50 years of Iditarod Champion Highlight - Dick Wilmarth

With 2023 marking 50 years of the Last Great Race, and the 51st running, it's high time we look back on the mushers who had that magic ride into Nome in first. For the next few weeks as we count down to March 4, we'll highlight the 24 Champions of Iditarod. That's right, 50 races with 24 names on the Champion list. Just as more folks have climbed Everest than have run Iditarod, the Champions list is surprisingly short. 

Iditarod's first Champion

Dick Wilmarth celebrates his win in Nome.
Photo: Iditarod Trail Committee Archives

Dick Wilmarth hailed from Red Devil, Alaska. An "unknown" on the 1973 roster, Wilmarth was a miner and trapline musher, not a racing team. Dick moved to Alaska at 17, leaving his logging job in Idaho behind. He and his brother were wooed to the Last Frontier with the promise of adventure and opportunity. Settling in the mining community of Red Devil, he learned to fly planes and got interested in mushing dogs. 

Born in 1942, Dick was 30 years old when he took off from Anchorage to Nome. Having heard about the race just a few months prior, Wilmarth cobbled a team with very little prep by trading goods for dogs out of several villages to add to his team for a total of twelve dogs at the starting line. He would later say in interviews that it was never about trying to win the race, it just sounded like adventure and he wanted to be a part of it.

As you can imagine, the first ever Iditarod race had its share of trials. There were no air drops of supplies in checkpoints in those days, and very little trail grooming (especially since what little was planned got sidelined when the snow was too much for the snow machines of the day to cut through). No trail had been set for years with just yearly clean up, and so it was more of an extended camping trip than a race. Still, as teams made their way to Nome, it was clear that the unknown from Red Devil was willing to take chances to stay ahead. Part of that, Wilmarth would say years later, was due to the fact that he had to keep moving to stay warm and stay fed. He would tell stories of nearly falling through the ice trying to get fish out of a fish wheel, and how he trapped beaver along the way to eat and feed the dogs. 

One of Dick's best known stories, perhaps, was in his telling of how he ran into a couple who were traveling who couldn't get their camp stove to light. He helped them get it started in exchange for a meal, they were hauling a load of canned goods including Dinty Moore's Beef Stew. Wilmarth said he ate six or seven cans of the stuff before continuing on his way (this was back before the no outside assistance rule was really a thing), a few miles down the trail he said his stomach started to growl - those "hearty meals" weren't Alaskan hearty.

At one point in the race, temps dropped to -50 degrees and some teams wanted to halt the race until conditions improved, but they could only do that if all mushers agreed. Like we've seen in more recent years, the future champ disagreed and felt he needed to continue, so he did.

Of the 34 teams that left Anchorage, only 22 finished, and Wilmarth was first to cross the finish line. He won a whopping $12,000 for the race's first ever win, and won Rookie of the Year (imagine that). He would tell reporters later that he had hoped to use the money to buy a backhoe. 

Wilmarth's win wouldn't be without controversy. There are two camps within the old timers and fans over if his win was legitimate. Some have accused Dick of having a lot more outside help than a few meals along the way, with some rumors to having used an airplane at one point. Dick Mackey would write in his biography in defense of the champion saying he ran close to Wilmarth for a lot of the race and never saw any signs of an airplane having touched down to carry the musher, sled, and dogs anywhere. 

Dick Wilmarth was a one and done champion - completely. He would not return to the race with a team again, which has also fed into the conspiracy theories. Chas St. George of the Iditarod Trail Committee would tell a story that when he asked Dick once why he never ran again Dick responded simply, "because I won." Dick would remain a part of the race lore and family, often showing up at a checkpoint to watch teams in, and in the early days would even fly race officials over the trail to give them a look at the teams from above.

Dick Wilmarth died in 2018 at the age of 75 after a battle with prostate cancer. He left behind a wife and six children as well as grandchildren. The race's first champion was part legend and part mystery, but is very much woven into the lore of the Last Great Race.


For some insights on Iditarod's first champion you can read the article by Tegan Hanlon for Anchorage Daily News after his passing, and view an extended clip of Iditarod Insider's interview with Dick for their documentary on Iditarod created to celebrate their 40th race. 

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