The longer the length of wire carrying an information bearing signal, the more power it loses and the signal progressively degrades until it may be inaudible at the other end.  A strategically placed repeater may help boost the power of the signal and retransmit it to extend its reach across miles of communication lines.  Such was the case along the Alaskan Highway that extended thousands of miles across the wilderness of western Canada into Alaska.  The highway had been proposed for several years, but a hesitant Canada was concerned about the military implications should their neutrality ever be compromised in a war between the United States and Japan.  Both nations priorities changed after Pearl Harbor and in February 1942 Canada agreed to the project as long as the United States bore the full cost.

An advanced detachment of the 843d Signal Service Battalion departed for actual operations in support of the ongoing project.  They were ordered to Edmonton to install, maintain, and operate the communications system for the highway, pipeline, and airfield construction.  They were needed immediately for the critical task.  With this advanced detachment was Edwin Johnston who had been drafted from his job as a boring mill operator at Sleeper & Hartley of Worcester, Massachusetts and made a repeaterman with the Army Signal Corps.  He was native to Canada, though about as far east of the Northwest Territory possible in Nova Scotia before moving to the United States at age four.

The early detachment of the 843d reported on November 21st, 1942 during the most vicious snowstorm in twenty years.  They soon found themselves clearing snow for the Royal Canadian Air Force where they shared a station as well as digging trenches in frozen earth for underground cable, constructing huts for living quarters, and hundreds of other details brought on by limited resources and personnel and winter weather.  Permanent radio installations and repeater locations began in January.  Operators were assigned upon completing each station, starting with Repeater #6 in Blueberry.  Within three months, each station from Dawson Creek to Whitehorse had been installed and was in operation.  The network went through Blueberry, Trutch, Fort Nelson, Summit Lake, Wuncho Lake, Coal River, Watson Lake, Seagull Creek, Brooks Brook, and Whitehorse to provide the only means of communication across the territory.

The main body of the 843d finally arrived in the beginning of May and the separate detachments finally reorganized into HQ, A (to which Edwin was assigned), and B Companies in August.  Throughout the year and into the next winter, at repeater locations technical troops were on guard to protect the continuity of communications.  Once they fulfilled their original mission, they evolved into a organizing and integrating a wire and radio communication network interlacing every point of activity and military importance throughout an area close to the size of the continental United States.  They were also tasked with a third mission to construct a pole line parallel to the highway to serve both as an administrative system for the command engaged in supervision of Alean and Canol construction as a linking landline between Alaska and the United States.  The radio network of the Northwest Service Command covered an area of more than 500,000 square miles from Edmonton to Norman Wells, linked the repeater stations of the Alaska Military Highway Telephone System up to Canyon at intervals of 80 miles, and followed the road from Whitehorse north to circle and Livengood.

Weather was forever their main adversary.  Summer brough forest fires churning through the timberland.  Melting ice and snow paired with heavy rains swelled streams into rivers and at one point washed out sixty miles of road.  Fierce wings and 40-below temperatures made winter the dominant foe in the Northwest Territory.  Most areas of the 2596 miles of pole line stretched across complete wilderness, in some cases (and by necessity) navigable only by dog team.  It made for a peculiar radio climate where high powered long wave radios were unavailable and blackouts attributed to an astonishing 40% of each 24-hour day, so relay stations were crucial.  Edwin was not spared the unceasing hours of work required by the battalion to maintain communication along the lines.

A Company’s headquarters was blessed to improve their living conditions at Dawson Creek only marginally in April 1944.  Gravel hauled and graded in the company area eliminated sopping mud pockets, stoves were improved, storm windows installed, and scenic paintings hung in the recreation hall.  But life continued to be arduous without much flavor until June 6th when all men at their stations hung on the radio to hear of invasion of Normandy.  Their lines carried vital reports of flight control and weather and as removed as they might be from ‘the front,’ they felt included in faraway operations.

The battalion began to deactivate its stations in September.  Equipment was packed, inventoried, and shipped ultimately to return to the Zone of Interior.  At their peak, the battalion numbered 330 personnel, but by September were cut by sixty-percent.  Most of them went to a neighboring AACS group, and eventually the Northwest Service Command itself dissolved in June 1945 and was absorbed into the Sixth Service Command.  Throughout the reductions of stations and personnel, Edwin managed to stay with A Company to the very end, returning to the United States in November and discharged two days later.