Lillian Alling Walking Home - New York to Russia

The Legend

Legend has it that Lillian Alling came from Eastern Europe in about 1925 to New York where she worked at a low paying job and became unhappy and homesick in America. Because she was unable to afford a ship ticket, she needed and wanted to find another way of getting home. She saved her money and checked out the New York public library in the winter of 1926, planned her route across land, and started to walk in the spring of 1927. She is said to have been wearing a tidy skirt, sturdy walking boots and a headscarf. She also carried a small amount of money, some food and a short iron bar to protect herself.

People say she was seen in the twin cities of Minneapolis/St Paul and was last seen in the United States in Chicago, because after that she turned north to Canada. Winnipeg, Manitoba seems to be her next stop then across the hot and dry Canadian prairie summer to Edmonton, Alberta and then she would have braved the arduous slopes of the Rocky Mountains eventually finding herself in Prince George, British Columbia.

At Prince George, she would have kept walking west towards the Pacific Ocean until she reached Hazelton, then turned north to follow the Yukon Telegraph Trail. At Cabin 2 of the Yukon Telegraph, she apparently collapsed with exhaustion. The telegraph operator, concerned for her safety, tapped out a message to the Provincial Police at Hazelton who came to get her. The police were worried that she would attempt to walk north along the Telegraph Trail in the upcoming winter which was severe in both its cold and the depth of snow.

A local Justice of the Peace charged her with carrying a concealed weapon, and she was sent for a few weeks to Oakalla Prison in Burnaby near Vancouver. After her short period in prison, she apparently got work in a Vancouver restaurant where she bided her time and saved money. But as soon as the spring of 1928 came around, she was steadfastly on her way and once again began walking.

Atlin Lake Panorama

She left the Lower Mainland and walked through the Interior of British Columbia, ending up in the Bulkley Valley area in the summer of 1928. In Smithers the police extracted a promise from her that she would report in to each cabin on the Telegraph Trail. To this she agreed, and she began walking once more. The Trail passes through spectacular mountains, plunging valleys, raging rivers and all the best scenery that British Columbia can offer. She dutifully reported to each cabin, getting help from telegraph operators and linesmen. Eventually she made it to Atlin, British Columbia and finally to Whitehorse and Dawson City in the fall of 1928. She wintered in Dawson 1928-1929 and, once again, worked as a cook. After break up in spring 1929, she took a small boat she'd been working on and launched herself down the Yukon River. There were a few tenuous sightings of Lillian later... one in Teller, Alaska and one in Providenja, Siberia (at the time that was the U.S.S.R).