Dan Morris stood in his basement and took inventory: he had the big Betacam, the Hi-8 camera, the DV camera, the still camera, and the Domke vest with camera pockets. Duct tape, gaffer’s tape, four cases of Beta. Three backpacks, three pairs of pants, three T-shirts. And eight pairs of socks–at least as essential as tape for his second trip to Alaska to film the Iditarod. A lot of stuff for one man to carry to the airport, but he’d done it before. He’d be packed and ready to go by the following day, no problem. Except there was a problem.
Morris had been driving the snowmobile and mugging for a camera held by his older brother Jeff, a film editor and bartender, whom he’d convinced to join him on the project. “I thought he wanted to get some hot shots of me driving around,” says Morris. He got one all right. In a corner of the frame, Morris can be seen straddling the snowmobile, his boots caught in the footholds, the rest of his body flipping backward. He can be heard screaming. Then the snowmobile moves on without him.
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“I knew I broke it instantly, but we got to the hospital and they said it was sprained,” he says. “So that gave me the energy to continue.” He only found out he’d been right when he got an MRI in Chicago three months later. His arm had been fractured in two places. He still has problems with the wrist.
Morris’s second son was born in 1995. Expenses in Alaska were high and salaries were low, and after the ’96 race he reluctantly moved to Chicago, where he’d gotten an offer he couldn’t refuse at Orbis. But every March he’d sit at the computer at work, checking out the Iditarod results: “My head would be in Alaska and the boss would say, ‘Please get off my computer–you don’t live there anymore.’”
By February the feature still had no backers, but at least Morris wouldn’t be the only person selling ads for the TV special this time–a couple of Alaskan friends had agreed to help out. Anchorage Chrysler Dodge had already written a check. Despite the unexpected $5,000 overage, he expected to cover expenses. He was going to every checkpoint. His arm felt good. On the other hand, he’d be gone for a month and his wife, Leanne, was seven months pregnant.
“My mouth was open. I had to go between her legs to get my camera, and she said, ‘Well, that wasn’t sitting here when I sat down.’” Morris showed her a $300 piece that held the microphone, now on the floor next to the camera. “She was like, ‘Well, I didn’t do that. That camera was not there!’” Morris reattached the piece with duct tape.
Dogs don’t die in the Iditarod every year, but it’s close. In the past three decades more than 100 have (early on no one kept count, so the exact number can’t be determined). But because of the deaths, groups like PETA and the Sled Dog Action Coalition have persuaded many corporations to stop sponsoring the race.
