Free The Ice Pilots by Michael Vlessides

and has built a reputation as a transportation hub for the rest of the Northwest Territories (it calls itself “The Hub of the North”). This is largely due to the fact that Hay River is the northernmost point in North America connected to the continental railway system. Hay River is also a major staging point for the many barges that ply the waters of the Mackenzie River during the summer, when northern communities along the river stock their larders as much as possible before winter sets in.
    Until 1968, when the highway to Yellowknife was built, Hay River was literally the end of the road, which made the town the ideal place to run an airline. Yellowknife may be the home of Buffalo’s massive hangar, and the site of all of its northern-based maintenance, but Hay River is the company’s legal base of operations.
    “I was always in the hangar,” Mikey told me. “I was honestly—legitimately—raised by rampies.” He was a snot-nosed kid, always lurking around the hangar, constantly underfoot. He would be passed off from rampie to rampie, and he would drive around in courier vans with them each day. They even took young Mikey on fishing and ATV trips. “So I really was raised by them.”
    Buffalo started its twice-daily Hay River–Yellowknife passenger service the year Mikey was born, so Joe was not a constant figure in his son’s life when Mikey was growing up in Hay River. “Every day he was gone to Yellowknife and wouldn’t come back until later that night. That’s all I’ve ever known,” Mikey said as we waited in the hangar one morning for the sked to arrive from Hay River.
    “Hey,” I asked as the DC-3 touched down in front of us with the yelp of rubber hitting asphalt, “is your Dad gonna greet you with a big hug and kiss? Tell you how much he loves you?”
    “More like he’ll tell me about something I’ve screwed up,” Mikey said with a laugh. He understands how his father operates, and if there’s any resentment corked up inside Mikey’s body, he does a hell of a good job covering it up. To the contrary, while Mikey may spend a fair bit of time griping about the old man, I know he admires his dad. “He’s not motivated by money at all,” said Mikey. “He’s motivated by one thing: doing the job. He’s completely customer oriented.”
    In a land where unique personalities are the rule rather than the exception, Joe is in a class of his own. His slicked-back pompadour speaks to his affinity for the 1950s, when he was an adolescent. This man is the product of a bygone era, and one that Mikey says he never quite left. In fact, Mikey considers his dad a cross between Howard Hughes, James Dean, and Married with Children’ s Al Bundy. “Of the six billion people on Earth, there’s nobody else who could run Buffalo,” Mikey said.
    That may be a bit of a stretch, but Joe is perfectly suited to helm the company. He is stubborn to the point of being unyielding, a trait that helps him keep his commitments to his clients. He is unconventional and uses any means necessary to deliver cargo across vast tracts of untamed wilderness. When your fleet is largely composed of World War II–era planes, thinking outside the box is an important characteristic.
    And perhaps most of all, Joe McBryan is simple. Not simple-minded, but rather there is nothing fancy about this man. In all the time I spent in the hangar, I knew I could count on Joe to bring his lunch to work every day, whether it was a bologna sandwich or a plastic container containing leftovers from last night’s dinner. Jeans and a plaid work shirt—that’s Joe McBryan.
    The way Mikey sees it, Joe has created a universe for himself, one that insulates him from the outside world. “He’s created himself this world that he can live in so he doesn’t have to go outside, really. He lives completely and eccentrically in his own world.
    “He’s never grown up, because he’s never had to,” Mikey added. “The moment he became his own boss,