Newly Developed Film From ‘40s Records Chapter in History : Photography: Camera buff, in defiance of orders, snapped shots of U.S. soldiers building the Alcan Highway. They are the centerpiece of a tribute to those who built the road during World War II.

John Paxton smuggled home his wartime memories nearly half a century ago, never figuring the secret photographs would bridge a gap in Canadian history.

Defying official orders, the Fresno man snapped candid shots of U.S. Army soldiers in 1942 as they built the Alcan Highway. The troops labored about a year to complete the World War II route that wound through 1,400 miles of wilderness in Alaska and Canada.

Paxton developed some of the 24 rolls of film when he returned to Fresno after the war. But most of the rolls were kept hidden in a file cabinet.

“They’ve been slumbering in there all this time,” said Paxton, pointing to a drawer where he stored the images until recently, when the Yukon Anniversaries Commission learned of them.

Paxton sent the commission dozens of rolls, which since have been developed. Now they are the centerpiece for this year’s 50th anniversary tribute to the 11,000 soldiers who built the war route.

“When I saw them developed, I said, ‘My God, I’d forgotten about all of this,” the 74-year-old Paxton said.

The surprisingly crisp black-and-white photos also fill a historical gap for Canada’s Yukon Territory, where the highway has spawned small towns and more than a tenfold population growth in the years since the war.

“I was surprised that others were so interested,” Paxton said. “People have never seen anything like them and they’re really latching on.”

He remembers secretly unfolding his dime-store camera and jotting down notes and cartoons while trekking through the unmapped terrain.

Military officials eventually found Paxton’s camera. They impounded it, but not before the self-described “compulsive recorder” had chronicled the project and coaxed an Air Force friend to fly the film back to Fresno.

The photos show Paxton’s regiment trekking through the Yukon’s thick mud, biting cold and “armadas of mosquitoes” as they forged the road. The troops set up makeshift work camps, waited in food lines, hunted and gambled. Their faces tell of the grudging task and the lighter moments that Paxton said kept them going.

“The beauty is that they are people pictures. They humanize the building of the highway,” said Ken Spotswood, who is helping to organize the tribute to the route that ferried servicemen and supplies to Alaska.

Spotswood, a former professional photographer, spent months looking for records of the Alcan project in the Yukon Archives and Canadian National Archives in Ottawa.

His efforts were mostly in vain until he met Paxton, who matter-of-factly showed him a few tattered photos and said he had dozens of negatives at home.

“It took me all of about 30 seconds before I felt like I had discovered the Mother Lode,” Spotswood said. “He calls them snapshots, modestly, but he had a terrific photographer’s eye and I don’t think he realized the value of those images.”

But the images serve as more than a historical record for Paxton, who recalls the names of nearly every soldier he photographed.

Five in his regiment died during construction while others are recalled for their gambling or musical prowess. He also remembers icy nights writing love letters to his wife, Mildred, whom he married just weeks before being called north.

“This whole thing is really a therapeutic treatment for me,” he said.

“It’s telling me there’s something about the life I had in the Army that I really liked. But I never have wanted to admit it, didn’t want to face up to it.”