SI contributing writer, Michael McKnight breaks down the fascinating story of former athlete of the year John Hultin and why it's relevant to today's pandemic.
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00:00The curiosity of Johan Holton, a hiker and former athlete of the year who ventured into
00:09Alaska to dig up mass graves of the victims of the 1918 Spanish flu, may help people today
00:15learn about the coronavirus. It's the closest analog we have to the current pandemic, and
00:19Michael McKnight writes about the now 95-year-old adventurer and the ability to persist for
00:25today's daily cover. Michael, first of all, how did you first come across this story?
00:30Well, like a lot of sports writers, we're pretty bereft of things to write about these days. So,
00:36you know, my editors and I are in constant conversation about what can we write about,
00:40and I remembered in some synapse in my head a San Francisco Chronicle story from 2002
00:46about this outdoorsman, hiker, mountaineer, and then I read recently a book by Gina Kolata of
00:54the New York Times called Flu, which is a quintessential book on the 1918 pandemic,
00:59and Johan Holton played a prominent role in each of those stories, and he is a sportsman
01:04without question. So I floated the idea to our editors in New York, and off we went. I got him
01:10on the phone, I got Johan Holton on the phone, and what can we learn from this man was the main
01:14question. Yeah, and I mean, that is the question there. I mean, you talked to him, he did this
01:18twice. So what did Holton learn from both of his hikes into the Alaskan wilderness?
01:24Well, first, I think he learned a lot about himself, which one of the reasons I think this
01:28story is interesting is that he flew blind, and it wasn't like he had a big operation
01:34supporting him. It was a one-man show both times going into some of the harshest
01:38environs in the world. Secondly, he learned, once he brought the tissue back to his colleagues in
01:46the States, he learned that there would be other pandemics, that these viruses, whether it's a flu
01:53virus or any sort of contagion, the table is set for something like 1918 to happen again. So I
02:01think that was his biggest takeaway, was that it's not over when 1918 pandemic was, when it went away,
02:08things were far from over. Absolutely, a lot we can learn. A great read right here. Michael
02:13McKnight, thank you so much for taking the time and for writing this interesting story.
02:16Thank you, appreciate it.