Sealaska Heritage Institute Press Release

MULTI-YEAR WEAVING APPRENTICESHIP TO CULMINATE IN INTENSIVE, DANCING OF THE ROBES AT SHI

Project part of effort to increase number of Chilkat weavers

Jan. 11, 2023

Sealaska Heritage Institute (SHI) will sponsor a Chilkat weaving intensive and a dancing-of-the-robes ceremony as the culmination of a two-year project envisioned and led by the award-winning Chilkat weaver Lily Hope.

The project is part of an effort to increase the number of people who can complete Chilkat robes, which are considered an endangered art form.

Hope, the daughter of the renowned Chilkat weaver Clarissa Rizal, began weaving and teaching the art form in earnest after her mother’s untimely passing from cancer in 2016. In October 2021, she began mentoring more than 30 students from across the country on how to make child-sized Chilkat dancing robes, starting with thigh-spinning 300 yards of their own warp.

The apprentices will come to Juneau in mid-January for the two-week intensive, during which they will finish weaving and add dance fringe, fur and other finishing touches. The project will culminate in February at the dancing-of-the-robes ceremony, known as the First Dance, which is a key part of letting robes go and easing the sadness that comes with that, Hope said.

“My mother said she was only able to dance one of her eleven robes immediately after cutting it off the loom. She said it was the first and only time that she didn’t fall into a deep depression after the robe went home with its new family,” Hope said. “She compared it to experiencing a grown child moving out. The ceremony and witness (for the weaver) of the first ‘steps’ away from the maker was critical for her to move on to the next great thing without grief.”

Hope taught her apprentices to make child-size robes, as teaching students to make adult-size versions can take many years. Through that process, students gained the knowledge on how to scale future robes to adult size.

Hope estimates that roughly 200 people currently know how to weave a Chilkat circle—one of the most foundational components of Chilkat weaving. Of those, only 10 have completed an adult-sized robe, and just five of them are willing to sell to museums and art collectors outside of Native communities, she said.

The project is significant because Hope has potentially quadrupled the number of weavers who can make adult-sized robes, said SHI President Rosita Worl.

“In my lifetime, I’ve witnessed the knowledge of Chilkat weaving almost go extinct. We are very proud of Lily for helping to perpetuate this sacred art form and for passing on the knowledge taught to her by Clarissa, who apprenticed with the late master Chilkat weaver Jennie Thlunaut,” said Worl, who is Thlunaut’s granddaughter.

The intensive begins on Jan. 20 in Juneau in partnership with the Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska (CCTHITA). The First Dance is scheduled Feb. 1 in SHI’s clan house. The robes will then be featured in a show, For Our Children: Chilkat Regalia Woven in the Lineage of Jennie Thlunaut and Clarissa Rizal, at the Juneau-Douglas City Museum in February. SHI will live stream the First Dance through its YouTube channel.

SHI is providing major funding for the intensive, which includes support for mentor and apprentice fees, travel, housing accommodations, supplies and video and photographic documentation of the intensive and events. Hope’s Chilkat mentorship is supported in part by Friends of Juneau Douglas City Museum, CCTHITA, Goldbelt Heritage Foundation, Native Arts and Cultures Foundation SHIFT: Transformative Change and Indigenous Arts Grant, The CIRI Foundation, Shee Atiká, Inc., Huna Heritage Foundation, Chilkoot Indian Association, SHI and Canada Council for the Arts.

About Lily Hope

Lily Hope was born and raised in Juneau, Alaska, to full-time artists. She is Tlingit of the Raven moiety. Following her matrilineal line, she’s of her grandmother’s clan, the T’akdeintaan. She learned Ravenstail weaving from her late mother, Clarissa Rizal, and Kay Parker, both of Juneau. She also apprenticed for over a decade in Chilkat weaving with Rizal who, until her untimely passing in December 2016, was one of the last living apprentices of the late master Chilkat weaver Jennie Thlunaut. Hope is one of few designers of dancing blankets. She teaches both finger-twined styles extensively in person (and virtually since COVID-19), in Alaska, Canada and the Lower 48. She demonstrates internationally and offers lectures on the spiritual commitments of being a weaver. She’s one of six artists in the Smithsonian’s inaugural all Indigenous biennial Renwick Invitational opening in 2023. 

About Chilkat weaving

Chilkat weaving is one of the most complex weaving techniques in the world, and it is unique to Northwest Coast cultures. Chilkat weavings, which function as clan at.óow or ceremonial objects within the Native community, are distinct from other weaving forms in that curvilinear shapes such as ovoids are woven into the pieces. The curved shapes are difficult and very time-consuming to execute, and a single Chilkat robe can take a skilled weaver a year or longer to complete. Traditionally, mountain goat wool and yellow cedar bark were used. The process of harvesting the goat and bark and then processing these materials was also complex and laborious. In recent years, Chilkat weaving was considered to be an endangered art practice. A few Native artists mastered the craft and are now teaching it to others, giving hope this ancient practice will survive.

Sealaska Heritage Institute is a private nonprofit founded in 1980 to perpetuate and enhance Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska. Its goal is to promote cultural diversity and cross-cultural understanding through public services and events. SHI also conducts social scientific and public policy research that promotes Alaska Native arts, cultures, history and education statewide. The institute is governed by a Board of Trustees and guided by a Council of Traditional Scholars, a Native Artist Committee and a Southeast Regional Language Committee.

CONTACT: Kathy Dye, SHI Communications and Publications Deputy Director, 907.321.4636, kathy.dye@sealaska.com

Caption: Child-sized Chilkat robes woven by Hope’s dearly departed mentors, Jennie Thlunaut and Clarissa Rizal. Photo courtesy of Lily Hope and @sydneyakagiphoto. Note: news outlets are welcome to use this photo for coverage of this story. For a higher-res version, contact kathy.dye@sealaska.com

Sealaska Heritage Institute Press Release

SEALASKA HERITAGE DIGITIZES, POSTS CELEBRATION 1996

Video series shows eighth Celebration, more years to follow

Jan. 9, 2023

(Watch)

Sealaska Heritage Institute (SHI) has digitized and posted online video of Celebration 1996.

Celebration is a dance-and-culture festival first held by SHI in 1982 that has grown into the world’s largest gathering of the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian people.

With 46 dance groups, Celebration 1996 was the largest event since it began in 1982. In addition to 37 dance groups from Alaska, there were 3 from the Lower 48, 5 from Canada and a group from Siberia.

Celebration 1996 also featured a significant lecture series with wide-ranging topics, including ceremonialism on the northern Northwest Coast by Frederica de Laguna, a speech on Tlingit protocol by Dr. Walter Soboleff and a panel discussion on the military and Southeast Alaska Native communities among others. Also on offer was a hospitality room that provided information on natural resources and voter registration, repatriation workshops for tribal members and waterfront performances by SHI’s Naa Kahidi Theater.

SHI sought grants to digitize and share past Celebration tapes so the footage could be used as a resource for dance groups wanting to learn from past performances, language learners wanting to hear Elders speaking, people wanting to learn more about their culture and to teach others about Southeast Alaska Native cultures.

The rest of SHI’s Celebration footage, up through Celebration 2016, will be posted online. Celebration 2018 was the first Celebration posted on YouTube in its entirety in 2019.

The Celebration: 10,000 Years of Cultural Survival project has been made possible in part by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities and by the Institute of Museum and Library Services. 

About Celebration

SHI held the first Celebration in 1982 at a time when the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian were in danger of losing knowledge of their ancient songs, dances and stories and the meaning behind the crests depicted on their regalia and clan at.óow (sacred objects). It was held at the urging of Elders, who worried the cultures were dying after a period of severe oppression, during which time Native people did not sing their songs and dance their dances in public. The first Celebration was meant to underscore the fact the cultures had survived for more than 10,000 years.

The event proved to be so profound, SHI’s board of trustees decided to sponsor Celebration every other year in perpetuity. Celebration sparked a movement that spread across the region and into the Lower 48 — a renaissance of Southeast Alaska Native culture that prompted people largely unfamiliar with their own heritage to learn their ancestral songs and dances and to make regalia for future Celebrations. Today, Celebration is one of the largest events in Alaska, drawing thousands of people to the four-day festival, including thousands of children.

Sealaska Heritage Institute is a private nonprofit founded in 1980 to perpetuate and enhance Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska. Its goal is to promote cultural diversity and cross-cultural understanding through public services and events. SHI also conducts social scientific and public policy research that promotes Alaska Native arts, cultures, history and education statewide. The institute is governed by a Board of Trustees and guided by a Council of Traditional Scholars, a Native Artist Committee and a Southeast Regional Language Committee.

CONTACT: Kathy Dye, SHI Media and Publications Deputy Director, 907.321.4636, kathy.dye@sealaska.com

Sealaska Heritage Institute Press Release

SHI EXPANDS SUPPORT FOR NATIVE LANGUAGE STUDY AND INSTRUCTION AT UAS

Scholarship available for the 2023 spring semester

Dec. 21, 2022

Sealaska Heritage Institute (SHI) will fund University of Alaska Southeast (UAS) students interested in taking courses in X̱aad Kíl, Sm’algyax and Lingít through a new initiative, Our Ancestor’s Echoes. Through the program SHI will also fund language teachers at UAS to provide free, non-credited language classes.

This funding will be available each semester throughout the duration of the three-year project, beginning with the spring 2023 semester and concluding with the spring 2025 semester. 

Scholarship applicants must be Alaska Native, planning to take an eligible language course, and have a cumulative GPA of at least 2.0 as a full- or part-time student at the UAS Juneau campus. Preference will go to applicants who are majoring in a field related to language (e.g. Alaska Native Languages and Studies) and to those who are working towards a heritage language teaching or speaking certificate.

The application is only for scholarship funding; students must register for the UAS course independently. Funding for these course credits is limited; application and necessary documents should be emailed to leah.urbanski@sealaksa.com by Friday, Jan. 6. Applicants must include an unofficial transcript from their most recently attended school and documents to show tribal affiliation. Applicants will be notified via email regarding their acceptance status.

Language Scholars

Through the same project, SHI has also selected six Native language students for a bachelor’s degree program to further perpetuate Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian languages in the establishment of learning nests.

Casey Moats, Crystal Fierro, Greg Frisby, Raven Svenson, Skaydu.û Jules and Terri Modig were chosen for this program, and SHI will pay room, board and tuition for the students. 

The three-year initiative builds on a similar program that ended this year. Through that program, six language learners received their teaching certificates and the remaining nine are working toward that goal as well, said SHI President Rosita Worl.

“We are so proud of the achievements of our language students. They are at the forefront of perpetuating our ancient languages. With this new round of recruits, we are building on our efforts to hear our languages once again spoken on the land,” Worl said.

Through the three-year program, these selected candidates will be expected to:

•         Spend four hours weekly listening to audio in their heritage language;
•         Spend each year with an advanced language speaker translating and transcribing 15 minutes of archival audio;
•         Attend SHI’s healing Summer Language Program each year; and,
•         Obtain a bachelor’s degree in Indigenous studies with an emphasis in Alaska Native Languages

Sealaska Heritage Institute is a private nonprofit founded in 1980 to perpetuate and enhance Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska. Its goal is to promote cultural diversity and cross-cultural understanding through public services and events. SHI also conducts social scientific and public policy research that promotes Alaska Native arts, cultures, history and education statewide. The institute is governed by a Board of Trustees and guided by a Council of Traditional Scholars, a Native Artist Committee and a Southeast Regional Language Committee.

CONTACT: For questions about applying for funding or about the scholarship program, contact leah.urbanski@sealaska.com. For questions about this press release, contact Kathy Dye, SHI Media and Publications Deputy Director, 907.321.4636, kathy.dye@sealaska.com

Caption: Photo of 2022 language graduates by Stacy Unzicker, courtesy of Sealaska Heritage Institute. Note: news outlets are welcome to use this photo for coverage of this story. For a higher-res version, contact kathy.dye@sealaska.com

Sealaska Heritage Institute Press Release

SHI RELEASES FEATURE-LENGTH FILM ON HISTORY, ORIGIN OF CELEBRATION

Program explores the origins of Celebration to today

Dec. 21, 2022

(Watch)

Sealaska Heritage Institute (SHI) has released a feature-length film on the history and origin of Celebration since its inception in 1982.

The film, 40 Years of Celebration — A Biennial Festival of Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian Cultures, begins with the first Celebration, when Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian people came together for the first time to celebrate that their cultures had survived, and progresses through the evolution of the event over the years.

“Imagine that for the first time ever in our long house we have the three nations under one roof,” said SHI Chair Judson Brown at the 1982 event. “I believe this is one of the most historic occasions for our three designated tribes. I believe we will remember this day probably into infinity.”

Celebration started off with primarily Elder participants, and hardly any children were there. The year 2022 marked the 40th Celebration, which now includes participation of all ages. It has grown to include many associated events, such as a Juried Art Show and Competition, a Native artist market, Native food contests, a Native fashion show, a toddler regalia review, a parade through downtown Juneau, several affiliated events, and other special events.

Today, Celebration, which draws thousands of people to Juneau every even year, is the largest gathering of Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian people in the world.

The 60-minute film, which premiered in June at Celebration 2022, includes footage of the first Celebration and interviews with numerous people. The documentary was produced by SHI through Farthest North Films with funding support from the U.S Department of Education Alaska Native Education Program. The program includes closed captions, which viewers can toggle on or off.

Sealaska Heritage Institute is a private nonprofit founded in 1980 to perpetuate and enhance Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska. Its goal is to promote cultural diversity and cross-cultural understanding through public services and events. SHI also conducts social scientific and public policy research that promotes Alaska Native arts, cultures, history and education statewide. The institute is governed by a Board of Trustees and guided by a Council of Traditional Scholars, a Native Artist Committee and a Southeast Regional Language Committee.

CONTACT: Kathy Dye, SHI Communications and Publications Deputy Director, 907.321.4636, kathy.dye@sealaska.com

Caption: Photo of Chilkat Thunderbirds by Brian Wallace, Celebration 2022. Note: news outlets are welcome to use this photo for coverage of this story. For a higher-res version, contact kathy.dye@sealaska.com

Sealaska Heritage Institute Press Release

SHI TO SPONSOR LECTURE ON NATIVE LEADERS’ HALL OF FAME

Free event to be offered in-person, virtually

Dec. 16, 2022

Sealaska Heritage Institute (SHI) will sponsor a free lecture next week on the activism of Native leaders during the United States occupation of the ancient homeland of the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian of Southeast Alaska.

In the talk, longtime Tlingit leader Ed Thomas will explore their successes in securing the human rights Native people enjoy today.

“My presentation is not a recital of the profiles of these great people but an attempt to review highlights of historical events that these people were an important part of,” Thomas wrote.

Alaska Native people have been in Southeast Alaska from the beginning of time, and so when people foreign to us began imposing their laws and policies upon our people and our lands it offended early Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian leaders, he wrote.

Aboriginal tribes of North America have always governed themselves at levels to meet the needs of their tribal citizenry. European “settlers” with the establishing of the United States has had the greatest impact on the very fiber of our existence and our way of life. Southeast Alaska Natives saw how tribal people in the Lower 48 were wiped out in endless wars with the United States, and so they chose to advocate for our rights utilizing non-Native laws, policies and procedures to gain equitable rights for our people, he wrote.

“Very little has been written about those wise Native leaders; the compilation of these profiles reminds us of who these people were and are. Placing their names in a Hall of Fame gives us an opportunity to celebrate their successes in securing our human rights,” Thomas wrote.

The lecture is scheduled for 12 pm, Tuesday, Dec. 20, in Shuká Hít within SHI’s Walter Soboleff Building, 105 S. Seward St. in Juneau. The lecture will be livestreamed and posted on SHI’s YouTube channel.

About the Lecturer

Thomas was born and raised in Craig, Alaska, where he graduated from high school in 1960. He began his college education at Sheldon Jackson College earning his Associate in Science degree and then went on to earn his Bachelor of Science in Education from the University of Alaska, Fairbanks.  In 1974, he accepted a fellowship from Pennsylvania State University where he earned his master’s in education administration.

Thomas began his 25-year commercial fishing career as a cook at the age of 13 on the FV Verness of Klawock. He would go on to skipper a seine boat and later a power troller; he currently owns a hand troller permit.

Thomas taught junior high school and coached the boy’s junior high basketball team in Klawock, Alaska, for a year. He was a high school counselor and coached the boy’s junior high basketball team in Craig, Alaska, and served as the Indian Studies student counselor for the Sitka School District. He also served as the executive director of the Indian Education Program in Ketchikan for nine years.

Thomas has been the president emeritus of the Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska (Tlingit Haida Central Council) since April 2008. He served as president of the tribe from October 1984 until April 2007, was re-elected in 2010 and officially retired in 2014. He served on the Sealaska Corporation board of directors from 1993 to 2020 and is the chairman of the Sealaska Timber Corporation board in addition to a variety of other positions and responsibilities he fulfills.

Sealaska Heritage Institute is a private nonprofit founded in 1980 to perpetuate and enhance Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska. Its goal is to promote cultural diversity and cross-cultural understanding through public services and events. SHI also conducts social scientific and public policy research that promotes Alaska Native arts, cultures, history and education statewide. The institute is governed by a Board of Trustees and guided by a Council of Traditional Scholars, a Native Artist Committee and a Southeast Regional Language Committee.

CONTACT: Kathy Dye, SHI Communications and Publications Deputy Director, 907.321.4636, kathy.dye@sealaska.com

Caption: Photo of Ed Thomas by Stacy Unzicker, courtesy of Sealaska Heritage Institute. Note: news outlets are welcome to use this photo for coverage of this story. For a higher-res version, contact kathy.dye@sealaska.com

Sealaska Heritage Institute Press Release

YAKUTAT TRIBE, SHI AND SEALASKA URGING CESSATION OF LOGGING OF HISTORIC SITE

Area is ancient homeland of the Kwaashk’iḵwáan clan

Dec. 15, 2022

Sealaska Heritage Institute (SHI), Sealaska Corporation and the Yakutat Tlingit Tribe are calling on Yakutat’s Native village corporation to stop logging an area that is a known and important cultural and historic site, until an assessment can be conducted and mitigation plans put in place.

The area, known as Humpback Creek (Kwáashk’ Héeni) in Yakutat Bay, is the ancient homeland of the Kwaashk’iḵwáan clan and where they obtained the humpy salmon crest. The area is so significant that it’s memorialized in clan names, crests, history and identity. “Kwaashk’iḵwáan” literally translates as “people of the Humpback Creek.”

This month, the tribe learned that Yakutat’s village corporation, Yak-tat Kwaan, was logging the site through its wholly owned subsidiary, Yak Timber. While logging, an equipment operator near Humpback Creek discovered an archaeological site reported to consist of several house pits and a series of parallel stone walls laid across a dry creek bed.  

Oral traditions tell of Humpback Creek, but until now, no physical evidence of the site had been discovered. Frederica de Laguna, an American ethnologist, anthropologist and archaeologist who studied Native culture in Yakutat extensively, reported local knowledge of a former settlement at this location occupied by the Hmyedi, an Eyak clan, but did not find any physical traces of it. Because of its known historical significance, the reported village and surrounding land were claimed by Sealaska Corporation under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, but the claim was denied due to the lack of supporting archaeological evidence, said archaeologist Aron L. Crowell of the Arctic Studies Center, Smithsonian Institution. 

Melenda Lekanof-Baker (Du Keíl) of the Yéil Naa (Raven Moiety), K’ineix Kwáan (People of the Copper River Clan), Tsisk’w Hit (Original Owl House), Kwáashk’ikwáan Clan (People of the Humpback Creek) recalls listening to her grandmother and friends talking in Lingít about Humpback Creek.

“As I listened, I imagined what my people’s village looked like. This is how I know there was a village there because a long time ago my people came from this place, and the village would put up so much salmon, berries and medicines. So being able to evaluate this area and this stone wall that was newly discovered is just a peek of what is out there,” said Lekanof-Baker, who works in sacred sites management for the Yakutat Tlingit Tribe as the Lands And Cultural Resources Director.

“It’s like a gift from our ancestors, reminding us they are here still,” she said. 

The site has sacred and spiritual dimensions as well has historic significance, said SHI President Rosita Worl.

“As a village site, it is highly likely that it contains ancestral human remains as well as shamanic burials on the periphery of the village site. Tlingit belief systems hold that we have a duality of spirits — one part that remains with the human remains even after death while the other transfers to the spirit world,” said Worl, noting that Sealaska, when it founded SHI, charged the institute with protecting Native historic and sacred sites.

“SHI has taken that responsibility very seriously,” she said.

Sealaska Corporation has looked to document and care for Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian sacred sites from the very beginning of its 50-year history. The original Sealaska board called for significant research on documenting these sites, and its research included interviewing Elders and traditional scholars in all communities about sites that were known to them.

“We have prioritized attaining as many sacred sites as possible within our own land selections, and we have partnered with our tribes and SHI to make sure these sites are protected. Our own forestry practices require 300-foot buffers around all known sacred sites, and we stop work if we find undocumented sites and immediately survey the area,” said Sealaska President and CEO Anthony Mallott.

“While Sealaska does not own all the sacred sites we’ve identified, we have partnered, again, with SHI, village corporations, and our local tribes to protect all known sites no matter who the landowner is – the Forest Service, the state, or others.  We look forward to the value of the cultural and scientific information that comes from studying this specific sacred site because of the depth of the oral history that pertains to the location,” Mallott said.

The Humpback Cove Village site is potentially one of the most important cultural resources in Yakutat Bay, with strong links to clan histories recounted in oral tradition, said Crowell.

“A remarkable set of cultural features related to salmon harvesting appears to be preserved, and cultural layers at the site could provide a unique record of traditional lifeways and subsistence practices extending back 700 years. Although part of the site has been clearcut, the cultural features do not appear to have been substantially damaged, and their future preservation should be a high priority,” said Crowell, who wrote a summary of traditional knowledge and a preliminary interpretation of the site this week after SHI reached out to him for assistance.

Oral Tradition on Humpback Creek (Kwáashk’ Héeni)

This text is excerpted from a paper written by archaeologist Aron L. Crowell of the Arctic Studies Center, Smithsonian Institution.

Although the physical remains of a village at Kwáashk’ Héeni are a new discovery, the site is richly documented in Yakutat oral tradition. The creek was the scene of a dispute over fishing rights between Eyak clans residing in the area (the Hmyedi, Koskedi, or Łuẋedi) and members of the newly-arrived Gineix Kwáan, an Ahtna clan that migrated to Yakutat from their homeland on the Copper River. The conflict at Kwáashk’ (the Eyak word for pink or humpback salmon; Thornton 2012:21), which took place about 500 years ago, was peacefully resolved when the Eyak transferred ownership and use rights for all of eastern Yakutat Bay to the Gineix Kwáan in exchange for a treasure of tináa, engraved ceremonial shields made of native copper (Crowell 2022, 2023:204-208; De Laguna 1972:231-242; Swanton 1909: 347-368). According to the late Lena Farkas of Yakutat, the Eyak people said, “There is more copper in that canoe than this little creek (Kwáashk’) is worth, so we’re going to give you all of Tłaxatà (Yakutat Bay)” (L. Farkas, 17 June 2012; Crowell 2023:207).

In commemoration of this land acquisition, the Gineix Kwáan adopted a new clan name, Kwaashk’iḵwáan, meaning the “people of Kwaashk.’” Secure in their ownership of the area, the Kwaashk’iḵwáan and affiliated Galyáx Kaagwaantaan (an Eyak clan they encountered at Icy Bay during the migration) built the large village of Tlákw.aan (Tlingit, “old town”) on the south shore of nearby Ganawás (Knight Island). This took place sometime in the decades just before or after 1500 AD, based on radiocarbon dates from the Tlákw.aan archaeological site, YAK-00007 (Crowell 2022; De Laguna et al. 1965). Tlákw.aan was inhabited until the late 18th century, and its residents almost certainly continued to use Humpback Creek for subsistence fishing, based on the large quantities of anadromous fish bones in the Tlákw.aan midden and the creek’s prominence as the nearest spawning run for pink and coho salmon, Dolly Varden trout and steelhead trout (Alaska Department of Fish and Game 2022). Oral tradition also indicates that a fishing camp or summer settlement was located at the creek and that Yaa Xooda Keit, a Kwaashk’iḵwáan clan leader who died in about 1880, sometimes stayed there (De Laguna 1972:64-65). 

A detail from the Kwaashk’ story may be important for interpretation of the stone walls reported at the site. The territorial dispute began when the Eyak discovered a Gineix Kwáan man fishing at the creek with a salmon harpoon, which they took away and broke. Spawning salmon were traditionally taken with barbed harpoons as the fish schooled below barricades built across watercourses. Large box traps made of wooden stakes were also constructed in rivers, their mouths flanked by bank-to-bank weirs, and an example of this type was found in 1997 at the Lost River (historical site YAK-00079). Stone tidal weirs placed across the mouths of streams were another type of trap, designed so that salmon passed over the top of the rock wall when the tide was high but were blocked behind it as the water receded (Emmons 1991:102-121; De Laguna 1972:381-391). It is suggested that the parallel stone walls that cross the dry creek bed at YAK-00014 could be tidal traps of this type or possibly stone weirs that flanked a box trap, in which case a central opening should be visible.

Archaeological Interpretation

This text is excerpted from a paper written by archaeologist Aron L. Crowell of the Arctic Studies Center, Smithsonian Institution.

Oral tradition indicates that Humpback Creek was an Eyak fishing site and probable settlement at the time that the Gineix Kwáan arrived in Yakutat Bay after their migration. The earliest radiocarbon dates from Tlakw.aan are about 1450 cal. CE (Crowell 2022, 2023), and the Humpback Creek site (YAK-00014) should therefore be older. Malaspina and Hubbard glaciers began retreating from the mouth of Yakutat fiord in about 1200 AD and had pulled back almost to Point LaTouche by 1450 AD, so the Humpback Creek/ Humpback Cove area could have been ice-free as early as about 1300 AD, suggesting a maximum site age of about 700 years. The village was used until the mid to late 19th century, based on its association with Yaa Xooda Keit. Cultural strata could therefore include dates and artifacts from the Eyak, Ahtna, and Tlingit phases of Yakutat history (Crowell 2023), and the uppermost levels probably include Russian and American trade artifacts such as glass beads, ceramics, metal items, and firearms.

Cultural features reported at the site include five house pits adjacent to a dry stream bed (Fig. 2). Five rock walls (Fig. 1) extend across the old stream, with parallel lines of evenly spaced boulders between the walls. As suggested above, the rock walls may be the remains of weirs constructed to trap salmon on high tides or direct them into traps, and the boulders could also be related to this fishing technique although their purpose is unclear.

Today the site is no longer adjacent to an active creek and is above tidal range, suggesting that uplift of the shoreline has occurred. This would have shifted the site both upward and inland away from the present shore and may also be responsible for rerouting the watercourse so that it now longer flows past the old village. The great earthquake of 1899 caused tectonic shifts in land levels all around Yakutat Bay but there was little or no vertical displacement at Humpback Cove (Tarr and Martin 1912) so that isostatic rebound – the land slowly rising after the great weight of glacial ice was removed – is therefore the likely cause. Isostatic uplift at the North Knight Island Village site (YAK-00205) was calculated at approximately 2 m since 1500 CE, so a similar or greater rise (causing decline of relative sea level, RSL) may have occurred at Humpback Creek, which is seaward of Knight Island and deglaciated earlier (Crowell 2023). As suggested by Richard Vanderhoek (the Alaska state archaeologist), the multiple rock weirs at YAK-00014 may have been built one after the other as RSL declined in order to keep the trap system at the proper level in relation to the tides. The older walls would be the highest ones. It is suggested that in surveying the site the elevation of datum be measured in relation to mean lower low water (MLLW); this will allow direct comparison to uplift at YAK-00205.

Sealaska Heritage Institute is a private nonprofit founded in 1980 to perpetuate and enhance Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska. Its goal is to promote cultural diversity and cross-cultural understanding through public services and events. SHI also conducts social scientific and public policy research that promotes Alaska Native arts, cultures, history and education statewide. The institute is governed by a Board of Trustees and guided by a Council of Traditional Scholars, a Native Artist Committee and a Southeast Regional Language Committee.

CONTACT: Amanda Bremner, Yakutat Tlingit Tribe Capacity Development Director, abremner@ytttribe.org; Aron Crowell, Archaeologist at the Smithsonian Arctic Studies Center, National Museum of Natural History, crowella@si.edu, 907-229-8369; Kathy Dye, SHI Communications and Publications Deputy Director, 907.321.4636, kathy.dye@sealaska.com. 

Photos courtesy of Defend Yakutat. Note: news outlets are welcome to use these photos for coverage of this story. For a higher-res version, contact kathy.dye@sealaska.com

Sealaska Heritage Institute Press Release

SHI TO SPONSOR LECTURE BY ARCHAEOLOGIST DETAILING DISCOVERY OF ANCIENT STONE FISH WEIR

Free event to be offered in-person, virtually

Dec. 8, 2022

(Video of Weir)

Sealaska Heritage Institute (SHI) will sponsor a lecture on Tuesday to delve more deeply into the discovery of an ancient, submerged stone weir, which was found near Prince of Wales Island this year through a partnership between a team of scientists and SHI.

In her lecture, Our Submerged Past: The Importance of a Submerged Fish Weir in Shakan Bay, underwater archaeologist Dr. Kelly Monteleone will expound upon the research team’s significant find, which is the oldest stone weir ever found in the world. The trap is estimated to date to at least 11,100 years ago.

Southeast Alaska, specifically the continental shelf and islands on the west side of Prince of Wales Island, had a drastic sea-level rise at the end of the Last Pleistocene/Early Holocene. There was up to 176 m of sea-level rise, from -165 m to 11 m, in approximately 7,000 years, which is an enormous change in a relatively short time, Monteleone wrote.

The stone fish weir confirmed on the seafloor at approximately 52 m and its age demonstrate that early land-use locations (archaeological sites) are preserved on the continental shelf. The find supports the hypothesis that people migrated to the Americas along the coast—a theory supported by ancient Tlingit oral histories—instead of a land bridge across the Bering Strait.

“The submerged coastline would have been part of the route for early peoples journeying to the Americas at the end of the last glacial period,” Monteleone wrote.

The structure was first found in 2010 by use of side-scan sonar technology, which detects and images objects on the seafloor. Scientists suspected the vague image to be that of a stone weir, but mostly due to funding constraints, the team was not able to confirm their hypothesis through underwater exploration until earlier this year.

“The confirmation of this side-scan sonar feature can provide confirmation of other side-scan anomalies that are thought to be stone weir structures,” she wrote.

Monteleone is an underwater archaeologist, a data analyst at Mount Royal University’s Registrar’s Office, and an adjunct assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology and Archaeology at the University of Calgary.

She completed her Ph.D. in anthropology in 2013 from the University of New Mexico and is actively seeking an assistant professorship in Canada. She has an MSc in maritime archaeology from the University of Southampton, UK, and a Hrs. BSc in archaeology from the University of Calgary.

Her research focuses on providing the tools and expertise to help locate submerged archaeological sites on the continental shelf of Southeast Alaska and assisting the local communities in learning more about their ancestors. Monteleone is active with Sigma Xi: the international honor science society, where she is the associate director for the Canada/International constituency.

The lecture is scheduled for 12 pm, Tuesday, Dec. 13, in Shuká Hit within SHI’s Walter Soboleff Building, 105 S. Seward St. in Juneau. The lectures will be livestreamed and posted on SHI’s YouTube channel.

Funding provided by NOAA Ocean Exploration (NA21OAR0110198).

Research Team

This project brings together a highly experienced team from around North America organized by Sunfish Inc. and Sealaska Heritage Institute. The team includes: Dr. Kristof Richmond (PI), Chief Technology Officer at Sunfish Inc.; Dr. Kelly Monteleone (co-PI), an archaeologist at the University of Calgary; Dr. Rosita Worl, an anthropologist from Sealaska Heritage Institute; Dr. Vera Pospelova, who specializes in dinoflagellate Cyst analysis from the University of Minnesota; Dr. Nancy Bigelow, who specializes in microfossil and pollen analysis from the University of Alaska, Fairbanks; Jill Heinerth, the lead diver and Education/Outreach specialist; Vickie Siegel, the field operations manager for Sunfish; and additional Sunfish team members. The project will hire local residents to participate, and tribal representation will be coordinated through Sealaska Heritage Institute. SHI also plans to bring interns majoring in sciences. Additionally, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, United States Geological Survey, and Tongass National Forest Service representatives will continue to participate throughout the project.

Sealaska Heritage Institute is a private nonprofit founded in 1980 to perpetuate and enhance Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska. Its goal is to promote cultural diversity and cross-cultural understanding through public services and events. SHI also conducts social scientific and public policy research that promotes Alaska Native arts, cultures, history and education statewide. The institute is governed by a Board of Trustees and guided by a Council of Traditional Scholars, a Native Artist Committee and a Southeast Regional Language Committee.

CONTACT: Kathy Dye, SHI Communications and Publications Deputy Director, 907.321.4636, kathy.dye@sealaska.com; Dr. Kelly Monteleone (co-PI), archaeologist at the University of Calgary, 403-478-3833 (note this is a Canadian number, so long-distance charges will apply), kelly.monteleone@ucalgary.ca

Caption: Image from a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) of semi-circular stacked stones on the seafloor, part of a larger weir complex. Photo and video by Dr. Kelly Monteleone (co-PI), an archaeologist at the University of Calgary, courtesy of Our Submerged Past Project. Note: news outlets are welcome to use this image and footage for coverage of this story. For a higher-resolution photo, contact kathy.dye@sealaska.com

Sealaska Heritage Institute Press Release

SEALASKA HERITAGE DIGITIZES, POSTS CELEBRATION 1994

Video series shows seventh Celebration, more years to follow

Dec. 7, 2022

(Watch)

Sealaska Heritage Institute (SHI) has digitized and posted online video of Celebration 1994.

Celebration is a dance-and-culture festival first held by SHI in 1982 that has grown into the world’s largest gathering of the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian people.

With more than 35 dance groups, Celebration 1994 was the largest event since it began in 1982.

One novel component in 1994 was a new entrance song written by Harold Jacobs that could be used by all groups. The song was given to the Sealaska Heritage Foundation and copies of the written lyrics were mailed out for all groups to practice and publicly debut for the first time during the Grand Entrance. Since the song was not owned by a clan, it was authorized for use by all dance groups.

The lyrics feature the words of Kichnaalx Lkanaaw George Davis of the Deisheetaan from Angoon during the 1980 Sealaska Elders Conference in Sitka, “We will open again this container of wisdom left in our care.”

SHI sought grants to digitize and share past Celebration tapes so the footage could be used as a resource for dance groups wanting to learn from past performances, language learners wanting to hear Elders speaking, people wanting to learn more about their culture and to teach others about Southeast Alaska Native cultures.

The rest of SHI’s Celebration footage, up through Celebration 2016, will be posted online. Celebration 2018 was the first Celebration posted on YouTube in its entirety in 2019.

The Celebration: 10,000 Years of Cultural Survival project has been made possible in part by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities and by the Institute of Museum and Library Services.

About Celebration

SHI held the first Celebration in 1982 at a time when the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian were in danger of losing knowledge of their ancient songs, dances and stories and the meaning behind the crests depicted on their regalia and clan at.óow (sacred objects). It was held at the urging of Elders, who worried the cultures were dying after a period of severe oppression, during which time Native people did not sing their songs and dance their dances in public. The first Celebration was meant to underscore the fact the cultures had survived for more than 10,000 years.

The event proved to be so profound, SHI’s board of trustees decided to sponsor Celebration every other year in perpetuity. Celebration sparked a movement that spread across the region and into the Lower 48 — a renaissance of Southeast Alaska Native culture that prompted people largely unfamiliar with their own heritage to learn their ancestral songs and dances and to make regalia for future Celebrations. Today, Celebration is one of the largest events in Alaska, drawing thousands of people to the four-day festival, including thousands of children.

Sealaska Heritage Institute is a private nonprofit founded in 1980 to perpetuate and enhance Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska. Its goal is to promote cultural diversity and cross-cultural understanding through public services and events. SHI also conducts social scientific and public policy research that promotes Alaska Native arts, cultures, history and education statewide. The institute is governed by a Board of Trustees and guided by a Council of Traditional Scholars, a Native Artist Committee and a Southeast Regional Language Committee.

CONTACT: Kathy Dye, SHI Media and Publications Deputy Director, 907.321.4636, kathy.dye@sealaska.com

Sealaska Heritage Institute Press Release

SHI OFFERING SCHOLARSHIPS TO MUSEUM, ART STUDIES STUDENTS

Initiative part of vision to make Juneau Northwest Coast arts capital

Dec. 5, 2022

Sealaska Heritage Institute (SHI) is offering scholarships to students majoring in art and museum studies under a program operated in partnership with the University of Alaska Southeast (UAS) and the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) in New Mexico.

The program, which offers $1,000 to $5,000 per scholarship recipient, is part of a larger effort to support an Alaska Native arts associate degree or certificate at UAS and a studio arts and museum studies degree at IAIA.

As part of the program, SHI is offering scholarships for the 2023 academic year to undergraduate and graduate students who are pursuing arts and science degrees with a focus in studio arts, performing arts, cinematic arts and technology, or creative writing, and who incorporate Northwest Coast arts studies in their degree; or a degree with a concentration in museum studies.

“The scholarship program is also part of our goal to make Juneau the Northwest Coast arts capital and to designate Northwest Coast art a national treasure,” said SHI President Rosita Worl.

Scholarships are available to Alaska Native students who are enrolled in Northwest Coast arts courses at UAS or arts courses at IAIA. Museum studies students may be enrolled at any US college. The application deadline is Dec. 16, 2022.

Sealaska Heritage Institute is a private nonprofit founded in 1980 to perpetuate and enhance Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska. Its goal is to promote cultural diversity and cross-cultural understanding through public services and events. SHI also conducts social scientific and public policy research that promotes Alaska Native arts, cultures, history and education statewide. The institute is governed by a Board of Trustees and guided by a Council of Traditional Scholars, a Native Artist Committee and a Southeast Regional Language Committee.

CONTACT: Kathy Dye, SHI Communications and Publications Deputy Director, 907.321.4636, kathy.dye@sealaska.com. 

Caption: SHI museum interns with artist Lily Hope in SHI’s collections vault. Photo by Kaila Cogdill, courtesy of SHI. Note: news outlets are welcome to use this photo for coverage of this story. For a higher-res version, contact kathy.dye@sealaska.com

Sealaska Heritage Institute Press Release

SHI EXPANDS AWARD-WINNING EARLY LITERACY PROGRAM TO ANCHORAGE

Institute to partner with the Alaska Native Heritage Center

Dec. 1, 2022

(Baby Raven Reads Books)

Sealaska Heritage Institute (SHI) is expanding its award-winning early literacy program, Baby Raven Reads, to Anchorage through a partnership with the Alaska Native Heritage Center (ANHC).

Through the expansion, SHI and ANHC will offer the program for one year to Alaska Native families with children ages 5 and under in Anchorage, and participating families will receive 9 Baby Raven Reads books and kits plus invitations to family literacy events.

“Southeast Alaska is the ancient homeland of the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian, but many of our people live outside of the region, and more than 2,000 reside in Anchorage. We are grateful to our partner, the Alaska Native Heritage Center, for helping us to make this expansion possible,” said SHI President Rosita Worl.

The partnership between ANHC and SHI is a perfect match, said ANHC President and CEO Emily Edenshaw.

“We’ve been envisioning an expansion of this remarkable program for our statewide community for many years, and we are grateful for the opportunity to promote early literacy through cultural stories and reading sessions at our facility. This project fits right into our expanding suite of cultural programs, which is only made possible through strong partnerships. We are stronger together and are so excited to partner with SHI,” she said.

Families may enroll now online.

The expansion was funded through a grant from the U.S. Department of Education. The grant also is funding the continuation of the program in Craig and Wrangell.

About Baby Raven Reads

Baby Raven Reads improves early literacy skills by translating cultural strengths into home literacy practices and incorporating culturally familiar terms and images into books. Baby Raven Reads provides family literacy events, training for care providers, and professional development for early childhood educators. A recent study by McKinley Research Group revealed that Native children who participated in the program made 20-39 percent gains in phonetic knowledge, awareness of print concepts and knowledge of letters and symbols, while scores for all other students have remained relatively static. The program was also known to increase parental and family engagement in student learning.

Baby Raven Reads was recognized in 2017 by the Library of Congress, which gave SHI a 2017 Best Practice Honoree award. In 2018, the American Indian Library Association awarded SHI’s book Shanyaak’utlaax: Salmon Boy its American Indian Youth Literature Best Picture Book Award, and in 2020 it gave Raven Makes the Aleutians a AILA Picture Book Honor award. In 2018, SHI’s Baby Raven book How Devil’s Club Came to Be was reviewed by the American Indians in Children’s Literature (AICL) blog as a recommended title. In January 2020, AICL also recommended Cradle Songs of Southeast Alaska.

Sealaska Heritage Institute is a private nonprofit founded in 1980 to perpetuate and enhance Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska. Its goal is to promote cultural diversity and cross-cultural understanding through public services and events. SHI also conducts social scientific and public policy research that promotes Alaska Native arts, cultures, history and education statewide. The institute is governed by a Board of Trustees and guided by a Council of Traditional Scholars, a Native Artist Committee and a Southeast Regional Language Committee.

CONTACT: Kathy Dye, SHI Communications and Publications Deputy Director, 907.321.4636, kathy.dye@sealaska.com

Caption: Photo of Baby Raven Reads students by Brian Wallace, courtesy of Sealaska Heritage Institute. Note: news outlets are welcome to use this photo for coverage of this story. For a higher-res version, contact kathy.dye@sealaska.com