Shannon Cartwright is a longtime Alaska Children's book illustrator. She lives in Talkeetna, Alaska off of a train line where her nearest neighbor is a mile away. Cartwright has been living off the grid for nearly 40 years with only her dog and a rifle as constant companions.
When I and an Anchorage Dispatch News reporter took the trip to visit Cartwright in her home, she had just finished her latest book "Alaska's Animals, You and I." It was her first book after having a Deep Brains Stimulation procedure done to help control her tremors.
Shannon Cartwright’s watercolor brushes and paint lie at her workspace after completing the last page of her latest children’s book on Sunday, August 7, 2016. The book is called “Alaska’s Animals, You and I.”
Shannon Cartwright lives off the grid with her dog, Coda, and a boyfriend living a mile away. Her home gets light through solar panels and has running water pumped from the river nearby.
She has lived at this location for 16 years.
Shannon Cartwright roles up her artwork for her book “Alaska’s Animals, You and I” to send to town via the train on Monday, August 8, 2016. Cartwright said that she gets nervous every time she sends the originals through the mail, but her art has never been permanently lost.
Shannon Cartwright gathers cabbage for dinner from the hoop house on her property on Sunday, August 7, 2016.
Cartwright grows much of her own food and goes into town for other foods that she can’t grow herself. The last time she went into town was in May of 2016.
As the passenger train approaches Shannon Cartwright’s stop, she holds Coda to keep him calm as he loves visitors, according to Cartwright on Monday, August 8, 2016.
A model train and rifle sit in front of the window in Shannon Cartwright’s home. The train was a model she used to complete her book "Ol’ 556" and the rifle belonged to her father.
The final painting for Shannon Cartwright’s new children’s book lies at her worktable on Sunday, August 7, 2016. “Alaska’s Animals, You and I” is her first book in 8 years and her first since having the Deep Brains Stimulation procedure done in January of 2014.
Alaska Children’s book author and illustrator Shannon Cartwright visits with friends riding the Alaska passenger train by her home.
Cartwright lives off the grid on a train stop, while living with Crones Disease and a Familial Essential Tremor that temporarily ended her illustrating career.
