Their aren't many left like the man who killed a wolf with his bare hands

I only met Iditarod Joe once, and that was at a mushers committee meeting at Iditarod HQ a little over 10 years ago. Even at his advanced age he had a strong, firm handshake and would look you right in the eye and flash an ear to ear grin. Fewer young people want the lifestyle anymore, and the old timers are dying out. Iditarod Joe passed away on May 1, and there are very few like him left. A good rememberence of him today in the Dispatch.

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WASILLA -- Not many in this day and age can claim to have killed a wolf in hand-to-fang combat, but that's not why hundreds turned out Sunday at the headquarters of the Iditarod Trail Committee in Wasilla to honor the late Joe Delia.

Delia was a man with big, gentle hands who knew well the kill-or-be-killed rules of the jungle, and yet lived by the best rule of mankind -- love thy neighbor. He was a strong man with the face of a smiling hawk and a heart full of compassion.

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Iditarod broadened the impact Joe had on the world, but he was one of those special people who would have had an impact without Iditarod. He was, quite simply, the best of what Alaska once was -- a place where those living deep in the wilderness reached out a hand to help anyone and everyone because of a shared recognition of the frailty of man.

"He was always looking out for everyone," remembered former Skwentna neighbor Joyce Logan, who along with husband Joe, once owned the Skwentna Roadhouse across the river of the same name.

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Joe befriended Israel's father, Tom Peyton, when he moved into the Skwentna River valley in 1975, looking to become a man of the wilds. At Joe's memorial service, Tom, now in his 60s, joked about how Joe often warned that "there's always some guy with a bag of traps in one hand and a .30-06 (caliber rifle) in the other" looking to make a life in the wilderness.

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The term "woodsman'' doesn't mean a lot to most people these days. But it still means much to a select few who know the hardships and difficulties of life beyond the edge of civilization, and understand the work ethic and complex bag of skills required to make that life look easy.

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"He jumped off his snowmachine and bull-dogged the wolf to the ground," Israel said. Joe pulled the snare tight around the wolf's neck, and the animal went limp. Joe thought it was dead. He tied it on the back of his snowmachine and headed home.

One problem: The wolf wasn't dead.

On the run back to Skwenta, it came to life and attacked Joe, knocking him off the snowmachine and into the snow. They ended up in a life-and-death battle in the bitter cold. Joe eventually managed to pin the wolf against the cowling of the snowmachine and beat it to death.

"And that's at age 60-plus," Israel said. "He killed it with his bare hands."

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The crowd was heavy with Alaskans from another time. These were people who knew how to use an ax better than a computer.

As the service ended, someone started to sing "Amazing Grace." It was not planned. It was sung a capella with only the wind whistling in the early leaves of May as accompaniment.

It was the kind of thing Joe would have appreciated.

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Probably will not get much interest here, but the world is losing these old timers and is changing so rapidly we'll not see the likes of them again. The old woodsman, there aren't many left. If you know one, spend time with them, listen to their tales. It's how they become immortal because they were larger than life.