She moved to Homer Spit, Alaska back in seventy-seven and lived in a campground as the winter caretaker, in a park model much like we have in Arizona, called Eagle Spot, until her death this past January. "She" is Jean Keene. From all I've been able to find out about her she must have been a real character. A nice character. A lovable character. One special lady.
Arizona has the Grand Canyon, Wyoming has Yellowstone and Florida has Disney World...Homer had Eagle Spot, the site that Jean lived on, and people came from the world over to see the eagles and to meet Jean.
It all started shortly after she moved to Homer, that first winter when she fed two eagles all winter long. She had secured employment with Icicle Seafood Cannery and was granted permission to load up the waste from the processed seafood to take home to her beloved eagles. She was also afforded the opportunity to take the excess and the freezer burned fish.
Thirty years later the number had grown from two eagles to around three hundred. Every winter, starting in late December and lasting through mid April, 300 eagles came to the Homer Spit for breakfast every day. Jean cut the daily 500 pounds of excess fish and freezer burned fish into more manageable pieces for the eagles to hold. The eagles trusted her. Some even let her get near them. She knew when one wasn't feeling well or was hurt and made sure someone came to get the bird so it could be nursed back to health. They instinctively knew that she meant them no harm.
Many townspeople wanted the practice of feeding eagles and other birds stopped and an ordinance was passed. It didn't apply to Jean as she was "grandfathered" into the ordinance and was permitted to keep feeding the eagles until the year 2010. As controversial as the eagle feeding was it was beneficial to the community. People came to Homer in the winter to see the three hundred or so eagles and the tourism helped the town. Motels rented rooms, restaurants fed the tourists breakfasts, lunches and dinners, local bars sold drinks and whatever stores were open sold.... well whatever it was they were selling.
It is estimated that 80% of all published photographs of eagles were taken on the Homer Spit and many were taken right at Jean's "compound".
The tourists not only came to see the eagles, they came to see Jean too. With her flaming red curly hair, her very large glasses and unique jewelry, she stood out in a crowd. She had a special booth and parking spot at Land's End Resort cafe where she held court to all those who came to meet her. She was definitely one of Homer's finest good will ambassadors.
In her younger years she was a rodeo trick horse rider until an accident broke her leg in 80 places. This was just the first of several life-threatening incidents that she would bounce back from. She was a breast cancer survivor and was involved a very bad auto accident as an example of some of these incidents. She had been a truck driver and a dog groomer in later years after the rodeo accident.
In 2003, a book named The Eagle Lady was published. It was Jean's life story. The author and photographer, Cary Anderson summed it up like this: "Lots of people write books, but rare are those people who lead such remarkable lives that they become the subject of a book. Jean's ruggedness, friendly character and her incredible relationship with hundreds of eagles won't be forgotten."
When it was apparent that Jean would be departing this life for the most beautiful aviary of them all, her friends and family spent time at her side. They weren't the only ones standing vigil. Another friend sat just outside her window. It was reported in the Homer News that long time friend, Peggy Chapple made this statement. "From her bed, she could look right out the window and there was an eagle, almost like it was watching, guarding over her," "It was awesome. That's the way she wanted to go. At home, at peace and with her eagles guarding her."
Shortly after Jean passed on her home caught fire and was removed from the site. All that remains is the perch that was erected there. I was lucky enough to get a picture of it. (And it doubles as a dead tree pic for LaVon - I guess you could call that "killing two birds with one stone" - ooh, that was bad, especially in this story!)
I wonder what will happen this coming December. The eagles will surely come. Will they stay? Will they instinctively "know" their friend is no longer there? Do eagles mourn? Will they take their places on the perch and just ....wait? This all remains to be seen.
If you are interested in more information on the book about Jean Keene, The Eagle Lady, click here.
Well, on with our day. It rained. We woke to the rat-a-tat-tat on the roof as the raindrops fell. It would stop for awhile, then start again, then stop and it went on like that for all the day long.
I visited with the girls for a short while but we mostly watched movies. Thank heavens we have a VCR/DVD player or one of us (he)would surely be dead by now otherwise.
I've had quite a few inquiries about the pictures I've been posting for the last several days. No, I don't have a new camera, or a new lens and I'm not using the camera I fished out of the toilet, although it works, I could. I found that I could enhance our pictures by clicking on these magic buttons on our camera's computer program. They've been there all the time, I just never paid any attention to them. I don't know why I started playing with them but I'm really glad I did. I get really orange-y oranges now, ice cool blues and vivid reds. I SATURATE my photos with color now. SATURATE, that's my new favorite word. I SATURATE my photos with color... I am lovin' this! Really, its about time I made use of this camera the way it should be used. After all, it's not just a point and shoot you can pick up for fifty or a hundred bucks. Wow, maybe I should even read the book that came with it now!
I'm so confused! We have a new reader on the blog. One of the stat readers tells me this new reader is from Winchester, Kentucky. Another that I use doesn't list Kentucky at all but instead shows me that a lot of reading is going on in Atlanta...a lot more than usual. I don't know how these things work. I know for a fact that my cousin in Virginia was doing some heavy duty catching up on the blog, actually, she started reading it from day one, and no activity was shown in Virginia but the numbers for Livingston, New Jersey were going through the roof. We used to blame wrong phone numbers on "crossed telephone wires", I guess I'm experiencing "crossed satellite beams". Regardless, welcome new reader! I hope you enjoy the journey.
We had hoped to moved down to the Spit today but the rain quashed those plans. In fact the weatherman says rain for the next week. I am hopin' he's wrong! We were going to try our hand at dry camping again, depending on our generator for short times of electric, but if we are facing a week of rainy weather not only are we going to a campground with electricity but one with CABLE! The hell with "camping" we are changing modes back to RV'ing! There is a difference.
That's it for today. More from the Spit.... tomorrow.
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