Marcus Bodnar News Today

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Best friends Ira Little and Marvin Smith came from California to the Kenai Peninsula in 1947. They homesteaded in the area that would soon be known as Soldotna and began building productive lives.

For the better part of a decade on the central Kenai Peninsula, the lives of Ira Little and Marvin Smith were inextricably linked. In fact, it was rare to read or hear about one without the other. It was usually “Smith and Little” this or “Smith and Little” that.

The lives of Ira Little and Marvin Smith were inextricably linked

Although their time on the peninsula was brief, they made an impact

“Over the hill came two people on an Allis-Chalmers tractor … ”

AUTHOR’S NOTE: The brothers Marcus and Alex Bodnar, sons of Ukrainian immigrants, came to the central Kenai Peninsula to homestead in 1947 and almost immediately set to work clearing land and building homes for themselves. They were among the first individuals to file homesteading claims in the Soldotna area.

It’s summer 1947, the year of the immense Kenai Burn: Marge and Frank Mullen are sitting at the mouth of Soldotna Creek, enjoying a rainbow trout for lunch. Through a still smoldering countryside, they have just completed a 60-mile trek, with full backpacks, from Moose Pass on the rough dirt swath that will one day be known as the Sterling Highway.

Ridgeway homesteader Larry Lancashire was reminded of the value of such friendship in December 1950 when he shot another illegal moose

The Lancashires had settled in

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Most of the people who came to homestead and stayed long term on the central Kenai Peninsula created a circle of friends and acquaintances and found ways to contribute to the greater society around them. This was true of Larry and Rusty Lancashire, who came to make themselves a home on Pickle Hill in Ridgeway in 1948. In almost no time at all, they were integrating themselves into their newfound community.