Fairbanks, Alaska Token

That's a pretty fancy token for such a small company.

You could try to get in touch with the current owner and find out if you've got a free ride coming,

There's actully a physical address listed, with a telephone number. One individual is identified as the company president. The business profile is for long distance hauling of freight. So unless there was once more to this operation, the token really doesn't make much sense.

Bus service in the outlaying areas is generally run by private companies since the local government is to small for keeping a bus line running. Local outfits would step in, an considering it is post1959 when statehood was always used with the name a lot has changed. Today it is probably a truck load broker with contract drivers, think ice road truckers.

Well, I wrote to the address I had found on the internet, but my letter was returned as not deliverable or forwardable. It was a longshot at best anyway, I suppose....

Looks like it was an old bus company back in the day.....check this out:

http://www.newspapers.com/newspage/16433048/

I've received a reply from the Tanana Yukon Historical Society, which I am reproducing verbatim here:

"AK Overland started in June 1953 as an operator of school buses for the City of Fairbanks AK [Victor Hart, Pres; Everett Patton, VP]. At the time, it did not own any equipment. By early 1955, without any formal certificate of operation, it had acquired its own buses and was providing service to the nearby Air Force base [Eielson]. In June of that year, it acquired the terminal building that its rival had occupied for several decades. By mid-1965, it continued to provide school bus operation, local transit, and was also providing scheduled bus service to the newly accessible connecting road to the river town of Nenana, Clear Air Force Station (a Distant Early Warning site), and Healy (the town adjacent to Interior Alaska's coal mining operations).

"In June 1973, AK Overland asked that its certificate as a common carrier be revoked by the State, and it was. It did so because the company had been acquired by Westours, a subsidiary of Holland America Line [itself a subsidiary of Carnival Cruises]. It continued business as a tour operation. After years of decline [actually, no activity] the corporation was voluntarily dissolved by its owner (Carnival Cruises) in 2005.

"The Alaska Overland token was issued in 1958, as a Statehood memento."

Always nice to have the full story behind the token.