something i find to be SUCH an interesting writing choice is how Hickey spends two episodes saving lives. like obviously we all discuss him committing accidental murder when he’s trying to save everyone during Stanley’s carnivale fire but ALSO in the previous episode he’s the one who reopens the sealed forward hatch and is literally the first one on deck during the Tuunbaq attack in episode five. you can argue this is because Darlington is dead so Hickey is the only one ABLE to open the forward hatch BUT Darlington died in the same episode and regardless i doubt any casual viewer would realise if it were just some random AB hammering away at the hatch. having Hickey to be the one to do that, directly after saving Manson from Irving’s wrath, then following it with his carnivale rescue mission is just so… interesting it’s SO interesting.
Terror Characters and their roles as technicians at a Summer Stock Theatre
This got out of hand, click to view under cut
Franklin: Artistic Director. I've yet to meet one that wasn't out of touch and rich. He would kill at giving his uneducated opinion on everything the shops are doing. STFU you don't know anything about how paint dries.
Fitzjames: Production Manager. Admin job where you're the go-between for production, the artistic director, and designers/directors, but also hop in and install a wall or hang a light? Perfect for Fitzy.
Hodgson: Assistant Production Manager. I believe the only requirements for this role are to know a little bit about every part of theatre and be a huge gossip. Talk to him for five minutes and you'll know everything happening in the company. Especially the things that are secrets.
Stanley: Company Manager. Last year I had a company manager not care that my housing was a few minutes away from burning up in an electrical fire. He'd be perfect.
Goodsir: Assistant Company Manager. Every theatre I've ever worked at, the ACM was the one who actually cared about you and actually did all the work. Once again perfect.
Jane Franklin: Costume shop manager/resident costume designer. Huge conflict of interest, considering her husband is in the CEO role of the theatre. Everybody lets it slide or uses it as an excuse for their own questionable relationships. When she's designing, everybody in the costume shop is in hell.
Le Vesconte: First Hand/Costume shop supervisor. Every costumer dresses so well its intimidating he would slay at that. Is one of the few year-round employees because he toured with Fitzjames and Gore for many years. Also is the one who actually does the designing when Jane is "designer". Bitches about it to anybody who will listen.
Crozier: Technical Director. I've met many, many TDs who were alcoholics. Also deals with the most bullshit because the scene shop is always, always going through it. And designers never understand that no, you can't put sixty people, a ten foot wide staircase, and a full orchestra on a turntable all at once it won't turn. Oh shit, who dropped a two-by-four on the intern?
Little: Assistant Technical Director. If you thought Crozier was in the trenches, he's got it worse. He's doing all the drafting, he's answering most of the carpenters questions, he's the one left in charge over load-in and tech week, aka the weeks where everything goes wrong as soon as you try to set up walls. The intern gets a concussion via Sonotube on the second show and he nearly has a heart attack.
Sophia Cracroft: Scene Shop Supervisor. Incredibly good at running the shop and communicating whatever Crozier and Little mean (but say badly) to the carpenters. The one who actually takes the intern to the urgent-care after the concussion.
Tozer: Carpenter. Loves nothing more than fucking with Little, much to Sophia's chagrin. Super skilled though and definitely could have gotten hired as a shop supervisor anywhere else, so everybody's glad he's there. They need all the help they can get. Always fights Little to be the one to take a sledgehammer to each new hire's welds to see if they were done right. Isn't too disappointed when Little wins that fight (checks him out the entire time).
Hartnell: Other carpenter. The previous year's carpentry intern. Everybody gives him shit because his brother works over in lighting. They all secretly agree his brother is slightly cooler.
Peglar: Deck Carpenter/Fly Captain. In the shop when shows aren't running. During a show run is backstage reading a book until a scene change, something needs flown in, or something breaks. Has a backstage book club with Bridgens.
Collins: Projections/carpentry swing. Not enough projections in the season for that to be his only job and never enough carpenters no matter how many you have. Made the mistake of letting Crozier know he was very good at welding. Ends every work day looking like he emerged from the mines.
Irving: Scenic Charge Artist. Main tool is a paint bible, you beat the hell out of brushes to clean them, and you use so much math to paint a drop? Of course I'm making him the painter (plus the watercolors thing). He's in hell for the entire season. Little ends up having to deal with it because Crozier doesn't want to.
Hickey: Scenic Artist. Actually an actor, has zero paint skills, lied to get this job so he could spend the summer with his boyfriend. Got hired because Billy lied too and Hodgson knew the name, but forgot he'd worked on a show where Hickey was an actor, not a technician. Spends the entire summer purposefully getting under Irving's skin. Somehow still well-liked by other departments?
Blanky: Props Master. Thomas Blanky is the ideal of what you want in a props master. No nonsense yet still knows how to have fun, super experienced, I could see him wearing fun shirts every day and also knowing how to craft realistic intestines out of cotton-balls and panty-hose.
Silna: Props artisan. She would know so much about how to make things I just feel it in my bones. Plus her and Blanky are lowkey my dream team they'd be making incredible shit happen in props land.
Gore: Audio Supervisor/Resident Sound Designer. I just think Graham Gore would be such a fun sound guy. That's my entire reasoning.
Bridgens: A2. Mics up actors, then reads a book until he has to swap batteries at intermission. He and Peglar have the healthiest relationship in the whole damn company.
Fairholme: Lighting Supervisor. Every lighting supervisor I've ever known was either straight out of college or one foot in the grave. He would have so much fun during a light hang while everybody else is in hell.
Armitage: Electrician/Light Board Op. I just think all the stewards would be running around backstage in their show blacks.
Other Hartnell: Electrician. Everybody's first choice to have a beer with.
Gibson: Dresser. Horrible attitude, somehow the best damn quick changer around. It drives Jopson insane that he is good at his job and still manages to slack off. Is Hickey's roommate/boyfriend, but makes him sleep in his car the several times they break up over the summer.
Jopson: ASM. Runs backstage like an army. While stage left is nice and calm, with Peglar and Bridgens reading their books, stage right is a goddamn psychological war zone thanks to Jopson and Gibson. Also made myself giggle imagining a production report note of "there was a weird, moving blue light during the scene change. Can we check the backstage blues for fade?" and Fairholme having to email back, "That's just Jopson's eyes."
Interns: Just assign your favorite ship boy to: Costumes, Lights, Sound, and Scenic. Paints lost their intern to budget cuts, sending Irving further into hell.
really love keeping up with my mutuals through their little tags and vent posts. getting updates on how they’re doing is something like: glad to know your job at the library is going well. i’m sorry you haven’t gotten that raise. glad your finals went well. i’m sorry your teacher is so unhelpful. glad your tv show got renewed. i’m sorry they killed your favorite character. glad that you scored tickets to see your favorite artist. i’m sorry they aren’t touring near you at all. glad your cat is doing well. i’m sorry your mom is sick again. glad you’re feeling better now that it’s your favorite season. i’m sorry your meds aren’t working. glad you’re married now. i’m sorry you have to step back for your mental health. glad you’re still here. i’m sorry life is so hard. glad you’re alive, i hope things get easier for you soon
My Terror fandom Hot Take is that I think it’s weird how little anyone into the real life history side cares about the Inuit who interacted with the FE. Lots of people dig in to the backgrounds of Tozer’s siblings or Irving’s friends, but nobody seems to have heard of Kokleearngnun or Too-shoo-art-thariu. I’ve observed a real lack of curiosity.
Ok, maybe not that weird, seeing as how I’ve blocked multiple people over the years for saying things like “the Inuit were/are liars”. When you’re saying stuff that was considered racist by some Victorians, it’s time to reconsider your views!
i think this is a fair take/critique that i myself can also learn from! for my part i’m very interested in ada blackjack (though i know she’s not involved with the FE), and have also noticed how non-white figures in polar history (e.g., matthew henson) receive relatively so little attention despite how compelling their lives and the obstacles they overcame are. this is not to say everyone has to let go of their white boy blorbo/interest, but expanding your mind beyond them is both imperative and rewarding!
also yeah, absolutely fuck anyone who discounts the firsthand testimonies of the inuit. i’d block their asses too 💯
In case anyone is interested, and you don’t fancy crawling through Charles Francis Hall’s journals yourself, I’ll give a brief summary of these two men’s most significant interactions.
Kokleearngnun told Hall about seeing a white man’s ship that became overwhelmed with ice and sank. He met a man by the name of Aglooka and a “pee-e-tu” (commonly interpreted to be a steward or non-seaman) who was called “Nar-tar”. Hall believed that that was a way of pronouncing “doctor”. Kokleearngnun was given two spoons with the initials FRMC stamped on them.
He met qallunaat at least twice (IIRC). I think that the most interesting testimony he gave was set aboard a ship. It’s quite controversial account, but I strongly believe that it is of the FE rather than of a different expedition. Hall, April 1866:
The Pelly Bay men described the Esh-emut-ta as an old man with broad shoulders, thick and heavier set than Hall, with gray hair, full face, and bald head. He was always wearing something over his eyes (spectacles, as Too-koo-li-too interpreted it), was quite lame, and appeared sick when they last saw him. He was very kind to the Innuits;—always wanting them to eat something. Ag-loo-ka (Crozier) and another man would go and do everything that Too-loo-ark told them, just like boys; he was a very cheerful man, always laughing; everybody liked him—all the kob-lu-nas and all the Innuits. Kok-lee-arng-nun showed how Too-loo-ark and Ag-loo-ka used to meet him. They would take hold of his hand, giving it a few warm and friendly shakes, and Too-loo-ark would say, “Ma-my-too-mig-tey-ma.” Ag-loo-ka’s hand-shaking was short and jerky, and he would only say, “Man-nig-too-mé.” “After the first summer and first winter, they saw no more of Too-loo-ark; then Ag-loo-ka (Crozier) was the Esh-e-mut-ta.”
Kokleearngnun's wife, Koo-narg, as well as several other women, also took tea aboard the ship with Toolooark, who gave them all ulus and, to Koo-narg, a silver pocket watch. It’s curious, because in the accounts from other expeditions, the British mostly gave the Inuit worthless (and sometimes insulting) gifts in exchange for information and items (e.g. pieces of old barrel).
Meanwhile, Too-shoo-art-thar-u definitely met the men after they abandoned ship. His group hadn’t heard that there were qallunaat on the island, so they sent their two bravest hunters (Ow-wer and Too-shoo-art-thar-u) (to use Hall’s renderings of their names) to go and investigate. They meet them at an ice crack, putting distance between them; one of the white men had a gun pointing at the hunters, but the man who was in front told him to put it down. He showed them an ulu and used it to make a line in the snow. He then pantomimed asking for something to eat. Too-shoo-art-thar-u called this first man “Aglooka”. Aglooka couldn’t speak much Inuktitut, but Too-shoo-art-thar-u eventually understood that he had come from two ships up north that had been crushed in ice. Quoting Hall again:
After this first interview the two men went ashore with the Innuits. While Aglooka was trying to talk with the Innuits (Ow-wer [my note: probably a shortening of Ukuararssuk] & Too-shoo-art-thar-u), the party with the boat and one other sledge passed by going a little lower down to a point or cape of the little bay where they then were. On getting ashore Aglooka wanted everything - every pack opened & opened them himself, the dogs' saddle bag packs, the women's packs and the men's packs, for everything was ready for making a journey across the land. Aglooka wanted meat & for this he wanted every pack opened. The Innuits were all willing he should do as he did.
After each man Innuit had given him some seal meat, it was all put on a (one) dog's back & then by the request of Aglooka all 4 Innuit men with the dog laden with meat went down with Aglooka and the man with him to where the men and the boat where, the men erecting a tent. As they approached the tent, one man came out to meet them. Aglooka spoke to the men when he and the Innuits were near the tent. The men along side the tent and the men alongside of the boat stood in line holding up their arms and open hands above their heads, showing they had nothing (that is no weapons) about them.
The men stayed for a bit. One of them caught a fish and one shot down a bird. In exchange for helping them, Aglooka handed out gifts.
The strange thing is that, several years earlier, in 1864, Hall heard a different story from the one above. That one was given by Too-shoo-art-thariu's cousins, and in it the white men stay for one night. The 1864 testimony was given by Too-shoo-art-thariu's mother and son. In that one, the white men stay all winter. They travel with Too-shoo-art-thariu and his family. They hunted and travelled in an inflatable boat. One of them died of illness, and the others left so that they could go back to their country. In thanks, Aglooka offered Too-shoo-art-thariu his rifle - Too-shoo-art-thariu turned it down because he didn’t know how to use it, so Aglooka gave him a “long knife” instead.
Ten years later, Schwatka met Ahlangyah, his wife, who claimed that the family had met ten qallunaat who stayed for five days. Just like in the previous accounts, two of the men were called Aglooka and Toolooah, but their physical descriptions don’t match Kokleearngnun's descriptions of the men he had dinner with. Furthermore, Rasmussen collected the testimony of a man whose father (Mangaq) had been with the group. It has similar features - the hunters meet the white men at a crack in the ice, the qallunaat (three this time) stay in their own tent (which is peculiar because it is not made of animal skins), they say their ships were crushed by the ice, they exchanged a knife for seal meat, and the white men leave because they want to go home. Rasmussen, as quoted in Unravelling the Franklin Mystery by Dave Woodman:
Father and his people would willingly have helped the white men, but could not understand them; they tried to explain themselves by signs, and in fact learned to know a lot by this means. They had once been many they said; now they were only few, and they had left their ship out in the pack-ice. They pointed to the south, and it was understood that they wanted to go home overland. They were not met again, and no one knows where they went to.
However, there was not a caribou hunt like in the first account, and this time they share a tent with Mangaq and the white men stay at least three days.
I’ll admit, I chose Too-shoo-art-thar-u at sort of random, because he’s a candidate for the man who was given the sword of a great officer , but when I checked my books and notes the story turned out to be more complicated than I remembered! But I decided to relay it to show everyone how difficult it can be to interpret Inuit testimony.
If you want to learn more, the best secondary sources with free pdfs of them floating around tumblr are Unravelling the Franklin Mystery by David Woodman and Encounters on the Passage: Inuit Meet the Explorers by Dorothy Harley Eber (slightly problematic in that it uses people’s Christian names instead of their proper names, so please ignore them). For an Inuit perspective, and what a lot of people say is the best book, there is The Land Was Always Used: An Inuit Oral History of the Franklin Expedition (if you have £40 to spare).
today i'm thinking abt hickey's "sort the ranks out of this in advance" in 1x6 and tozer's continued (mis)belief that he's an equal in their relationship. and it may seem that way at first (tozer confiding in hickey abt the fairholme party, the hodgson neptune lunch, orchestrating the guns, acting as his second in command at the mutiny camp). but when tozer shows his soft belly, makes suggestions/demands abt how they should proceed and unwittingly gives hickey the last piece for the tuurngaq plan (the soul eating!) in 1x9 hickey drops him like a hot potato bc hes not useful anymore (& of course hickey NEVER thought of tozer as an equal - that's crozier! - but he obviously up to that point had an interest in making him THINK he is. bc lbr without tozer and the guns the mutiny would be DUST. but i digress). most notably hickey does not involve tozer in the crozier kidnapping At All - tozer isn't even in camp when they return! i'd die for a tozer reaction shot bc omg what are you thinking. what WAS the ranks sorting out bc he sooo underestimated and misjudged his relationship with hickey...i mean post-almost-hanging tozer very much clocked that he bet on the wrong horse (his growing passivity at mutiny camp....) but at that point obviously it's really way too late and you gotta make the best of a really bad situation. hashtag his sunk cost fallacy but also like WHAT was he gonna do at that point. guy who was an active and confident leader who got worn down thru the combination of trauma, starvation/illness, and bad decisions to someone who is sososo scared and passive... like of course he's doubting his decision-making/leadership skills bc look at what his previous ones led them to. it's 11:05 am on a friday and i'm making myself sad about tozer :(
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