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By Brian O’Connor Sentinel writer About thirty or forty tourists packed into the Chief Shakes House last Wednesday to take in the newly renovated house and learn about the sun, the moon, and the stars. However, first they had to learn a little bit about Raven. “Raven is considered a trickster,” interpreter Lu Knapp told the assembled crowd. Raven in this case was the figure from Tlingit mythology, and the story Knapp told that afternoon concerns the chief and three boxes in the possession of a...
The 2013 Bearfest celebration came roaring back to Wrangell last Wednesday as the Shtax’Heen Kwaan dancers presented a moving and eloquent recitation of traditional Tlingit dance and language – and fed the nearly 60 visitors with fresh baked and smoked salmon dishes at the Chief Shakes Tribal House. Wrangell Cooperative Association president Tim Gillen said the sharing of food is important to the Natives of Southeast Alaska as a way of keeping ancient Tlingit culture alive. “From my persp...
A series of capital projects led the way in Borough Manager Tim Rooney’s final report to the Borough Assembly last week as he highlighted the improvements on-going or planned in the Borough. Starting off, Rooney informed the Assembly about a number of projects related to the city’s Harbor Department, including upgrades at the Marine Service Center pier. “Pool Engineering has begun work on the pier upgrades and good progress is being made,” Rooney wrote. “The two new batter piles have been driv...
The Sealaska Heritage Institute “Latseen Hoop Camp,” which started on Monday at the Old Gym, features a combination of Tlingit language directions mixed with muscle-memory basketball as a way of teaching not only the sounds, but also meanings of words in the Native language of Southeast. Basketball fundamentals such as offensive and defensive skills are also taught and are at the core of the program – along with a set of lessons designed to teach leadership and cultural pride. According to th...
A Canadian parliamentarian has submitted a bill in the legislature of British Columbia seeking to protect the Stikine, Nass and Skeena rivers Nathan Cullen, Minister of Parliament for the Skeena-Bulkley Valley of Northwestern B.C. has introduced a member’s bill that he says will put the protection back into what he calls a government-gutted Canadian Navigable Waters Protection Act. Cullen said he submitted the bill believing that the Conservative government of Canada has removed what he calls “9...
The festivities scheduled during the 2013 Fourth of July celebration will feature three new events – with all of them being food-related. First up, on Sunday, June 30, a pie-eating contest will be one of the attractions of the Welcome Home Picnic, which will be held from 5-9 p.m. at Shoemaker Park and is being sponsored by Wells Fargo, the Wrangell Cooperative Association, Bobs’ IGA and City Market. Two more events, one new and one returning for the first time since the 1960s, will be featured on July 4 at the sidewalk near the Totem Bar and...
With the Chief Shakes Tribal House project completed earlier this month, and the rededication ceremony written in the history books, the main objective of the Wrangell Cooperative Associated has shifted to their next major building effort – a carving shed for traditional Tlingit woodwork. The shed, which is currently under construction on Front Street at the corner of Lynch Street, will be about 3,600 square feet in size and will have a training room, a carving room, as well as totem storage a...
It took more than a year to complete, but the Chief Shakes Tribal House came together late last week as project manager Todd White and his crew installed the newly carved Bear screen and put finishing touches on the interior of the structure. The house cost nearly $1 million to rebuild and saw a crew of adzers spend the majority of last summer carving away at monolithic planks of nearly foot-thick cedar that would go into the new construction. A part of that million-dollar price tag was a $222,000 award from the M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust...
On May 4, the sun rose on Wrangell Island under gray skies – though those skies would part slightly and sunshine would descend upon a place that is the spiritual heartland of the Tlingit in Wrangell as the Chief Shakes Tribal House was rededicated for the first time in more than 70 years. Last week, over the course of May 2-4, Wrangell entered the pantheon of history as nearly 1,000 visitors from the Native communities of Southeast Alaska and beyond traveled to the Borough to witness the r...
During the rededication of Chief Shakes Tribal House, Wrangell saw an uptick in retail sales and money spent by nearly 1,000 visitors on lodging, food and services, providing a much needed boost to the local economy. Ernie Christian, who is both a member of Wrangell Cooperative Association’s Tribal government and manager of Ottesen’s True Value in downtown said that although he has not crunched the numbers, the Front Street events and the numerous visitors to Wrangell were a boon to his business and others in downtown. “It was a good weekend, I...
The new Chief Shakes Tribal House did not reappear magically overnight. It took a number of years of planning, funding acquisition and construction to see it through to completion, which happened last week in Wrangell. The following stories are a look back in time during 2012 – and what it took to get from there to here – and how the new Shakes House rose in place of its predecessor built in 1940 by the Civilian Conservation Corps. Jan. 26, 2012: Over the next year, the over 70-year-old Chi...
The Shtax’ Heen Kwaan canoe group held a blessing ceremony last weekend for a canoe that will lead the dozens of participants from the One People Canoe Society into Wrangell during the Shakes Island rededication on May 2. The OPCS paddlers began their voyage to Shakes Island on Wednesday, April 24 from a number of communities throughout Southeast, with canoes coming from Yakutat, Juneau, Kake, Petersburg, Sitka, Prince of Wales, Hydaburg and Klawock. Nearly 50 members of the community were on h...
The Wrangell Cooperative Association has submitted a letter to the Borough Assembly requesting that the Wrangell Institute Property be donated to WCA. The letter requests that the possibility of WCA acquiring the land be placed on the April 23 Assembly agenda for discussion. According to Borough Manager Tim Rooney, the item will be placed on that meeting’s agenda. In a March 25 letter to the Borough, WCA board president Tim Gillen lays out his reasons for the request of the property that f...
The final touches on the Chief Shakes Tribal House are currently underway in preparation for the May 3-4 rededication ceremony on the island – and last week saw a colossal parade of students from Wrangell High School and the Native community down Front Street to restore a pair of cedar house posts to their rightful place in the Tribal House. The posts, which were carved by Steve Brown and Wayne Price, traveled from the James and Elsie Nolan Center in a flatbed trailer and were accompanied by m...
Ground has been broken on a new carving shed for the Wrangell Cooperative Association on property adjacent to the SNO Building in downtown. The construction, under the direction of WCA project manager Todd White, began with grading and underground work and will progress over the coming months to include pouring a foundation, framing, and ultimate completion of the one-of-a-kind structure. According to White, the work will begin in earnest once warmer temperatures arrive and the snow gives way...
The Southeast Alaska Power Agency Board of Directors held their regular bi-monthly meeting in Wrangell on Tuesday and Wednesday, March 5-6 to discuss a number of items of both new and old business – and to announce the agency is working with a public relations firm to try to “foster a positive public image.” In SEAPA CEO Trey Acteson’s report to the board, he outlined his plans for improving the image of the agency – and challenged that misinformation and inaccuracies are abundant in local med...
After carbon testing, a skull found on Government Slough last year has been found to be more that 1,000 years old – and is of Native Alaskan heritage. The skull, which was discovered by Wrangellite Vena Stough while hunting near the slough on Oct. 5, was first turned over to the Wrangell Police Department, who then handed it over to the Tongass National Forest supervisor’s office in Petersburg. According to U.S. Forest Service District Ranger Bob Dalrymple, the testing showed a range of dat...
A “bridge” can be both a noun and a verb – and at Wrangell’s Chief Shakes Island it is both a literal and figurative example of what a bridge can be. The footbridge connecting Shakes Island to Wrangell Island is currently undergoing a facelift, with new handrails and planks being installed by the same crew that renovated the Tribal House during the past year. It’s the bridge’s connection between landmasses – and the action of bridging the past with the present – that Wrangell Cooperative Ass...
In the oral history of Native Alaskans, the thunderbird is a creature that is revered, respected, sometimes feared, and responsible for stirring the winds with storms and thunder when it flies. That said, after 62 years of absence, the Wrangell Thunderbirds basketball team, comprised of organizer Anthony Harding along with Brad Angerman, Cody Angerman, Jason Clark, Dustin Johnson, Kevin Young, Keith Young, Archie Young, Ryan Howell, Graham Gablehouse and Mitch Mork, will travel to Juneau for...
With less than four months remaining until the rededication of Shakes Island and the Chief Shakes Tribal House, the Wrangell Cooperative Association is at a make-or-break moment when it comes to housing a group of 1,000-plus guests and dignitaries who will visit the island May 3-4. According to WCA Board of Directors member Ken Hoyt, a number of spaces have been filled, primarily by reserving nearly every room in the Stikine Inn, Diamond C Hotel, and Alaskan Sourdough Lodge, as well as a number of bed and breakfasts and private homes. It’s s...
Elections were held Jan. 3 for four open seats on the WCA Board of Directors. *Tim Gillen - 43 *Lovey Brock - 41 *Arthur Larsen - 37 *Ken Neish Hoyt - 28 James Stough - 25 Marge Byrd - 20 Myrna Torgramsen - 20 64 total ballots were counted, with 5 questioned ballots not counted....
A new mayor, renovations to the Shakes Island Tribal House and Marine Service Center, and the ongoing Wrangell Medical Center debate – all of these stories were newsmakers in 2012. Let’s take a look back at some of the biggest stories in Wrangell over the past year. JANUARY A late night blaze destroyed a trailer and sent a woman to Wrangell Medical Center with severe burns on Dec. 22. The fire, which began at 10:30 p.m. in a small pull-behind trailer near the top of the park, severely inj...
The City and Borough of Wrangell is asking its citizens for help in lobbying Governor Sean Parnell’s office to help get a public works project in downtown back on track. A proposed renovation of Evergreen Road beginning at the Alaska Marine Highway System ferry terminal, and extending north and then east from the city center, has been a priority item on the Alaska Statewide Transportation Improvement Program since 2008 – holding down the top spot on that list since 2010. Last week it was str...
Dawn Hutchinson – Stevens, 66, passed away on December 5, 2012 with family by her side. Dawn was born April 11, 1946 in Wrangell to Fanny Stepetin (Nauska) and Henry Bradley. Dawn picked up the nickname of Butchie as a young child and some still called her that. She was also proud of her Tlingit name - Glaintz. She graduated from Wrangell High School in 1964 and obtained a BA in Fine Arts from Washington State University in 1982, with a minor in Native American Studies. Dawn returned to W...
