Blood, Bone and Stone: The story of Jack McKey, mountain man, maker of primitive weapons, and mystic

foreign [Music] Mountain that's the most probably religious of the most powerful mountain in this entire Rocky Mountain mountain range and I mean from top to bottom I'd say I was eight and I was taken to that mountain I saw that mountain I was there and I was shown what the end of the Earth would look like as we know it from that mountain it scared me and then all down through life I've had every proof in the world that I ain't it who I am so it makes you think something's going on here [Music] and my quest has always been that Jack where do you get these ideas beware are you reincarnated do you have dreams I mean it's almost like unnatural that a human being could have this knowledge and take that knowledge and turn it into something you can actually use I try to find a word that might describe him he's a stubborn old cuss is what he is and sometimes I come up with primitive outdoor sea going cowboy he's just an old cowboy you know he's just an old he's the Marlboro Man I'm the one to go [Music] say stop say stop don't want no questions everything like is it real or not you know uh he's a good cowboy he was you know he's an old-time Cowboy a realist and a true mountain man I'm not sure [Music] doing since all I need so someone whose goal is to go into an environment and survive with minimal or native materials but I remember asking one time says you know how did you learn that stuff you know the the Native American tribes teach you how to do this he said well actually as I teach them about their own crafts I teach them about their history and after being around him I realized that that was really solid [Music] if the zombies take over and the apocalypse starts tomorrow I'm gonna find Jack Mackey because I know I'll have shelter I know I'll have food and water and I know I'll have a way to protect myself America [Music] my name is Jack Mackey and I grew up in Valdosta Georgia he was adopted my mother my biological mother took a center tail feather from a golden eagle and placed it in my adoption papers when I was adopted and told Mother he'll know what it means one day his biological parents I think did not have any intentions of having children war was going on and so on and so they apparently found a nice family that wanted to adopt him Winston Carlisle Mackey was my father and Dorothy made Jackson was my mother and growing up he had he always liked to play you know play Cowboy he dressed up and he liked to when I go out and make a bow and bow and Aaron I was making errors when I was a little bitty guy walking around we made our own bows out of cane and whatever once in a while we were lucky mama would go to antibias when those little bows from the 10 cents store and we'd go up down the Creek shooting frogs in North Carolina that's when he made that birch bark canoe I was what about eight or nine when I built my first birch bark canoe when I think about it I think about a gifted child growing up that was overlooked where is it where does it come from I have no idea I don't know how I know how to do anything I do all I know is I can do it it's all up here I knew what the materials were knew what they had to be and I knew how to make them maybe I had some kind of help from somewhere else maybe somebody was standing over my shoulder somewhere I don't know all I know is everything has been that way ever since I had some things take place that uh could really spook you as a kid let me see how it all started I was in my bedroom mother had a picture on the wall it was a picture of Jesus with his hands on a young boy's shoulder she had that hanging in my room and I found myself standing in front of it I felt a pressure behind me on my right side and all of a sudden I was beginning to see a picture of a place that I'd never seen before and I could look out across a group of mountains and I could see the Pacific Ocean and I knew that's what it was in a while there was a tremendous blast and that blast created a heat wave that came and I could feel it physically feel it and then I began to feel my flesh melt off my bones and whatever it was behind me I could feel his hand on my shoulder he said don't worry you're with us now but what you have seen is the end of time as you know it and uh it then it all just sort of went away but I knew right then and there that from that point on I'd be protected and I have been all my life his adopted dad Winston Carlisle Mackey passed away when Jack was only 10 or 11 years old my mother told me she was trying to get out of the woods you know and she sold all the property that Daddy had and uh she wanted to come into town I don't want to get out in the woods and I think she gave him dancing lessons ballroom dancing lessons to try to change him or make a doctor a lawyer or something else that I think was expected of him to do and I didn't want to be no doctor didn't want to be no lawyer you know I didn't want to walk around my lawn and cloth around my neck like most of these people do and I just wasn't interested in that's not where my heart was he just liked to be outdoors he liked to be around horses he liked to be in the woods and I had five years you know in high school and first year college in a military school and when I got out of that uh well I actually went out west with Uncle Donnelly uh started working cattle out there his uncle had quite a big spread uh down there you know I was breaking about 84 head of Colts a year for him and while I was there uh the Cuban crisis broke out Ray Stevenson term Soviet blackmail in Cuba was a quarantine of all offensive weapons being shipped from Russia to that Island Fortress he was in the National Guard and he he enjoyed it and got his honorable discharge I didn't stay in the National Guard but I had three years that I spent down in Central America and we were after somebody down there and it took us three years to catch him but we did foreign [Music] classified today so I can't talk about it I came back the Valdosta last year of the National Guard business or whatever it was uh I came back here and uh starting hunting Gators it kind of started like I was in the swamp and I got to where I wouldn't use a gun to shoot alligators with I'd kill them with an ax or I'd kill him with a lance and sometimes you'd have to kind of improvise you know so how would you do it you didn't have modern tools to do stuff with so you have to think back well what did the old people do how did they do it you know how would you catch a Gator by George if you ain't got no hooks well you'd have to use a throat gouge so you don't cut a limb like that and type a rope in the middle bait it all up hang it let the gator come up and get it he'd swallow it when he started to swim off it turned sideways and lock in his throat if you needed something and you didn't have it you had to improvise to get it and that's kind of the way things really really came together Mary Alice's first wife uh Jay's mother I remember she was just one of the sweetest just a very very sweet kind lady in every way [Music] foreign memories I have Jack I guess I was probably maybe four three or four somewhere around there where he used to take me down to Key West being so young I don't have vivid memory of it but he used to take me out on a on a boat and it seems like one of the best memories I have is he and I being on a boat together and these three Jets come flying over you know [Music] I met Jack in Valdosta Georgia when I was attending graduate school I was working with the Planning Commission at the time and uh one day Betty just come walking down the aisle with these little short red thing on didn't look too shabby gorgeous set of legs I guess I could say our first date was a fishing trip you know she liked being outdoors and had a good time fishing so I tickle me he had a Dory skiff and so we went fishing off uh it was a little place called Spring Warrior and it was just the neatest little place I mean miles off the coast and it was still shallow and you could see the bottom and uh anyway we went out quite a ways and all of a sudden I'm like oh I need to be excused I got to go to the bathroom and I think we're too far out to go back in you're gonna have to either pee over the side or pee in the boat or I'll give you a bucket and I forgot to put the water in the bottom of the bucket he handed me a five gallon bucket of plastic five gallon bucket and so I was trying to be as discreet as possible and as soon as I relieved myself it was just this noise like a drum and I was so embarrassed and I got to laugh and she got embarrassed I told her I said if you're gonna be around me you're gonna have to get used to stuff like that and don't worry about it it's been that way ever since he was witty and just full of a lot of things to do I mean you didn't get bored around Jack I remember a couple of times that that Jack and I had had Jay was with with visitations he was about four years old I guess he was up there trying to reach for something and then just looking at me and I looked at him and he looked at me and Jay took off and I chased him out front door and he ran under the car it was so funny and I could just see Jack doing that the last time I saw Jack I was at a babysitter I can't remember if he picked me up and hugged me for the last time set me down walked out the door was the last time I seen him [Music] when I left it broke my heart it pure broke my heart I didn't know what else to do but it was decision I had to make I wanted my boy alive I wanted his mother alive and I was afraid they wouldn't be by George if I stayed I know that Jack felt he didn't want to hurt anybody but as time went on we had quite a few setbacks and when he feel like reconnecting something else was going on or he would have a setback financially my mother remarried a guy from Lake Park there Ray Dowdy and Ray was a great father you know I couldn't ask for a better dad to raise me in some of these situations is like somebody has to be the bad guy and I guess he said I'll be the bad guy we never have a chance to get together we just never had a chance to get together as I recall we were not present when an adoption took place we were in Wyoming in a remote rant with very few Communications and we may go to town once a month [Music] oh I I think we are born with a uh a need to create if you believe in the Bible where it says and God created man in his own image if God was the master Creator created the Earth the universe the Stars the plants everything around us if we're creating His Image when we want to do a little creation as well when we first went out west um we were we lived in Jackson Hole and he was talking about building a horn bow he always talked about I want to make a horn bow I want to make a horn boat I had no idea what a horn bow was uh he started Gathering materials then when he would see an opportunity to do that if there was a problem animal if there was a roadkill if there was an animal that had to be put down they would call Jack fishing game would call Jack so I was getting you know materials for even Center and stuff he uh got a set of sheep horn that actually it was Rocky Mountain sheet that came out of New Mexico yeah they would give me sheep horn and moose antler and anything I needed you know he managed to salvage and use just about every every part of an animal he met that blame government giving me stuff and that's when he made his first sheep horn bow but when he started on it it took him nine hours standing up and he he raised the temperature at about 109 degrees and he stood he was in there for nine hours sweating and working on this bow and the reason he had the temperature so high was because of the glues that he worked with so they wouldn't set up too fast oh there were only a few or maybe a couple dozen that I know of that actively will make a sheep horn boat it's a real challenge foreign [Music] [Music] that was their atomic bomb they would not tell white man about this boat at all when you shoot it it's like pulling a rubber band but it shoots so fast if you've ever shot one it feels like you're pulling a rubber band back when you let go of that Arrow shoots out there like a rocket so it's a very advanced technology in archery you know I've hunted all my life I guess I've killed just about everything on the North American continent and uh I've killed it all with a bow a good friend of his was a mentor of mine a Dr Charles uh Grayson he went by Bert he told me that Jack made a horned bow and he hunted Buffalo off of horseback with it and he harvested four Buffalo with only four shots from his horned bow good but I would say seeing his talent and realizing that when he got into a lot of the naturalistic technology that he that he does was probably from the time he was around 40 to 44. I think a lot of the natives would be very envious and of the of the of his ability and the things he can do I mean he was always acknowledged as a real expert in all the the archival kind of uh uh tools you know from hundreds of years ago and I don't know anybody else can do that I have no idea how he is that talented but it has to be from some higher plane I think [Music] another one [Music] this weapon like a coup and that would be done he earned the feather that day probably one of the most important things they could do is take a man's weapon [Music] laughs most of the time that we were out west we were near Native Americans whether in Alaska or in Idaho around Nez Perce or in Montana after Betty and I actually got married and we drove out there and we went into Browning something made me go there and I was coming down the highway from Cut Bank I looked up and there it was and I knew immediately what that mountain was you know I said Betty there's Chief mountain right there I know it I know that's the mountain I knew as though it had just happened that was a true Vision Quest is all I know I didn't know who these people were I couldn't understand the language but I understood exactly what they were saying one of them guys or who it was put his hand on my shoulder he says you don't worry you with us now now he was standing right here and the only other place in that same direction that I knew about was a 60 car which is the real word for likely during the time we've been together there's just been a lot of things that have happened that are just hard to explain the book that this that uh that an old man gave him when we were in Alaska until the Ghost Dance religion and we looked in the index and I started looking at these names and there were names back there that were like Jack Winston or Jackson Winson or very close to what his name is Winston Jackson Mackey and then I looked at the next thing that said names that were vocal went by and well vocal was you know just he he started the Ghost Dance religion a lot of these Indian women never where I've been the Mona Clank it blackfeet you're not from here you from someplace else one of them looked at me one day and she said Jack she says you're a reincarnate of wavoca it just gives you chills you know when you think about something like that and just in some of his associations with Native people when he was shooting his horn bow it was a real cloudy day and the clouds parted back we had an encampment on Cut Bank Creek and uh cook Bank Creek was coming straight out of the Rocky Mountains right out of Glacier Park everybody had their TP set up all that crowd had a sweat going on sweat lodge but it was a big one we had a thunderstorm building back toward the mountains and I mean it was black and it was lightning in there like you wouldn't believe I picked the bow up took the first era and reared back and I fired that first air and as I did so that storm came right to the point that it was in our face and I mean it was terrible that's a blackish Cloud I've ever seen lighting as big as my leg and uh when I fired the last Arrow the storm stopped started moving back it split and moved back toward the mountains when he got back toward the mountains it was completely split it turned and came back down on either side and the Sun was shining down on the camp and on us on the sweat lodge you all heard the mumbling going on especially from the elders and yeah I was a teacher I think for 12 years and then I was a a school counselor for maybe 25 plus years something like that when we lived in clockwise I was a principal teacher and uh we built a boat in Southeast Alaska he and I and it was part of a boat building class to show the high school shop class how to build a boat because that was their livelihood that's what they did they fished and so we built a boat there and he fished that he would take people out we were always around a native Village you know and Jack was you know he was fishing dick Boris and I were fishing on Dick's Boat and one of our buddies was a native from croquan and he was in the next boat over by himself and had caught a whale and that way it was having a fit and we we said geez we need to go help him do whatever so we cranked up it's real our net in as soon as we did we started to pull over toward him and he kept waving us back but we came on in and pulled up to the side of him and tied our boat off to his boat but he kept motioning us back and he was sitting there talking to that whale and he talked in a low low good old voice real low tone you know calling her mother calling her grandmother he'd reached down and passed that oil I want you to lay still so I can cut this net off of you and he did and she did he cut that net off of her in just a few minutes he had it all off she just raised those old flutes I'll never forget it long as I live she just raised over old flutes and just down she went just gone most beautiful thing I ever saw in my life the whole thing the conversation he had with her all of it and I asked him I said hi how are you learn to do something like that he says we do this all the time and that was where it went well there wasn't too long after that I was hunting with father Mike and uh he'd kill the deer had that deer on his shoulders we were walking out of the woods and all of a sudden we run smack into Browning and brownie just sat there and looked father Mike stop me I was about to have a fit I was kind of worried about that deal that was a big brown bear and uh father might just started talking to him grandfather let me pass my children are hungry please let us pass we're not here to hurt you your children are hungry too and I will share what I have with you you go your way let me go my way I promise I'm not here to hurt you I'm not here to hurt your family pretty soon that old bear just sort of dropped down on all four feet and then looked off toward the woods stepped off in the woods and just let us go by father might never looked back and never look back and I feel it behind him I'm telling you what I could have bred him I was so close to him I talked to Austin Hammond about it he showed it again went through it again and showed me and explained to me in those same gun low tones he was talking to the bear he was talking to me at the same time and uh was actually explaining you know what's going on here I don't know I guess after that my experience with them I've talked down as far as I know something like 22 bears we were fixing to leave Alaska after going through quite a bit we lost a boat the nice boat we lost fishing season after obedience I said well maybe it's time to go so I loaded everything in that stock trailer 33 years in the back of my truck we were relocating to Idaho and we were in a hurry because I had a job interview and so we went down there you know and that's when that convocation took place [Music] so we had all of our papers when we crossed the border we were asked the usual questions and everything and Jack offered for the agents to you know hear him he had bows behind the seat and of course Canadian customs is actually environment is run by Environment Canada or either environment in Canada is run by the revenue department okay they ain't like us it's all social they ain't like us there was a bear hide that was in my trailer black bear hide and it had fallen down by the door and that's that started it and they saw that bear hide and they like to had a pit they just started tearing everything apart and that Stark trailer come to the truck took my Parker off my back you know took my moccasins my mukluks off my feet anyway they ended up confiscating all of his all of his work 33 years of my work was in that I had a 17-foot stock trailer and it was loaded from floor to ceiling side to side just everything I'd done I spent a lifetime building it making it trying to learn from it [Music] this was about a five-year case with a U.S senator working on it and a law firm working on it pro bono and they returned items that were like raw materials including sheep horn including some other things but they kept most of the finished collection that he had made and they did burn some things including the eagle feather that was with his adoption papers it tears you apart inside it makes me think about some people in terms I didn't never like to think about yeah I'd cut their throat I'd do it in a Flash his health just really started deteriorate deteriorating at that time and I could see that I mean Jack had his health went steadily down after he had a heart attack over all this and it cooked me in half I was half the man I ever was [Music] there's a saying that knowledge is not the feeling of a vessel but the lighting of a fire you can steal everything I got and I'll go back and redo it [Music] always find a way to get the things I need cause sitting back and watching just saying me you know what I mean from Sun out till the sun goes down don't stop till the day is gone I hope one day I can just sit back and be proud of the work I've done a wise man said that you run the day before you let the day run you I guess that's why I put in words like I got something to prove that's why I can't stop I had a dream and saw everything [Music] [Music] the community of Orofino Idaho is preparing to reenact the Journey of Lewis and Clark on the Clearwater she was doing the working on the canoe project in Idaho during the the Ken Burns documentary well we had that uh bicentennial you know for Lewis and Clark and uh they wanted to make the trip for marfania they wanted to build the votes in Orofino air Canoe Camp area and uh come float the river the same thing Lucy Clark did they want to just do that reenactment we built 30 of them um I guess from 17 feet to 30 feet long we've always considered Plymouth Rock as the discovery of America America wasn't discovered until Lewis and Clark got the orfino Idaho that's when they realized we've got a whole country behind us and we've made it to the ocean and they got to uh virtually we I the upon the Prairies on the campus prairies that we I but they where they met the Nez peers for the first time that was the discovery of America that was America that clinched it we did it he was doing a lot of presentations there for schools and for civic groups and he was staying very busy with those things [Music] [Music] I'll teach anybody I can that's what I'm here for that's what I got to do I'm a bridge between two cultures yes it's soft and dry he gave lectures all over the country about this kind of stuff it wasn't it was that he hid it I wish there were more people that had interested going to young people would want to learn it live with it you know and so they can carry it on that's it's important stuff to uh you keep your culture alive give your history alive it's got to be put in people's hands it's got to be told to them and they've got to want to learn it and you saw what a crowd we drew last time there's people there that want to learn and they really do things [Music] [Music] he corresponded with uh some some of the people he knew with in the spt Society of primitive technology and and made some connections there [Music] foreign [Music] yeah I mean I didn't start it started me so I mean it's always been a part of my DNA if you're a teacher you're always thinking about creating somebody who's going to be your teacher now who's going to do it better than you [Music] but I'd be teaching even if I didn't get taught I think one reason I was put on Earth was to learn and then transfer what I learned to other people we all came from these this is our common ancestry we all inherited this and knows no bounds through race or color or Creed you know people that go to these primitive technology skills and workshops and I'll hopefully we're keeping it alive it's not all going to be lost [Music] thank you [Music] [Music] thank you foreign [Music] my whole life story has been defined by being interested in primitive skills and then when I started learning primitive skills I was just instantly hooked it was really like the moment I made a fire by friction and blew a Tinder bundle into flame there was nothing else that was as exciting for me anymore when we turn on um the skills when it wakes up our minds and our bodies to do these things that we've evolved to do it's incredibly empowering it's exciting and inspiring [Music] we all have a natural blueprint to connect with the natural world right we have our five physical senses and then our intuition that was honed over millions of years of living close to Nature we're wired to notice the sound of that bird over there to feel that change in temperature when you gather your set for your friction fire kit from that cottonwood tree over there or that juniper tree you suddenly start to realize that you have a relationship with it foreign [Music] deserts to damp rainforests living in the most brutal Landscapes on Earth takes a certain kind of human that's where Hazen comes in Primal Survivor continues it got a little crazy fast Mondays at 8 on National Geographic well I'm Hazen Ardell and right now we're in our fifth season of a show called Primal Survivor it basically it looks at how different indigenous people or traditional living people are living in really remote corners of the globe and just looking at how they're living off the land how they're raising their families out there and which is my passion some people are born makers and some people are are just born with having an understanding of nature too and with like for Jack for example he's he's he's interested in nature and he's a maker at the same time Jack Mackey how are you doing if we do get that opportunity to meet somebody that's like a maker that's doing it and especially you know you see somebody like Jack and their they're engulfed by their passion and if you get a chance to meet hands on hands with somebody like Jack you can't help but to wonder like what is going on what are the what are the gears twisting around that guy's head you know what makes him tick I just do it I'm told to do it I think I feel like I'm told to do it and I won't argue with them I'll do it come on in here I don't look at myself as a survivalist or anything like that um but there's like for me my take on it is that I totally love nature and I love participating in nature I don't just want to see um so me being a survival guy I'm just really handy up top there that's actually a blow gun um and that is a essential tool for survival for the the people for the group of people that I was living with the walranis so I lived with them in my when I was 19 in my early 20s this is knowledge and skill that's been refined for Generation to generation Generations Lord have mercy son and that's a round bow too so that means the compressions and the tensions are balanced right down the very center of that boat there ain't no wonder this Boat Works as good as it works the deeper thinkers are like God you know I really wish I would have listened to Grandma look at this you know because she knew how to do it really well and all it takes is for all that knowledge and all that information that's been passed on for hundreds of generations we're at these last two generations where none of that information is being passed and so now we're really lost and the minute somebody goes from living off the land and being reliant on things that their mom make them like this backpack and then going into like the capitalistic Society it just takes one generation for all this knowledge of how to build things like this totally gone wow that is nice now we've got kids out there some young people that are beginning to learn how to do some of this where you met so they don't have to learn it all uh even native people didn't know it all that's a nice outfit somebody else they did some thinking they always had one person in a village that knew how to just do this thing another person knew how to do this thing well and anytime something happened these people would pop up and be there to show others how to do this and that when they needed it and I guess they understood that's the way it was going to be because our people won't learn like our Western culture is really you know you could say it's 100 years old and we had this dominant Force to like change cultures these cultures that have basically kind of perfected themselves over thousands of years and we're telling them that they're doing it wrong well we can already tell right now that it's we're living a culture that's not sustainable but they've been sustainable for thousands of years they've had it figured out and they're content and happy and you see that this is a lifesaver they live with the natural environment whether it's a desert whether it's Tundra whether it's coral reef or a jungle and they know how to maximize everything out of their environment and so they're makers they have to be makers Oh No Rotten you don't know how much I appreciate this yeah well me too this makes my heart sore you can just do it foreign [Music] Lord good God Almighty time that's the most precious thing in this earth to me I'm telling you what he and I he was three years old the last time I saw him I don't remember a whole lot but I know one thing he really loved that boy and talked about Jay for years I remember when Jay and I did this Jay and I did that and Jack was always on my mind you know I when I was a child I kept thinking he was eventually gonna you know I was gonna see him again and eventually as I got into high school you know it was you know you kind of get angry and uh you know where's this guy at well Jay and I had been dating probably about a year and he had told me about his dad and uh you know he told me he hadn't been in touch with him I could have gotten a hold of him I had him I tracked him down but I wasn't ready I don't want to call him out of the blue and then him reject me and of course when I met Catherine uh I knew then that I had found the right person in my life that I knew that I'd spend the rest of my life with she told me she said you need to contact him you really need to get hold of him and I said well we've got the number if you want to call him you call him I'm not going to do it Catherine had called me on the telephone she's I'm your boy's fiancee and would you want to talk to him I said yeah I I made it quite clear I did so Jack said well he said uh I love my boy and I want him to know that his daddy loves him and I've been waiting for this phone call for a very long time and I would love more than anything to talk to him she says well I'll have him call you and I'll tell him and I'll have him call you well I was waiting right there I sat by that Telephone by a while I'm waiting on that boy to call me and uh so finally he did when I first talked to him the first thing he said he said boy he said I've been waiting on this phone call for 35 years and uh he said I'm sorry and I just want you to know that I love you more than anything in the world and there has not been one day that has gone by that I haven't thought about you I just want to reach through that phone and grab that younger and I look Dave still is a youngin you know I didn't look at him as a grown man Jay has always had something inside of him that he didn't understand he was just a little boy when his daddy left but he's had this adventure inside of him this this part of him that would seek Adventure you know without even knowing him and even knowing that the things that he did with his hands as far as like making bows and arrows and knives and you know just all the things that Jack can make I mean he's an artist without a doubt these are things I didn't as a child I had no idea that he did these things yet I found myself crave going out into the woods and cutting limbs down and making bows and eras and and uh just making my own knives making all kind of I had no idea that he did these things and it's funny because I have a 16 year old that I've got on video doing the same thing when he was five six seven eight years old you know I mean he it's just it's there it's in us it was very emotional he hadn't talked to his dad and over 30 years and he just really wanted to know that his daddy loved him and that's what he found out I came home from uh work he said I talked to my boy today I said what [Music] he went long after that I told Betty I was having problems with my hands anyway I was going to have to make a decision of some kind I didn't know what the winters are brutal there it was getting the point that he was about to lose his hands so you know we both have we both have family down here and it was much warmer I told her I said pack it let's go and we did we packed up and we left the Northwest and uh we went back to to the southeast so so I could see my boy really he's always wanted us to come to Montana we've talked about it you know I got a phone call one day Betty said hey they you know they want to take him out to Montana and shoot some of the stuff that he's been talking about and be where he was and experience what he experienced and she said but you know he's he's not in great health and uh I really don't want him to go without you I knew I was going to have a hard time even before I went in the hospital I knew I was going to have a hard time with me I almost didn't come because because of my business but Catherine is a nurse and Jack is he's he's got you know he's got health issues and he really needed a nurse here with him full-time the week before Jack was in the hospital I feel like I want to go home his breathing was terrible um of course I'm sure that I'm sure they didn't want to let him out of the hospital but with people like Jack you don't really tell him what he's going to do you know and he meant he was coming and he told us you know he said I'm I'm going with you kids one way or the other we flew into Spokane Washington and we drove down to uh we up of Idaho and after Jack came back from Alaska that's the place they settled in at just to to get to Know Jack more and to see where I come from I need to see where he's been what he's done meet some of the people that that he's uh uh been in contact with we actually stayed at the house that he lived in from 2007 until 2011. and uh you know you got to think I had no idea where he was at so it was it was really interesting to actually stay in the house that he lived in through those years because I can look back and see where I was at [Music] we left we came across the uh the Rocky Mountains into Glacier East glacier Montana and it's uh let's stunning Jack knows that this trip could be his last trip Jack knows he could die on this mountain tonight Jack's okay with that because this trip with us has meant a lot to him being able to show his son where he was what he did you know experience the beauty of this place with him has meant more than anything I think it has meant the world to help and I wanted him to see some of what I had kind of been through in a way Chief Mountain I'm talking about primarily I'd say I was eight and I was taken to that mountain and it's as clear as I'm standing in right now I was there a lesson from it well I'll tell you this you better take care of it you better take care of this Earth I know that much you take care of the earth and it'll take care of you [Music] my feet below Chief Mountain you know that's that's major if I die today just put me out there for the counts in the bottom of the mountain let the coyotes eat you know turned into something of good for nature if he died today his life is complete and he'd be happy with it you know for Jack yes this was this is Jack's last hoorah it's a it was a you know it was a chance to come to Montana and and uh and spend some time with my father and I'll be out here more now that he's shown me this I'll be here with my son yeah it's meant a lot to me to watch J heal and to watch him and to watch Jack fulfill what he wants to fulfill you know to show his boy where he was you know what he saw what he experienced what his life has been that's I mean it's it's what movies are made of I look at it like this and this is the reason why I'm so forgiving in life with people that you know uh you're put here to live your life and you're put here for uh whatever it is that the creator has you're put here for your purpose whatever your purpose is well you know Jack served his purpose [Music] [Music] yeah yeah somebody that you can hunt [Music] someone that never leaves tough foreign [Music] [Music] Jack you know and that 30 kept you wondering you know I can't see [Music] when I was a child I kind of idolized him because I had a lot of people through the years that you know oh you're Jack Mackey's son and uh you know old Jack boy he sure was a you know he was a he was something else you know you'd love to know your dad [Music] hearing stories about it everybody and no one had anything bad to say about you I've never heard a bad word I've never heard anybody say anything bad about that everybody loves Jack everybody needs a here [Music] that's what you think [Music] [Music] I hope one day I can just sit back and be proud of the work I've done a wise man said that you run today before you let the day run you I guess that's why I put in words like I got something to prove that's why I can't stop I had a dream and saw everything [Music] and I know I got I got a bone and Stone [Music]

Channel: Tom Grant

Views: 127,851

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Id: 5NfuaRBkfBM

Length: 55min 1sec (3301 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 15 2022