Feature Copy: Alaskan Native culture
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In the Siberian Eskimo village of Gambell on Alaska's St. Lawrence Island, where black walrus meat dries on racks outside homes and ancient, ivory is so plentiful pieces lie on gravel roads, Native culture thrives.
Some of Alaska's best carvers live in the village of 650, honing images of birds, whales and seals from bone and ivory. The work is so valuable it can sell for thousands of dollars at East Coast auction houses like Sotheby's and has captured the interest of art experts at the Smithsonian Institute.
For those who cannot venture to the village 100 miles across the sea from Nome, they can easily experience the strength and beauty of that and other Alaskan Native cultures in a growing network of cultural centers and museums in both the state's well-traveled cities and in more rural communities.
No other state in America holds such a broad range of Native cultures as Alaska. From the Inupiat (In-OOPY-at) Eskimos of Barrow, just above the Arctic Circle, to the Tlingit (CLINK-it) Indians of Ketchikan on the tip of Southeast Alaska, Native cultural diversity is a hallmark of the state.
Alaska's 94,000 Native people make up about 16 percent of the state's population. The majority are Eskimo, Indian and Aleut and live in villages scattered along the coastline and rivers of Alaska, where they still practice traditional hunting and fishing lifestyles.
In larger communities such as Anchorage, Fairbanks and Juneau, Native dress, language, and social customs blend with modern city life. The blend is part of why Alaska is ranked as one of the top five states for historic and cultural travel by the Travel Industry Association.
"Alaska is a land of many peoples," said Ann Campbell, executive director of the Alaska Native Tourism Council. "For thousands of years, Alaskan Natives have preserved their rich traditions, and passed this cultural heritage from generation to generation. While the languages and philosophies vary from region to region, many common goals, values and spiritual beliefs weave these Native societies together in the past as well as today."
The variety of these groups can be traced back to Alaska's first Native descendants, who came by way of a northern land bridge that once connected Siberia and Alaska. As the Ice Age ended and the seas claimed the land, the nomads moved to higher ground. As the continents drifted apart, that land would become Alaska.
Some groups settled in the Arctic. Others crossed mountain passes to various regions of the state, or migrated through Alaska, continuing on to distant lands, in some cases as far as South America.
Alaskan Native cultural centers and museums across Alaska are a good way to get an overview of Native culture. Live demonstrations, performances, arts, crafts and one-of-a-kind collectible pieces are commonly found at the cultural centers. In fact, the hunger among Alaskans and the demand by visitors to know more about Native culture prompted the Smithsonian Institution to host a three-day workshop in Anchorage to teach Alaskan Natives how to preserve and promote their cultures through museums.
The Chugach Heritage Center in Seward is a prime example of Alaska's expansion of Native culture showcases. Located in a small fishing town a few hours' drive south of Anchorage, the newly constructed center features a play, displays of traditional artifacts, art and a gift shop.
And slated for opening in the summer of 1999, is a 26-acre Alaska Native Heritage Center in Anchorage, which will showcase all five of the state's major Native groups.
or the traveler who wants to explore Alaskan Native villages independently, Campbell recommends first calling a regional or statewide tourism organization to find out which communities are the easiest to get to from the state's population centers.
"From wherever you are in Alaska, it's easy to access anywhere else," Campbell says. "And there is so much to experience in the rural communities. Cultural attractions can be planned as a day-trip, or as the basis of any itinerary."
In the larger communities, several collections of artifacts and fine art owned by businesses and Native corporations are displayed in their buildings and are open to the public. Combined with visits to the top-drawer museums and performance centers in hubs like Anchorage, Fairbanks or Juneau, slipping inside Alaska's Native culture is available on any size budget.
SOUTHCENTRAL
The Southcentral and Interior regions of Alaska are home to the state's largest populations of Athabascan Indians, known for their innovative survival instincts in one of the earth's harshest environments. Natives who have made this region home thrive on moose, caribou, plants, berries and river fish. Athabascan art features superb skin sewing skills using pelts from big game in the region. Athabascan beadwork and embroidery is recognized as being among the finest in the world.
HIGHLIGHTS:
- Eklutna Historical Park, 26 miles north of Anchorage, provides a glimpse into Native Athabascan culture and the influences of Russian Orthodox missionaries. The park includes a sacred burial ground of the Dena'ina Athabascans, with over 80 spirit houses, the historic St. Nicholas Russian Orthodox Church, and the Heritage House Museum. Open daily May-September. Phone: (907) 688-6026. Across from the park, tours of the Mike Alex Cabin, the former home of an Eklutna chief, are also available. Phone: (907) 688-3824.
- The Alaska Heritage Library and Museum, located in the National Bank of Alaska lobby in Anchorage, has displays of Native baskets and artifacts, plus photos, rare books, and paintings by world-renown artists Sydney Laurence, Fred Machetanz, Eustace Ziegler. Free admission. Open year-round, M-F, noon-4 p.m. (907) 265-2834.
- Anchorage Museum of History & Art permanent collection depicts 10,000 years of Alaska history. The Alaska Gallery includes dioramas of Native life, life-size house depictions, extensive collection of ethnographic and archaeological materials, artifacts, and fine arts and crafts. Open daily May-Sept; Tues-Sun, Oct-April. Phone: (907) 343-4326.
- The Alaska Native Performance Series at the Anchorage Museum of History & Art hosts over 100 performers representing the traditional societies of Alaska-Inupiat, Yupik, Tlingit, Haida, Athabascan, Aleut-Alutiiq-as they share their unique cultures through live dance, drama and storytelling presentations. Weekly performances may include the Wainwright Dancers, Inupiat Eskimos telling of their great whale hunts, and the King Island Dancers, known for their great expression and efficient movements that reflect cramped living space resulting from their insular village on stilts. Daily performances June-August. Phone: (907) 343-4326.
- The Chugach Heritage Center offers a 25-minute play, "So They Say," based on legends from the Chugach Natives, on the hour most days. Displays of traditional artifacts, and a gift shop featuring the handiwork of several Native groups are inside a restored railway depot in Seward. Call (907) 224-5065.
- The Alaska Native Heritage Center, scheduled to open in May 1999, is a 26-acre center just 12 minutes from downtown Anchorage. The facility will have five main galleries. The Culture Hall will house 3-D wall displays that introduce each culture and its region. The Gathering Place Hall will host Native dancing and drumming, special performances, classes and special events. Cultural events similar to traditional celebrations in Alaskan villages will also take place at the center. Phone: (907) 263-5170 or (800) 315-6608.
SOUTHEAST
Southeast Alaska's history was shaped by the Northwest Coast Indians: Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshians. They were fishermen, hunters, artists and carvers whose intricate totem poles, some 90-feet tall, amazed Europeans when they first landed on these shores. Today, the craftsmen of the region are also known for their handmade dance masks, decorative paddles, button blankets, and finely-woven cedar bark and spruce root baskets.
HIGHLIGHTS:
- The Stikine River is as much a part of Southeast Alaska's history as the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshians who have been a part of this land for thousands of years. In Wrangell, a walking tour includes the ancient Native carvings of Petroglyph Beach, Totem Park, and the Tlingit House on Chief Shakes Island. From there, a jet boat heads into the wilderness of the Tongass National Forest, passing an old homestead where Natives gathered for potlatches, a tent city from the Klondike gold rush, an icefield and glaciers. Daily tours available April-October.
- Juneau is Alaska's capital city and has been home to Tlingit and Haida tribes for thousands of years. Tours and attractions focus on Juneau's history as seen through the eyes of an Alaskan Native, and include stories of how the Raven made the first people, the first white settlers' meeting with the Auke Kwaan and Taku tribes, the traditions of Indian villages along the way, and a stop at Mendenhall Glacier, the famous ice river reported in John Muir's 1879 journal entry. Daily tours May-September. The Alaska State Museum, accessible from most downtown hotels has a spectacular collection of Alaskan artifacts.
- Saxman Native Village, located three miles south of Ketchikan, has more than two dozen cedar totem poles, comprising one of the world's largest collections of totemic art in the world. This 2 1/2-hour, award-winning tour includes a look inside the carving center with live demonstrations by master carvers Lee Wallace and Nathan Jackson. Other highlights: a brief introduction to the Tlingit language, Native culture of Alaska and Southeast, life-ways of a clan house, a play presented in the Native storytelling fashion, arts and crafts demonstrations, and a performance by the Cape Fox Dancers. Daily tours May-September.
For information on these and other Native travel options in Southeast Alaska, call the Southeast Alaska Visitor Center in Ketchikan, (907) 228-6214.
SOUTHWEST
The Aleuts of the Aleutian Islands were the first Alaskans to be contacted by Europeans who had been hired to explore for the Czars of Russia. These maritime people depend on fish, sea otters, seals, and whales for subsistence. The largest single population of Aleuts lives on the Pribilof Islands - St. Paul and St. George - in the Bering Sea. Others remain in the Aleutian Islands, on Kodiak Island, and throughout the Alaska Peninsula.
HIGHLIGHTS:
- The Alutiiq Museum and Archaeological Repository in Kodiak provides a general overview on pre-historic Alutiiq life and includes an exhibit gallery, traveling displays, repository and museum store. Call (907) 486-7004 for museum information.
- The Kodiak Native Tourism Association is a cooperative marketing organization that provides information on a network of Alaskan Native attractions, including Native-owned hunting and fishing lodges, bed and breakfasts, cultural tours, archaeological digs. Call (907) 486-6014 or (888) 288-5736.
The Kodiak Island Convention & Visitors Bureau provides information on member businesses including the six Native villages on the island, and bear viewing activities on the Katmai Coast. Call (907) 486-4782 or (800) 789-4782.
- St. Paul Island in the Pribilofs is 300 miles from Alaska's mainland located in the middle of the Bering Sea. This Aleut community is known for having the largest fur seal and bird rookeries in the world. The Aleut Natives here are descendants of Aleutian Islanders who came here with Russian merchants and explorers in the late 1700s to harvest fur seals. Eventually the Russians left, but the Aleuts stayed and today continue their traditional subsistence lifestyle, as well as commercial enterprises such as tourism and fishing. Tours range from 3 days/2 nights to 8 days/7 nights and are available May-August.
- Unalaska, in the Aleutian Chain, was attacked by Japanese bombers and fighter planes on June 3, 1942, forcing most Aleuts into relocation camps over 1,000 miles away in Southeast Alaska. Only half of them ever returned to Unalaska. Tour highlights might include the Holy Ascension Russian Orthodox Cathedral, World War II history and landmarks, and a visit to Dutch Harbor, the adjacent deep-water port that has some of the richest fishing waters in the world.
For information on the Southwest region, call the Alaska's Southwest at (907) 562-7380.
FAR NORTH
Stretching north of the Arctic Circle to the Bering Sea Coast, the Arctic region of Alaska is the region's most remote and romanticized. Though population centers are spread out across the region, small towns like Barrow and a smattering of even smaller villages are home to strong communities of people. Many rely on marine mammals including walrus and whale for food, and carving the bone and tusks of the mammals is an exacting art form here.
Some Athabascans and both Gwitch'in and Kutch'in also live here, using the caribou herds of the region for food and cultural expression.
HIGHLIGHTS
- Barrow, "The Top of the World," is located on the shores of the Arctic Ocean, and lies 330 miles north of the Arctic Circle. Attractions include a traditional Eskimo culture program with Eskimo dances by men and women in traditional parkas. These story dances relate tales of hunts and adventures on tundra and ice. Tours also include demonstrations on mask making, skin sewing, fancy fur parkas and games. Eskimo artists show their craftsmanship in ivory, baleen and skins. Daily tours May-September. Call the Barrow city offices at (907) 852-5211.
- Barrow's Inupiat Heritage Center offers an environment where the knowledge and expertise of the Inupiat elders is recognized and valued. The library has historical, research, and language materials, as well as rare books. The cultural arts exhibit room has 14 exhibits that show the development of the Inupiat from 20,000 years ago to present. Open daily. Call (907) 852-0422.
- Gambell Village on Saint Lawrence Island is just within sight of Russia. Mountains 40 miles to the west lie in Russian Siberia, not North America. The Eskimos of Gambell are Siberian Yupik and are more closely related to the Native peoples of Siberia than to the Eskimos of North America. The half-day tour includes a walking tour of the village, an old sod whalebone hut that is mostly an underground dwelling, polar bear and walrus hides hanging out to dry, and countless white-bleached whale and walrus bones laying on the beach. At the local ivory co-op pieces of ivory are transformed into intricate artwork available for purchase. From Kotzebue or Nome, Gambell is an easy one-day, add-on tour. Call Gambell Village Tour at (907) 276-7568.
- Kotzebue is one of Alaska's largest and oldest Inupiat Eskimo villages. Devoted to Inupiat culture, the NANA Museum of the Arctic offers a cultural slide show, demonstrations of drumming, the blanket toss and fancy parka sewing, a wildlife diorama, performances by the Kotzebue Eskimo Dancers, and storytelling. The museum's Inupiat Cultural Camp offers information about traditional clothing, foods, harvesting and survival techniques. Open daily. Call (907) 442-3747.
INTERIOR
The low, rolling country between the southern slope of the Alaska Range and the northern face of the Brooks Range is Alaska's version of the outback. Wide-open and wild, the region has few roads. Rather, communities are tucked in along rivers, which Alaskan Natives for centuries have used as thoroughfares both in summer and winter. Of the estimated 99,000 people whom live here, about 12 percent are Eskimo or Athabascan Indian. Fishing the rivers and hunting for caribou remain a way of life.
HIGHLIGHTS
- The University of Alaska Museum in Fairbanks, the state's primary repository of natural and cultural history, is internationally recognized for its comprehensive northern collections. The main gallery exhibits provide an overview of Alaska's people, natural resources, and events that have guided the development of the state. Five galleries representing the major ecological regions of Alaska highlight each region's distinct natural and cultural history. Dynamic Aurora is a multi-media presentation at the museum that tells about the mysterious aurora borealis, or northern lights, through lectures, slides and videos, including Native stories and mythology that attempted to explain this incredible natural phenomenon. The museum's Northern Inua is a breathtaking performance of Alaska Native athletic games, culture and dance from all different groups of Alaska Natives. Open daily June-August. Call (907) 474-7505.
For information on the Interior contact the Fairbanks Convention and Visitors Bureau, 550 First Street, Fairbanks, AK 99701, call 800-327-5774.
For Alaska Visitor Information write to: Alaska Travel Industry Association, 2600 Cordova Street, suite 201 Anchorage, AK 99503, call 800-862-5275 or visit our web site http://travelalaska.com.
Alaska Travel
Industry Association
2600 Cordova St. Ste. 201
Anchorage, AK 99503-2745
P. (800) 327-9372
F. (800) 276-1042
E. ATIAmedia@gci.net