Architectural History

Alaskan Abodes and More

An interesting website for browsing is the SAH Archipedia, described by their own text as “an authoritative online encyclopedia of the U.S. built environment organized by the Society of Architectural Historians and the University of Virginia Press. It contains histories, photographs, and maps for over 22,000 structures and places. These are mostly buildings, but as you explore SAH Archipedia you will also find landscapes, infrastructure, monuments, artwork, and more.”

The SAH Archipedia has a very large collection of Alaskan entries, organized by regions and subregions, and many of the entries are by Alison K. Hoagland, Professor Emerita in History and Historic Preservation at Michigan Technological University, and the author of Buildings of Alaska (Oxford University Press, 1995) and The Log Cabin: An American Icon (Univ. of Virginia Press, 2018).

A sample entry is the long-gone Nirvana Park in Cordova: “Alaska's climate is too harsh and the living too difficult to produce many follies, or idiosyncratic creations of visionaries. A rare example is found in Nirvana Park, developed in the 1930s by Henry C. Feldman, a Cordova businessman. Feldman carved statues, erected bridges and gazebos out of branches, and built a stone fountain in a style that goes beyond rustic into the bizarre. Winding paths and its wooded setting on Lake Eyak, which are all that remain, made Nirvana Park a popular retreat.”

There’s no photo at the SAH Archipedia site, but a quick search at the Alaska State Library located this great image:

Nirvana Park, Cordova, Alaska. Two girls in swimsuits, standing in a fanciful gazebo created on the stump of a fallen tree. Clothes are draped over tree trunk at left. Water, swimming platform and diving board, cabins on far shore. [Skinner Foundation. Photographs, Alaska Steamship Company, 1890s-1940s. ASL-PCA-44. ASL-P44-01-152.]

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One of Alaska’s most unique architectural histories involves the Quonset hut, and there are still many of the WWII era constructions in use around the state.

Quonsets around Alaska

There are also plenty of abandoned relics:

A World War II era Quonset hut on Adak Island, Alaska. [Wikimedia Commons]

A good history of the structures can be found at the Washington State Department of Archeology and Historic Preservation (DAHP): “The building was designed in 1941 by a team of engineers at Quonset Point Naval Air Station in Rhode Island, hence the name.  With America preparing for the possibility of war, the Navy had approached the George A. Fuller Company to design a prefabricated, portable structure that could be shipped in pieces to faraway military outposts.  The structure had to be able to be set up quickly by untrained personnel and had to serve a variety of purposes.”

Territorial Anchorage Memories: The Quonset Hut School

By Jana Ariane Nelson -February 13, 2012 for Alaska Public Media

Inside a Quonset Hut School.

Circa 1948: “The only elementary school in Anchorage at the time was Chugach Elementary, and with an influx of new children in the area, overflow students were sent to Quonset huts nearby.”

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Of course what could be more Alaskan than the log cabin? From Richard L. Proenneke’s handcrafted masterpiece of a cabin at Upper Twin Lake to the many log cabins slowly disappearing around the state, the log cabin remains a classic as described by the aforementioned Alison K. Hoagland in her book The Log Cabin: An American Icon: being both a "seemingly simple structure" and a symbol freighted with numerous "narratives and counternarratives."

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An endlessly fascinating book about Alaskan homes is Jane Haigh’s Alaska Pioneer Interiors: An Annotated Photographic File (Univ of Alaska Press, 1986), featuring original photographs of the interiors of homes from the late 1800s to just after the turn of the century. Showing the everyday furnishings and decor of a wide variety of people, the book is an excellent record of the pioneer era in territorial Alaska.

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And finally, most Alaskans are aware of the very wide—and very strange—assortment of buildings in our state, from the “Dr. Seuss House” to the Broad Pass Igloo to the Chena Hot Springs Aurora Ice Museum:

Anyone seeking an interesting romp through architecture will find plenty to appreciate in Alaska. We may have fewer buildings than most states, but we probably have the widest—and wildest—variety!