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Hello Readers,
I am pleased to tell you the July-August issue is finished, currently being proofed and finalized, and will be mailed on schedule on June 15th! If you haven’t ordered a print copy yet, there’s still time to have yours sent with the first mailing, just click the link below. Articles will be emailed to paid subscribers of this newsletter starting July 1st.
In this issue: • Dispatching the Army to Alaska • The Clay Street Cemetery • Alaska Nellie, Peerless Alaska Railroad Hostess • Ivan Petroff’s 1880 Report on Alaska • Jujiro Wada, The Samurai Musher • USGS Topographer-in-Charge, R. Harvey Sargent • 1926-1929 U.S. Navy Aerial Alaskan Survey •
Alaska Mining Hall of Fame
A valuable resource for researching early prospectors, miners, and others involved with the mineral wealth of Alaska is the Alaska Mining Hall of Fame. Their Mission Statement: The Alaska Mining Hall of Fame Foundation, Inc. was founded to honor outstanding individuals that have played important roles in the development of Alaska's mineral industry. These mining pioneers include a wide variety of individuals active since the mid-19th Century, including prospectors, miners, mine entrepreneurs, professional geologists and engineers, educators, government employees, aviators and even those in the legal profession. These individuals must be known, understood, and appreciated for their contributions to the development of the Territory and subsequently State of Alaska. The AMHF interprets and disseminates knowledge concerning the lives of the AMHF inductees, and encourages others in historical fields to gather additional biographical information. The AMHF believes that honoring those mining pioneers helps tell the story of mineral resource development in Alaska as well as providing a better understanding of other important events in Alaska's history. Since 1997, more than ninety pioneers have been inducted into the AMHF. Because many qualify for induction into the organization, the board determined that, at least for now, AMHF inductees must be deceased for at least two years in order to be eligible for the AMHF.
• Books from Northern Light Media include The Alaska Railroad 1902-1923, Alaskan Roadhouses, The Matanuska Colony Barns, The First Iditarod, Alaska & The Klondike, Camping and Trailing in Alaska (1909), The 1935 Matanuska Colony Project, and many more! Check them out at this link:
Alaskan History Magazine is published by Northern Light Media, and book sales support the continuing publication of the magazine.
Alaskan Museums
Carrie M. McLain Memorial Museum, Nome
The Carrie M. McLain Memorial Museum in Nome, dedicated to collecting, preserving, and sharing the culture, history, and artistry of Nome and the Bering Strait, reopened in the new Richard Foster Building in October 2016. The environmentally-controlled Museum comprises a collections storage area, conservation, and object preparation lab, visiting research room, and two exhibit galleries. Learn more here.
Book Excerpts
Free book excerpts are posted to the newsletter site and emailed to both free and paid subscribers almost every week. Titles online now include The Beautiful Matanuska Valley, A Dog Puncher on the Yukon, A Woman Who Went to Alaska, Long Hard Trails and Sled Dog Tales, The Tanana Valley Railroad, The History of Seward, and The Land of Tomorrow. If you missed one they’re all still free to read at the newsletter site.
Hudson Stuck’s Sled Bag
The Episcopalian minister Hudson Stuck, known as the Archdeacon of the Yukon, published five books about his travels and adventures in Alaska, including Ten Thousand Miles with a Dog Sled, published in 1914. In that book the photograph below appears, and a sled bag can be seen hanging from the handlebars. That sled bag is on permanent display at the University of Alaska Museum of the North in Fairbanks.
Originally posted to Northern Light Media, August 5, 2020.
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~ A free subscription - the version you’re reading now.
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Thanks for reading, see you next week!
Helen Hegener, publisher
Northern Light Media