The Inuit of Northwestern Canada

Maine is known for having some of the most extreme weather patterns in the United States. If you ask any local, they will tell you that it actually has only two seasons, summer and winter. If you continue to move north this is more of the case, but winter seems to become the more dominant of the two. When the weather starts to get to 20 below on a regular basis in the winter, you would think anyone in their right mind wouldn’t want to live there and you would steer clear of the area. However, this is not the case for the Inuit in Northwestern Canada. They, along with other tribes, have been inhabiting this massive, inhabitable area for thousands of years. It’s as close as anyone can get to the north pole without actually living on an ice cap. 

Let’s do a little comparison of the extremes of Maine and the Inuit territory, starting with the interaction with animals. 

It's always a bummer when you wake up in the morning on trash day and everyone on the streets garbage can is pushed over. You walk out to see what happened (when you already know) to see a black bear having the feast of its life. If you couldn’t guess, this is Maine. The black bear population is estimated to be quite large in the northern part of the state and in some cases can get used to humans being around, making them less scared of encounters. But if you want it to go away, just make loud noises and in some cases run at them and they will usually get out of your hair. Now picture waking up in the morning and the whale blubber that you harvested for the year, one of the most precious resources for the house, is being indulged, but there is nothing you can do about it. It would actually be quite dangerous to even try and go outside to shoo it away. The time you do walk outside to check the area, you walk to the end of your driveway, to then turn around and see this massive white beast sleeping under your house. If you haven’t guessed already, this white beast is a polar bear. Which is about four times the size of the black bear that will keep people in Maine on their toes. This is one of the extremes they have to live with in this area. You may be thinking, well there aren’t that many polar bears so it can’t happen that often. Oh contraire, two thirds of the polar bear population lives in their territory. In some cases there can be 60 bears in one square mile of land. Umm, that’s a lot. Not the most fun thing to wake up to in the morning. 

Then, there is the more obvious part of the comparison, weather. Let’s talk about everyone’s favorite part of winter, snow (until you realize it’s not going to stop and it turns into more of an inconvenience than a pretty sight). In Caribou, Maine, they get the most snowfall in the state at around 110-120 inches per year. When put into perspective, that actually doesn’t seem like a whole lot. Winter weather in Maine starts in November and will probably get the last snow in March. If the 120 inches is spread throughout the winter that is only about one six inch snow storm a week, seems manageable but that is still 20 weeks of consistent snow (so maybe a lot), and it’s not melting away. Let us migrate to our friends up north. Now, you’re probably expecting me to tell you this astronomical number of inches of snow, but I’m not going to. It’s actually a little underwhelming at only a mere 60-70 inches per year. However, snow isn’t the problem they face. The northwestern climate is way too dry to get the amount of snow Maine gets on an annual basis. Although, it gets colder than Jack Frost’s beard up there. So much so that when we were kids, we were constantly trying to recreate and perfect the houses they used to live in. We would start with a huge snow pile and dig out a little fort, or start with a ring in the ground and build upon that. 

Why are we telling you this? You clicked on jackets and all you’re getting is a bit about the cold extreme weather that these people have been enduring for thousands of years. Well, extreme weather, as we have discussed, calls for extreme adaptations. At some point they got tired of trying to cover themselves in blankets and sheltering in nature’s insulation to stay warm. They had to come up with an idea that was just as extreme at their conditions. Think of the most outrageously large piece of clothing that, when you look at it, you associate it with freezing temperatures, but you also think of coziness. It’s the only outerwear piece so robust in nature and is the only one that can stand up to this kind of weather, and they invented it. The parka.