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With Jackson at his side, the hulking, taciturn Healy saw to the establishment of missions and schools, often erected with cargoes of lumber carried aboard the BeAR. One wonders with amusement what Mike's brother James, by then a Catholic bishop thought of this well-publicized partnership. Early in his Arctic service, Healy had been impressed with the relative wellbeing that large herds of domesticated reindeer afforded the Siberian natives living along the west coast of the Bering Sea. Between them, Healy and Jackson came up with the idea of purchasing some of these animals and transporting them to the Alaskan side of the Bering Sea where, it was believed, they would multiply and effectively replace the dwindling herds of barren-grounds caribou, which had been decimated by overhunting. The cost of purchase and transport of the first dozen animals in 1891 was borne by Presbyterian mission funding, but a trip to Washington by Jackson brought long-term Congressional funding, so that in 1892, 53 more reindeer were brought to Alaska, followed by a hundred or so in each remaining year of the decade, by Healy and other cutter captains. With the reindeer from Siberia came a number of Chukchi herdsmen, men with long experience in caring for the animals. Many of the men would remain to become permanent residents of Alaska. Though Captain Healy zealously hunted down and prosecuted the traders who sold liquor to natives, he was himself progressively addicted to whiskey, engaging in periodic bouts of heavy drinking, doubtless due at least in part to the frequent and lengthy periods of separation from his wife, as well as to the penetrating Arctic chill, to which the Georgia-born Healy, despite decades of far-northern service, never really adjusted. Although Healy denied that his drinking interfered with the discharge of his various duties, his superiors, on several occasions at least, thought otherwise. After reports that Healy had unjustifiably boarded an American sealer and maltreated several of her crew, Captain Healy was court-martialed in San Francisco, but was found not guilty on all charges. In view of the previous reprimands for drunkenness and misconduct, however, (one dating back to 1872) Healy was to be denied command of a cutter for a period of two years. In 1900 and again in 1903, he was involved in serious incidents, in one of which he would probably have been convicted, had he not been judged temporarily insane. Healy went ashore for the last time in 1903 and was dead the following year. In 1894, the year before Healy relinquished command of the BeAR, a New York Times reporter wrote of the man who deserves much of the credit for the transformation of coastal Alaska during the previous 15 years: "He is the ideal commander of the old school, bluff, prompt, fearless, just. He knows the Bering Sea, the Straits, and even the Arctic as no other man knows them." During Mike Healy's life, his boisterous, intemperate ways must often have been a source of embarrassment to his cleric brothers and sisters. But then none of the others had ever happened upon villages of the dead, nor discovered the terrible secret of the marooned whalers of Point Hope. � Crewmembers aboard the Bear hoist reindeer from Siberia, Aug 28,1891, for transport to the Alaskan side of the Bering Sea. USCG Historian 38 RESERVIST � Issue 2 • 2015