Characters from the North: Canada or USA?

[Matilda]

I was just making for myself a list of the characters in my headcanon Duckiverse according to their place of residence. I was curious to see which countries/states/imaginary lands would be represented on this list.

For a handful of characters, the question arises whether they live in Canada (usually Yukon) or in the USA (Alaska or elsewhere in the "North Woods"). I am embarrassed to say that when I was a youngling, I thought Yukon was *in* Alaska! But even once I outgrew that, the confusion sometimes remained, since various characters went back and forth between Yukon and Alaska.

Here's my sense of Where They Are Now (in the "present" which in my headcanon is the mid-to-late 1950's):

Yukon: Goldie O'Gilt (and Blackjack)
    Big Barnsmell aka Barnsie ("A Trailblazing Tale" Transgaard/Gattino)

Alaska: Barko
    Soapy Slick (Rosa says Slick used to be in Dawson, Yukon, but got deported to Alaska, where he is in "North of the Yukon")
    Jeb and Zeb Clinker ("Rattled Railroader" Fallberg/Strobl)

Greta Goose (Gus's cousin) and Hjalmar the Hunter (GD story in WDC 141, Christensen/Wright) live in the "north woods," where Greta is a lumberjack. Here I would vote for the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, probably, where there'd be a bunch of Scandinavians (and still, I believe, an active lumbering operation in the 1950's).

Does that look right to you?

I really like the fact that the love of Scrooge's life is a Canadian.

[Scrooge MacDuck]

Jul 6, 2017 1:49:54 GMT Matilda said:

I really like the fact that the love of Scrooge's life is a Canadian.

Hmmm… Was Goldie born in Yukon, you think? Or did she emigrate from Ireland? Or from elswhere entirely? And if she did come from elsewhere, did she ever get a Canadian citizenship? For that matter, it appears that Scrooge is an American citizen (he pays taxes and so), but Don Rosa never shows ups when he became one, so at which point do you suppose…?

[Matilda]

Jul 6, 2017 8:44:04 GMT Scrooge MacDuck said:

Jul 6, 2017 1:49:54 GMT Matilda said:

I really like the fact that the love of Scrooge's life is a Canadian.

Hmmm… Was Goldie born in Yukon, you think? Or did she emigrate from Ireland? Or from elswhere entirely? And if she did come from elsewhere, did she ever get a Canadian citizenship? For that matter, it appears that Scrooge is an American citizen (he pays taxes and so), but Don Rosa never shows ups when he became one, so at which point do you suppose…?

I didn't claim she was Canadian-born! But she's certainly been in Canada long enough now... She must have "landed immigrant" status, at least. (Nowadays it's "permanent immigrant" status.) I prefer to believe she's a citizen.

[RobbK1]

Jul 6, 2017 1:49:54 GMT Matilda said:

I was just making for myself a list of the characters in my headcanon Duckiverse according to their place of residence. I was curious to see which countries/states/imaginary lands would be represented on this list.

For a handful of characters, the question arises whether they live in Canada (usually Yukon) or in the USA (Alaska or elsewhere in the "North Woods"). I am embarrassed to say that when I was a youngling, I thought Yukon was *in* Alaska! But even once I outgrew that, the confusion sometimes remained, since various characters went back and forth between Yukon and Alaska.

Here's my sense of Where They Are Now (in the "present" which in my headcanon is the mid-to-late 1950's):

Yukon: Goldie O'Gilt (and Blackjack)
    Big Barnsmell aka Barnsie ("A Trailblazing Tale" Transgaard/Gattino)

Alaska: Barko
    Soapy Slick (Rosa says Slick used to be in Dawson, Yukon, but got deported to Alaska, where he is in "North of the Yukon")
    Jeb and Zeb Clinker ("Rattled Railroader" Fallberg/Strobl)

Greta Goose (Gus's cousin) and Hjalmar the Hunter (GD story in WDC 141, Christensen/Wright) live in the "north woods," where Greta is a lumberjack. Here I would vote for the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, probably, where there'd be a bunch of Scandinavians (and still, I believe, an active lumbering operation in the 1950's).

Does that look right to you?

I really like the fact that the love of Scrooge's life is a Canadian.

We had tonnes of Swedes, Norwegians, Icelanders and Finns in Manitoba, and they had good numbers in Western Ontario as well.  Of course, there were loads of Scandinavians in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, The Dakotas, Montana and Michigan.  There were even a few Danes in those provinces and US states.  A lot of Scandinavians and Finns immigrated to The North Woods and Great Plains states and provinces because they were experienced loggers and knew how to grow wheat, oats and barley in the far northern climates (and they were used to the cold).  You can still find whole towns full of those ethnic groups on both sides of the border.  Lawrence Welk grew up in a small town in North Dakota, populated solely by Germans.  He didn't learn to speak English until in his 30s.

I'd place Greta and Hjalmar in Manitoba or western Ontario - if they were in USA at all, it would only be in The iron Range country of northern Minnesota, near Lake Superior. 

And why would Goldie have wanted to remain Irish and not become a Canadian, if she intended to remain in Canada (as Barks showed she indeed had done for the vast percentage of her life (EVEN if she arrived there as a young adult-and there's no evidence that she wasn't born there).  The worst of The Potato Famines was during the 1840s.  So, it's very likely that her father immigrated to Canada during the late 1840s or 1850s, and she was born there.

[Matilda]

Yeah, I'm with you, Goldie is either Canadian-born (more likely) or a Canadian citizen by "now" (1950's). I wasn't claiming she was or was not born in Canada.

Sure, the Iron Range of Minnesota is a possibility for Greta & Hjalmar, too, but no more so than the U.P. of Michigan--plenty of logging (and Scandinavians) there, too. I wasn't identifying Michigan as the only possibility, just the one I chose out of the range of possibilities. And yes, they could just as likely be in Manitoba or western Ontario, though the story doesn't indicate that Grandma Duck had to go through customs! Not that that was a big deal in the 1950's.... I'll have to read the story again to see if anything about it says "Canada" or "northern USA" to me. "Hjalmar" made me think northern Midwest rather than Maine, in any case.

[RobbK1]

Jul 6, 2017 21:37:58 GMT Matilda said:

Yeah, I'm with you, Goldie is either Canadian-born (more likely) or a Canadian citizen by "now" (1950's). I wasn't claiming she was or was not born in Canada.

Sure, the Iron Range of Minnesota is a possibility for Greta & Hjalmar, too, but no more so than the U.P. of Michigan--plenty of logging (and Scandinavians) there, too. I wasn't identifying Michigan as the only possibility, just the one I chose out of the range of possibilities. And yes, they could just as likely be in Manitoba or western Ontario, though the story doesn't indicate that Grandma Duck had to go through customs! Not that that was a big deal in the 1950's.... I'll have to read the story again to see if anything about it says "Canada" or "northern USA" to me. "Hjalmar" made me think northern Midwest rather than Maine, in any case.

We just drove across the line into USA and back during the 1950s, and waved to the man inside the little kiosk.  He waved back.  We didn't even stop! 

I think the story just wanted The North Woods to be in whatever country got the story.  We got the same comic books in Canada people got in USA (other than a few advert pages (when they had them in USA).  And stories were also printed in Europe.  In The Netherlands, we were supposed to think The Ducks lived in The Netherlands. "The North Woods" were supposed to be a small patch of woods north of Groningen, I suppose, or, maybe in Sweden.  Or maybe they were near the north end of Westbroek Park, just west of Den Haag, 2 streets from where my Oma and Opa lived.