Using Solar Energy Effectively

The 1941 book Kabloona by Gontran de Poncins contains a description of an unusual labor-saving application of solar energy by the Eskimos of King William Island in Northwest Territories. The description also illustrates how powerful the sun's rays can be during early spring-April and May--even far above the Arctic Circle.

Long ago, the King William Eskimos noticed that a small piece of fur or a rag would absorb enough solar heat to melt its way into several feet of ice. Normally, if a King William man was in a hurry to create a hole in the ice to fish through, his only recourse was to chop his way through with a cutting tool. But he knew that if he was not in too much of a hurry, he could use solar energy. The accepted method was to lay dog feces on the ice in the right places and then wait for the sun to do all the work.