeer project. 00:13:47.919 --> 00:13:50.539 It is a fascinating piece of history. Healy had 00:13:50.539 --> 00:13:52.580 been observing the ecosystem collapse in the 00:13:52.580 --> 00:13:54.960 region. Commercial whalers were just decimating 00:13:54.960 --> 00:13:57.679 the whale and seal populations. He saw this happening 00:13:57.679 --> 00:14:00.639 firsthand on his patrols, but he also saw the 00:14:00.639 --> 00:14:03.340 human cost. The native Alaskans relied heavily 00:14:03.340 --> 00:14:06.190 on those animals for food. With the whales disappearing, 00:14:06.750 --> 00:14:09.029 entire coastal villages were facing starvation. 00:14:09.509 --> 00:14:11.070 So he didn't just write a report about it to 00:14:11.070 --> 00:14:13.389 Washington. He came up with a massive logistical 00:14:13.389 --> 00:14:16.129 solution. He looked right across the Bering Strait. 00:14:16.570 --> 00:14:19.450 He had been to Siberia on his patrols. He noticed 00:14:19.450 --> 00:14:22.049 that the Chirkshi people over there had domesticated 00:14:22.049 --> 00:14:24.769 reindeer. They used them for food, for clothing, 00:14:25.009 --> 00:14:27.809 for milk, for travel. And he thought, why can't 00:14:27.809 --> 00:14:30.850 we do that in Alaska? It sounds so simple on 00:14:30.850 --> 00:14:32.789 paper, but the logistics of that must have been 00:14:32.789 --> 00:14:35.309 a nightmare. You are talking about transporting 00:14:35.309 --> 00:14:38.490 live herds of semi -wild animals across the ocean 00:14:38.490 --> 00:14:41.549 on a wooden boat. Exactly. He teamed up with 00:14:41.549 --> 00:14:43.750 Reverend Sheldon Jackson to make it happen. They 00:14:43.750 --> 00:14:46.870 had to sail to Siberia, negotiate with the Chukchi, 00:14:47.330 --> 00:14:49.970 load these terrified, kicking animals onto the 00:14:49.970 --> 00:14:52.110 bear, keep them alive during the rough crossing, 00:14:52.629 --> 00:14:55.090 offload them in Alaska, and then teach the local 00:14:55.090 --> 00:14:57.370 population how to actually herd them. It is an 00:14:57.370 --> 00:14:59.769 incredible feat of agricultural transfer. It 00:14:59.769 --> 00:15:01.929 was literal nation building. Over the course 00:15:01.929 --> 00:15:04.490 of a decade, transported over a thousand reindeer. 00:15:05.110 --> 00:15:07.789 It created a completely new food source and a 00:15:07.789 --> 00:15:10.549 new economy for the native Alaskans. It actively 00:15:10.549 --> 00:15:13.409 prevented a famine. So you have this man who 00:15:13.409 --> 00:15:16.309 will hoist a sailor up by his handcuffs to stop 00:15:16.309 --> 00:15:20.049 a mutiny, but will also spend years carefully 00:15:20.049 --> 00:15:22.870 transporting reindeer to save a population he 00:15:22.870 --> 00:15:25.590 has absolutely no blood relation to. That is 00:15:25.590 --> 00:15:28.409 the duality of Michael Healy. He was a savior 00:15:28.409 --> 00:15:31.889 and a terror all wrapped into one. He was also 00:15:31.889 --> 00:15:35.070 formally recognized by Congress in 1885, specifically 00:15:35.070 --> 00:15:37.909 for his life -saving work, rescuing whalers who 00:15:37.909 --> 00:15:40.870 got trapped in the crushing ice. He was constantly 00:15:40.870 --> 00:15:43.370 pulling people out of the jaws of death. So how 00:15:43.370 --> 00:15:45.769 does the story end for the King of the Arctic? 00:15:45.990 --> 00:15:47.830 It ends with the inevitable passage of time. 00:15:48.169 --> 00:15:51.450 He retired in 1903 at the mandatory age of 64. 00:15:51.889 --> 00:15:54.139 Forced retirement. For a man who loved this ship 00:15:54.139 --> 00:15:55.639 more than anything, that must have felt like 00:15:55.639 --> 00:15:57.620 a death sentence in itself. He really didn't 00:15:57.620 --> 00:15:59.940 last long on land. He died just a year later 00:15:59.940 --> 00:16:02.919 in 1904 in San Francisco. He had a heart attack 00:16:02.919 --> 00:16:05.519 and he was buried in Colma, California. And when 00:16:05.519 --> 00:16:07.919 they buried him, the world still viewed him as 00:16:07.919 --> 00:16:10.879 a white Irish -American captain. Correct. His 00:16:10.879 --> 00:16:13.080 African -American ancestry was not generally 00:16:13.080 --> 00:16:15.759 known. It was a secret he successfully took to 00:16:15.759 --> 00:16:18.440 his grave. It wasn't until the late 20th century 00:16:18.440 --> 00:16:21.039 that historians started to really dig into the 00:16:21.039 --> 00:16:23.440 Healy family history and realized, wait a minute, 00:16:23.899 --> 00:16:26.559 this legendary Arctic captain was part of this 00:16:26.559 --> 00:16:29.440 incredible mixed race family from Georgia. It's 00:16:29.440 --> 00:16:31.899 amazing how history can be rewritten or at least 00:16:31.899 --> 00:16:34.759 clarified so long after the fact. And now the 00:16:34.759 --> 00:16:37.100 Coast Guard has fully embraced his actual heritage, 00:16:37.259 --> 00:16:40.559 right? Oh, absolutely. In 1999, they commissioned 00:16:40.559 --> 00:16:43.539 a massive research icebreaker and named it the 00:16:43.539 --> 00:16:47.000 USCGC Healy. It is one of the most advanced ships 00:16:47.000 --> 00:16:49.659 in the entire fleet. He is now officially and 00:16:49.659 --> 00:16:51.980 proudly celebrated as the first African American 00:16:51.980 --> 00:16:54.259 to command a U .S. government ship. I love that 00:16:54.259 --> 00:16:57.259 arc. From a runaway cabin boy hiding his identity 00:16:57.259 --> 00:16:59.620 to having a massive icebreaker named after him. 00:16:59.919 --> 00:17:03.340 But there's one final incredibly ironic twist 00:17:03.340 --> 00:17:05.619 to his legacy that the Wikipedia source mentions. 00:17:06.000 --> 00:17:07.920 It brings us all the way back to Georgia. Yes. 00:17:08.140 --> 00:17:11.039 The plantation. The exact land where he was born, 00:17:11.160 --> 00:17:13.259 where he was legally a slave, and where his mother 00:17:13.259 --> 00:17:15.660 was owned by his father. What is that piece of 00:17:15.660 --> 00:17:18.380 land today? It is called Healy Point. And it 00:17:18.380 --> 00:17:21.259 is the Healy Point Country Club. A country club? 00:17:21.420 --> 00:17:23.859 Yeah. You really cannot make this stuff up. The 00:17:23.859 --> 00:17:26.200 site of his enslavement is now a golf course 00:17:26.200 --> 00:17:28.740 bearing his family's name. History has a very 00:17:28.740 --> 00:17:31.319 strange, sometimes dark sense of humor. It really 00:17:31.319 --> 00:17:34.579 does. So let's wrap up this deep dive. We have 00:17:34.579 --> 00:17:37.619 Michael Healy, born to an Irish father and an 00:17:37.619 --> 00:17:39.759 enslaved mother. He runs away from a life in 00:17:39.759 --> 00:17:42.599 the church, passes as white in a time when being 00:17:42.599 --> 00:17:45.859 black meant exclusion or worse, joins the revenue 00:17:45.859 --> 00:17:47.819 cutter service with a signature from Abraham 00:17:47.819 --> 00:17:50.339 Lincoln himself, and becomes the most feared 00:17:50.339 --> 00:17:52.660 and respected man in the American Arctic. He 00:17:52.660 --> 00:17:55.119 protects the environment, saves the native population 00:17:55.119 --> 00:17:58.299 from starvation with the reindeer fights mutinies 00:17:58.299 --> 00:18:00.799 with brutal discipline, battles his own alcoholism, 00:18:01.140 --> 00:18:03.579 and leaves a legacy that is only fully understood 00:18:03.579 --> 00:18:06.660 a hundred years after he dies. It's just an incredible 00:18:06.660 --> 00:18:09.299 story of resilience and navigation. He navigated 00:18:09.299 --> 00:18:11.859 the ice, sure, but he also navigated the social 00:18:11.859 --> 00:18:14.500 traps of the 19th century with incredibly high 00:18:14.500 --> 00:18:17.759 stakes. And it forces us to rethink what the 00:18:17.759 --> 00:18:19.740 frontier really looked like. It wasn't just this 00:18:19.740 --> 00:18:22.500 monolithic expansion. There were people of all 00:18:22.500 --> 00:18:25.759 backgrounds shaping the map of America, even 00:18:25.759 --> 00:18:28.519 if they had to hide who they were to do it. That 00:18:28.519 --> 00:18:30.079 actually brings me to the big question I want 00:18:30.079 --> 00:18:33.200 to leave you, our listeners, with today. We know 00:18:33.200 --> 00:18:35.900 about Healy now. because historians did the difficult 00:18:35.900 --> 00:18:38.799 work to connect the dots. But it makes you wonder, 00:18:39.400 --> 00:18:41.539 how many other hell -roaring mikes are there 00:18:41.539 --> 00:18:43.960 in the history books? That is the real question. 00:18:44.019 --> 00:18:45.980 How many other figures who completely shaped 00:18:45.980 --> 00:18:48.480 our world had secret identities or backgrounds 00:18:48.480 --> 00:18:51.559 or heritages that completely define their internal 00:18:51.559 --> 00:18:55.440 drive, yet remain totally hidden from us? Does 00:18:55.440 --> 00:18:57.119 the way a person identifies themselves in their 00:18:57.119 --> 00:19:00.059 own time matter more, or does the box history 00:19:00.059 --> 00:19:02.640 puts them in matter more? It is definitely something 00:19:02.640 --> 00:19:04.700 to think about. Thanks for taking this deep dive 00:19:04.700 --> 00:19:06.779 with us into the frozen north. Always a pleasure. 00:19:06.960 --> 00:19:09.079 We will catch you on the next one. Stay curious.