The archetype of the LIFE photographer was a combination of artist and adventurer. That ideal was celebrated in the form of Sean Penn’s character in the 2013 film The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, but in real life no one embodied it better than Margaret Bourke-White.

Bourke-White was one of the magazine’s original four staff photographers, and her adventurous spirit was on display in LIFE’s Oct. 25, 1937 issue, which featured two related stories from her. The first, which began on page 40, was headlined “A 10,000-Mile Tour of Canada’s Northwest with Lord Tweedsmuir.” She had traveled along with Canada’s governor general as he visited remote communities in the Northwest Territories.

Bourke-White’s second story in that issue, which began on page 119, was also set in Canada’s Northwest Territories, but in that one the photographer briefly became a subject. She was on a separate tour with Archibald Fleming, the Anglican Church’s first-ever Bishop of the Arctic, when their small plane encountered heavy fog and had to make an unplanned landing in an unpopulated location. Bourke-White was the lone woman in the traveling party of five, and she pitched in to gather driftwood to build a fire while they waited who-knows-how-long for the fog to clear. That was typical of the hardiness she demonstrated throughout her career.

Bourke-White’s willingness to go the distance in the Northwest Territories resulted in an intimate portrait of the lives of indigenous people in one of the most remote locations in North America. Her photo essays in that 1937 issue, which include shots of Inuit people at their homes and at a Hudson’s Bay Company trading post, document an ancient culture being touched by outside forces, and are the reason LIFE photographers like her were always up for a journey, no matter how arduous.

LIFE photographer Margaret Bourke-White gathered driftwood for a fire after her plane made a forced landing due to fog in the Canadian Arctic, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

After a forced landing due to fog in the Canadian Arctic, members of the traveling party of Archbishop Archibald Fleming studied maps to determine their whereabouts, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Rev. Archibald Fleming served as the Anglican Church’s first-ever Archbishop of the Arctic, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Inuit people arrived by boat to meet the plane of Rev. Archibald Fleming, Anglican Bishop of the Arctic, in the Northwest Territories, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Inuit people greeted Rev. Archibald Fleming, Anglican Bishop of the Arctic, after his landing in the Northwest Territories, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A priest played during vespers in the Church of St. Theresa, Fort Norman, Northwest Territories, Canada, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An aerial view of Aklavik, a town on the Mackenzie River delta in the Northwest Territories of Canada, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Canada’s governor general, Lord Tweedsmuir, looked at a map of his domain made of moosehide and embroidered with silk that was given to him by the townsfolk of Fort Simpson in the Northwest Territories, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

In Kugluktuk (then known as Coppermine) people gathered outside the Hudson’s Bay Company trading post, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An Inuit person traded wolverine fur for flour, baking soda, tallow, butter, jam and tobacco at the Hudson’s Bay Company store in Kugluktuk (then known as Coppermine) in the Northwest Territories, 1947.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Furs at the Hudson’s Bay store in the Northwest Territories, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

White fox pelts at the Hudson’s Bay Company store in the Northwest Territories, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Inuit children at the Sacred Heart school in the tiny town of Fort Providence in the Northwest Territories awaited a visit from Canada’s governor general and the chance to perform a dance they had spent months rehearsing, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The sisters of the Sacred Heart School harmonized along with an organ in Fort Providence, Northwest Territories, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

This Inuit family enjoyed such modern conveniences as a victrola, a sewing machine, and a coal-burning stove in their tent, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Portrait of an Inuit mother and her child in Kugluktuk (then known as Coppermine), Northwest Territories, Canada, 1937.

.Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An unidentified Inuit couple in Kugluktuk (then known as Coppermine), Northwest Territories, Canada, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An Inuit mother tended to her child in Canada’s Northwest Territories, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A scene from Inuit life in Canada’s Northwest Territories, 1937.

Margaret Bourke-White/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

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