Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
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Thunderfoot
THERE ARE LOTS OF
reasons to go to the Alaska State Fair in Palmer every year. Turkey
legs and crab cakes and cream puffs. The Elks' Rat Race. The giant cabbages. The Scheer
Lumberjack Show, where my friend Rhonda Sleighter can sigh over Fred “The Silver Fox”
Scheer's biceps. Yodeling along with Hobo Jim at the Sluice Box.
Wait a minute. Yodeling?
You bet. Also howling like a wolf, yipping like a coyote, and stamping like an elephant.
Also dancing until your feet hurt and singing until you're hoarse.
Hobo Jim has that effect on people from up there on stage, bright blue eyes and evil grin
flashing out from beneath the crushed brim of a white straw cowboy hat, fingers a blur on
the guitar strings, foot stomping hard enough to go through the stage.
And in fact, he went through a stage once during a performance, in 1982 in Evergreen,
Colorado, stomping hard enough to go through all the way up to his waist. What did he do?
“Climbed out and kept playing. The crowd went nuts.” He was the opening act for the
Amazing Rhythm Aces, and they had to put down a piece of plywood over the hole so Rus-
sell Smith could come out and do his thing. It cramped Smith's style some and he gave
vent, calling Hobo Jim a “thunderfoot.” Since this is a family magazine, I'll delete the qual-
ifier.
The nickname stuck, everyone in Alaska knows who Thunderfoot is, and everyone in
Alaska lines up to attend his performances. He always closes down the Sluice Box on the
last day of the Alaska State Fair, and it's always SRO long before he sings the first note.
Sue Anne Weaver, a teacher from the Valley, has been holding down a piece of one of the
Sluice Box's picnic tables since four o'clock. “I've been a fan for twenty years, and I can
sing every word to all the songs.” So can everyone else in the room.
