George Meegan
George Meegan (2 December 1952 – 10 January 2024) was a British adventurer and alternative educator best known for his unbroken walk of the Western Hemisphere from the southern tip of South America to the northernmost part of Alaska at Prudhoe Bay.
He received substantial media coverage (including appearances on the Today Show, CBS Morning News and Larry King Live) and was featured in numerous public speaking forums.
In the course of his walk and subsequent worldwide residencies, Meegan developed a profound interest in indigenous cultures; he sought innovative ways to teach native peoples how to flourish in modern technological society while retaining their language and identity.
From there he went to sea in the Merchant Navy, first, on the MV Trecarne (1970), then the other tramp freighter Hain-Nourse, which was then a part of the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company (P&O)—embarking on his childhood ambition for a life of ‘high adventure.’[citation needed] Seafaring took him to more than 100 international ports of call, including Hong Kong, Bombay, Calcutta, Melbourne, Port Elizabeth, Cape Town, Antwerp, Dar es Salaam, and Mombasa.
A notable incident (during his anchorage off Lagos, Nigeria) in which Meegan played an important role—maintaining order aboard his ship, the Omar—is now called The Great Cement Scandal of 1975.
Door-to-door attempts to convince others to publish the manuscript failed until he met American war hero John Walker, who introduced George to Dodd, Mead and Company.
[citation needed] However, the 199-year-old firm, after a series of non-familial corporate ownerships, later went bankrupt, so in 2008, he self-published The Longest Walk: The Record of our World’s First Crossing of the Entire Americas.
[11] In 1988, Dodd, Mead and Co, which did the first Lewis and Clark journal, published the more familiar edition with Meegan's preferred subtitle The Longest Walk: An Odyssey of the Human Spirit.
[12] Following the Dodd, Mead publication, strong reviews led to appearances on the Today Show, CBS Morning News, and Larry King Live.
Following the People publicity, New Yorker, Backpacker, Voice of America, Studs Terkel, various primetime TV interviews, and numerous newspaper articles from The New York Times to The Washington Post showcased the "witty, clean-cut globetrotter".
In frequent letters to notable politicians and public figures, Meegan extols the land's open space, an innate drive of its people to achieve, and the availability of the American Dream to all.
"It includes the opportunity to prosper and succeed, and an upward social mobility achieved through hard work that is available to the common man like him, an orphan, school dropout who ran away to sea.
[clarification needed] On 23 January 2001 Meegan reached his goal – land's end of North America – with about 100 Barrow villagers and adventurers from the world,[20] including Lt. Col. Norman D. Vaughan.
The purpose of the Alaska 2000 effort was to complete the hemispheric walk and to bring hope to the indigenous world by developing an alternative educational route whereby they could maintain their endangered culture and yet be a part of the 21st century.
The year 2000 March was cancelled due to weather until the following 23 January, which is the true Millennium (the 23rd is when the new sun finally reaches Barrow, the 11th most north village in the world).
Arctic survival gear was provided and John 'Jumper' Bitters,[21] formerly of New Zealand's elite Special Air Service, parachuted down with flags as the thirty walkers reached Jumper DZ from Point Barrow.
At this millennium event, in front of world media, the US government formally apologized to First Nations—the more than 600 Aboriginal peoples spread across Canada and Alaska who are neither Inuit nor Métis—in a public gesture unique in American history.
[22] "At Barrow on 1 January 2001, the US government via the White House and Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) offered sincere apology for 'the cowardly killing of woman and children'... and other atrocities spelled out in three-and-a-half pages read out loud.
From these worldwide journeys emerged the principles of Democracy Reaches the Kids (DRTK)—beginning with the question, "What does each individual child, at the beginning of that great challenge and adventure we call life, need to be successful in the 21st century?"
While hitchhiking to the ship in Kobe, George was picked up by Yoshiko, then they stayed in touch by mail for two years until he decided to break the long-distance hiking record held by David Kwan (18,500 miles).
[citation needed] By the completion of the Longest Walk in 1983, Yoshiko had birthed a son and daughter during timeouts in Japan, as George marched the unbroken route up the Americas.
'[48] With his own children in the midst of peer pressure to withdraw, Meegan fought back with a written abstract titled "Hikikomori: New Approach of Hope"[49] dealing with the country adolescents pulling inward by seeking extreme degrees of isolation.
She sang *The Star-Spangled Banner" in front of 2000 people, plus VIPs, at the annual dinner and press conference for her father hosted by the Explorers at the NY Waldorf Astoria Hotel.
[citation needed] Ten years earlier, in 1990, George and son Geoffrey had slept behind the couch of an old friend in Barrow named Rex Wilhelm[57] who had since become president of the historic Alaska Commercial.
Using Democracy Reaches the Kids as a platform, Meegan ran for 2010 general election as a non-political Independent by gathering 109 personal votes for the constituency of Gillingham and Rainham, where he grew up as boy.
One of its earliest supporters was celebrated NY teacher John Taylor Gatto, who used notes from Meegan's book and carried them protected in laminations with him during his lecture days.
"Meegan's personal letters to public figures to drum up support for educational reform were buttressed by facts, dusted with Shakespearean charm, and always accompanied by a 'cheerio' goodbye.
"[67] In another letter to Captain Mark Kelly USN, Astronaut, he proudly featured his E11 visa, "I have been judged at the highest US peer review level,[68] and my deep regard of America is well known.
The Waorani or Huaorani, also known as the Waos, are Native Americans of the Amazonian who have marked differences, such as language, culture, and a deep identification with the Jaguar, from other ethnic groups from Ecuador.
[73] On arrival in Puyo, he arranged meetings among the tribe and on 6 June 2013, presented a lecture called "Stealing the Fire" to the Quito Ministry of Higher Education.
