Tléix' Táakw: A Shakes renovation year in review

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 Chief Shakes Tribal House on Shakes Island will be restored, and Todd White is now on board as project manager.

When talking about the project to restore the tribal house, which has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1970, White is obviously proud to be a part of it.

White, of White Construction, said he has been working in the private sector since 1984, and completed over 21 community projects in Wrangell.

“What I bring to the table is the experience of getting stuff done,” he said.

Yet, the project on Shakes Island is the one that makes him most excited.

“I can build 15 more buildings in my life, but it won’t mean as much as this,” White said standing inside Chief Shakes Tribal House, in awe of its rich history, impressive artwork and cultural significance.

Construction of the tribal house on Shakes Island, which is a replica of the original house erected on the site in the 1800s, began in 1938 and was completed in 1940. The project was a collaboration between the Civilian Conservation Corp, the Forest Service and the local Tlingit tribe.

However, over the last seven decades, the tribal house has rotted in places, and needs to be restored. Despite obvious wear, the outside of the tribal house looks almost exactly as it did 70 years ago, according to a picture published on the front page of the Sentinel on May 31, 1940.

Feb. 9, 2012: Sealaska will donate twelve cedar logs to the Wrangell Cooperative Association to use towards the renovation of Chief Shakes Tribal House on Shakes Island.

WCA requested the six red and six yellow cedar logs late last year through Sealaska’s log donation program. Sealaska – a native corporation – announced last week its board of directors had approved of the donation request.

The logs will be used to replace the corner posts of the 70-year-old Shakes House.

WCA had requested Sealaska’s log donation because it had run out of the resources necessary to complete the renovation, said Dawn Hutchinson, who was the WCA Board President up until yesterday, when new board members were sworn in. The logs WCA had access to were not going to be big enough to replace the large corner posts of the tribal house, Hutchinson said.

“We had all but exhausted all that would be available to us, and we still needed logs,” Hutchinson said. “We went to Sealaska because we absolutely needed more, and they came through.”

The large cedar logs WCA is set to receive are hard to come by, Hutchinson said.

“We had no access to those size logs,” she said.

Rosita Worl, vice chair of the Sealaska Board of Directors, said yellow cedar logs, like the ones WCA will receive, are becoming more and more rare. She said Sealaska is looking into different types of wood, such as spruce, that would be used on clan houses in the future.

However, WCA’s request for the cedar logs was granted because the tribal house on Shakes Island is a historical and monumental structure well known not only in Wrangell but also throughout Southeast Alaska, Worl said.

June 21, 2012: When the Eagle totem at Shakes Island came down for renovation in September 2011, it was a beginning for the renovation project on the island – a project that would take more than a year and see the Chief Shakes Tribal House gutted down to its bare framework of original cedar.

Another milestone in the life of the house came last week when workers raised the first newly adzed corner post for the building on June 15.

The cedar plank, which is part of a batch of wood acquired by the Wrangell Cooperative Association from sacred lands on Prince of Wales Island, came from property managed by Sealaska Corporation.

Todd White, the project manager for the Shakes Island project, said the raising of the first new corner post was a sacred moment in the genesis of the structure’s rebirth.

“Today was a big day for us,” White said of putting up the new post. “We’re going in the right direction by putting the house back together.”

Among all the days required to adze the corner posts, White estimates about 72 total hours of labor were involved between the adzers and millers involved in the process.

July 12, 2012: The Wrangell Cooperative Association welcomed one of the earliest and largest contributors to the Chief Shakes restoration project to Wrangell last week, as members of the Rasmuson Foundation paid the Tribal House and Carving Shed a visit on June 25.

“The Chief Shakes Island Tribal House restoration is exactly the type of project the Rasmuson Foundation likes to get behind,” said CEO Ed Rasmuson, who before becoming President and Chairman of the Board for National Bank of Alaska spent two years running the Wrangell branch after the tenure of former Governor Frank Murkowski.

“I called Wrangell home in 1966 and 1967 and it still holds a place in my heart,” he said. “I would like nothing more than to see the Native culture preserved for future generations. Throw in the visitors that the restored Tribal House and a new carving facility will bring to town and this was a no-brainer project for us to back.”

Rasmuson added that his organization enjoys focusing on projects in the region.

“The Rasmuson Foundation absolutely loves Alaska,” he said. “We’ve contributed more than $2.5 million to Wrangell projects and are proud to have contributed to Wrangell Cooperative Association. We can’t wait to see the Tribal House and Carving Shed completed and the totems back in their rightful place again soon.”

Dec. 20, 2012: Construction on the Chief Shakes Tribal House wrapped up on Friday, Dec. 14 as the rebuilding effort marked a major milestone with an open house and the official completion of work in an effort that took a year to finish and cost just around $1 million.

The cedar structure, which was the home of Chief Shakes VII, the last leader of the Wrangell tribe, began its transformation in 2011 and has seen a brand new house rise in the place of the former.

Todd White, a lifelong Wrangell resident, is the project manager for the renovation and oversaw the rebuilding.

March 14, 2013: The traditional cedar screen that will adorn the face of the renovated Chief Shakes Tribal House will spring from bare wood beginning this week – and give colorful life to the new building, courtesy of master carver Steve Brown and his crew of adzers.

According to Brown, the past week saw the cedar used on the screen adzed, joined and the traditional design drawn on its face courtesy of some high-tech methods.

“We’re wrapping up the adzing of the boards and the surface will have the same hand-hewn texture as the rest of the house, only it’ll be done to a little finer scale because we will have to paint on it,” Brown said. “Our next task is to use a projector to place the image of the original Bear screen onto the boards and we’ll pencil in the design. Then we’ll start painting it and finally we will carve the background away.”

The design used will replicate the original Bear screen used in the 1940 Potlatch, though with different types of paint and a few changes in size.