Module 6

What are issues facing Alaskans today related to transportation and communication?

Construction on the Glenn Highway

The main issue that is facing Alaskans today for their transportation system is also affecting the rest of the United States, maintenance.  We have built a very impressive system here in Alaska cutting through some of the most inhospitable terrain and climate. But if you look at when they were built it was decades ago.  The Glenn Highway (1942) The Richardson Highway (1920s) are just 2 examples.  The state is now trying to just maintain what has been built.  Without large federal projects most of the state money just keeps a holding pattern on their conditions. 

Map of the different highways in Alaska

Besides the issue of money it is the limited population that many of these roads would serve.  It is very hard to justify the expense of building a multimillion dollar road to a community of 100.  The issue of the bridge to nowhere still haunts the state and now the bar to build a new road has been set very high. In my village they have talked about a road that would connect them to Valdez but most people are resistant due to the fact that it would change the village forever. This is another issue that most people don't think about when a road is suggested.

What were the challenges in the development of communication systems?

Walking the Valdez glacier

The resiliency of the Alaskan communication systems has been very impressive and the readings clearly show that.  No matter what the communication system; be it mail, or telecommunications they were all dramatically affected by 4 things: distance, weather, geography, technology. The establishment of the US postal service at the outset of the handover shows in importance of communication. While it took a while for it to move beyond Sitka with any regularity attempts were made to spread it farther north. The sheer distance between points made contact with the lower states slow added in the rugged conditions and possible weather delays times of over a year were not unheard off. I have this image of men climbing up the glacier out of Valdez taking the “All American Rout” packing the mail with them.  The other thing that I was impressed to learn was how much mail was hauled by dog sled.  It puts the Pony Express to shame when you think about what dog sleaders had to put up with to deliver the mail.

Alaskan sled dog mail carrier from 1910

            It was the invention of air mail that was able to give Alaska the first regular mail service and over come so many of the challenges that normally hindered the mail.  Now only weather could really stop the mail and I am going to tell you based off my mail situation “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.”  This is not true and all of these stop my mail from coming.   Now the mail is the lifeline of many towns around Alaska.  It provides not as much communication but a way of surviving with all the food deliveries.

Extend: How dependent is your community on air transportation?  

Alaska Air Transit over Tatitlek

Living off of the road system is a completely new situation for me.  Growing up in suburb of Portland, Oregon I never was without an opportunity for food or outside entertainment.  Now that I am in Tatitlek I have learned how fragile our communication is with the outside world.  My village has no regular air service and is charter only.  So when I want to leave it is hope that another person has chartered a flight or plunk down $1300 for my one way ticket.  Almost all the food for the village comes in by air and all of the mail. Since our mail comes in by air we are often cut off for weeks with no possibility of packages going in or out.  Air is not our only way in but is the fastest and most practical for small items.  By sea Valdez is only 30 miles away but not a lot of people have boats and even in Valdez items are expensive.

Other Blogs

My Cove and beyond uses great pictures to tell the story.  I am impressed how he was able to get them all to line up and look that well.  Also I was impressed that he was able to find so many different ones.

Miss Mannan had a great write up this week.  The section about the rail transportation system right on.

Alaska Reflections:  I was impressed with the embedded video this week.  I have not been so daring to try and figure it all out yet.  Also the video added a great element to the blog.

Reflection

This week was hard for me due to my schedule but I found the reading easy and very interesting.  The amount of effort that was put into each different communication and transportation component boggles the mind at times.  Just thinking about how long it would take to string the telegraph system one post a time.  I am looking forward to the next module but also glad for the break.

Module V

What have been the major components of the Alaska economy during the American period of 1867-present?

The Alaska Commercial Company Cir 1880s UAA photo

The Alaskan economy has gone thorough many changes and I think the best way to describe it is boom and bust.  Very little restraint has been shown when a resource has been discovered and like the tragedy of commons, people will do what they can to only benefit themselves. From the start when the Americans took over fur was on the decline.  Over hunted by the Russians  and finished by the Americans most fur baring animals was getting harder and harder to find. This was also happening to the whales, hunted for oil among other things.  For both industries they brought a lot of people into the state and money but were unsustainable.

Skagway, Alaska 1899

Prior to oil gold was the largest boom to the Alaskan economy.  Discovered several years after the American purchase of Alaska it brought thousands of people the area to try their luck.  Creating boomtowns out of Valdez, Nome, Seward, and Fairbanks to name a few. While most people would not strike it rich they did provide a large population boost.  These gold rushes were just the start of the extraction of minerals in Alaska.  As the booms ended large companies moved in and started commercial mining operations on a large scale all over Alaska.  From the copper mines around Cordova to the possible Pebble Mine.  Mining still is an important part of the economy even today.

Alaska Commercial Fishing photo: Alaska Fish and game

Alaska has been gifted by some of the best fishing waters in the entire world. This past week I was in Seward for a school field trip to the AVTEC facility.  During our trip we had a chance to visit the Alaska Sealife Center and. I was just astounded on how much fish is pulled from the Bering Sea every year.  Even today as the number of fish have drastically declined in some areas over 1.84 million metric tons of fish were harvested in 2011.  All of this brought in 1.3 billion dollars to the Alaskan economy in one year alone. On a much smaller scale, fishing is very important to my village it has sustained them for thousands of years. In addition to this fact commercial fishing is the only job outside of the council office.  This way of life has transitioned from a subsistence harvest to a commercial one. But the fishing here is a shadow of what it used to be due to another part of the Alaskan economy affecting the harvest. 

Exxon Valdez, Apr. 13 1989

On March 24, 1989 the Exxon Valdez collided with Bligh Reef 7 miles from my village.  1500 miles of devastated coastline later the fishing industry around the area was gone.  By why was a large tanker heading through such a pristine country? Oil, since Russians discovered it in had not played a major part of the Alaskan economy.  The costs are high to collect and process it, not to mention the very high transportation costs. By the 1950s large enough deposits were causing people to take notice and put the needed capital into recovering it.  But it was not until the massive discoveries on the North Slope that Alaska was changed forever into an oil producing state.  With roughly 13 billion barrels of oil Alaska now was on the map of major oil producers. This made the State of Alaska dependent on oil for most of its budget, roughly 80% at times.  Boom and bust cycles in the price of oil has forced the state to try and diversify is economy.  This has happened a little but it will be many years before black gold does not drive the state.

What were the primary motivations for Americans moving to Alaska in the late 1800's?

I can relate a lot to the early American settlers to Alaska.  I have a bumper sticker on my truck that reads “Alaska, North to the future.” People moved to Alaska to make money pure and simple. If you look at what people had to go through to make it to the gold fields, or the conditions they lived in at the whaling stations you can’t tell me it was for the view.  The lure of life changing amount of money for some discomfort was all it took for many. 

Packing the trailer to move to Alaska, Summer 2011

There was another factor that also drove people to Alaska besides money.  The lure of adventure, the unknown.  At this time America was settled from the east to the west.  The blank spaces in the map had been filled in and a person could take the train across the country in comfort.  For many it may have been that they felt fenced in.  But in Alaska you could be what you wanted to be. 

I put myself in the latter category (obviously as a teacher money was not going to be the determining factor).  I packed my entire family up in a used truck, built a trailer and drove north. Other than myself no one in my family had been to Alaska let alone the small remote village that we were moving to. But what made us do it was the thrill of adventure.  Something that most people would never do it their lives.

Extend: Describe the economic base for your area of Alaska and share any current issues confronting the local residents.

Tatitlek Alaska in the summer

The small village of Tatitlek has been around for a long time.  It was one of the villages listed by the Russians when they arrived.  Predominately a subsistence village up until the start of the 20^th Century it had a modern economy forced upon it.  The village was moved 2 miles when copper was discovered and a mine was built.  When that closed a cannery was built and also closed a few years later 1950s.  Since that time no major jobs have been located in our community.  A few commercial fishing boats operated out of the village but that ended with the Exxon Valdez oil spill. Currently the town has no real economy to speak of.  We have no stores, or any real jobs other than make work ones by the tribal office.  The lack of the economy has contributed greatly to the dramatic shrinkage of the village now down to 60 people.  The local corporations have been trying to develop a long term economic plan but nothing has been presented.

Other Blogs

Investigate Alaska was very clear and easy to read I attempted to emulate that this week with my blog. Also her use of hyperlinks in the text was very useful.

Heather’s Alaskan Exploration was very well done.  Besides the insightful responses to the questions the blending of the pictures into the text was very well done.  I also related a lot to the economy of her town.

Explore AK was well done and the response was very complete.  The articles he posted helped explain and increase the usefulness of his blog.

Response

This weeks blog was a wealth of information (maybe a bit overwhelming at times) that helped me get a much better grasp on what goes on in Alaska.  I think the most surprising thing that I saw was the graph of how much of the Alaskan economy was dominated by 2 main areas: federal government and petroleum.  I have seen how massive the government is here in Alaska just by drilling with my army unit.  The resources available are crazy and the land set aside is immense. 

I am looking forward to the next module about transportation. After driving the Alaska/Canadian Highway last summer I am very impressed on what it took for them to complete it so fast.

Module IV

How is the experience of Russian America an example of 18th-19th century imperialism and colonialism?

There are so many aspects of the Russian imperialism, colonialism, occupation that I wanted to look at an unique one that took place in my region.  There is an excellent book called Looking Both Ways, that discusses the history of the Alutiiq people. This population one of the first that had contact with the Russians and most of the trading posts were set up in their homelands.

A creole priest from Aleutian Islands, Peter Dobrovolskii

I learned of a unique part of history, that was the establishment of a Creole class.   Many Russian hunters married into the Native communities. A Creole class was established which included "descendants of these marriages and others who were assimilated into the Russian culture without a direct family relationship." In Paul's Harbor, Russia or Sitka, some Creoles were educated and trained. They served as clerks, navigators and managers basically an "in between" class.  They also were instrumental in helping others to Russian literacy.

The Russians also used the Creoles as a portable population. St. Paul Harbor, Afognak, and Spruce Islands saw Creole families settling there in the 1830's. In the late 1830's, a smallpox epidemic wiped out a good percentage of the people. In the 1840's, the Russian company located some Russian and Creole retirees at Ninilchik on Cook Inlet. There was further relocation after the epidemic in the 1840's, mainly to places near the Russian posts.

By establishing a population that they could “trust” and one that was dependent on them they were better able to manage their business on the edges of the frontier.  This also had a lasting impact on the native culture here in SE Alaska where I teach Vlassoffs, Totemoffs etc.

What other nations demonstrated an interest in Alaska?  Why?

Russia was not the only country interested in Alaska, Britain its political rival at times also had designs on the area.  Discovered for the British in 1778  by Captain James Cook the famous explore who could also claim to have “found” Hawaii, Australia, and many other Pacific territories. His reason for exploring the region was twofold. One reason was to discover a possible northern passage to China in the hopes of expanding trade. He tried unsuccessfully to enter the Bering Strait several times and travel farther north. So he headed South back to Hawaii where he upset some locals and died as a result. The second reason for his Alaskan adventures was to help establish British claim on the west coast of North America. During this period just looking at an area could increase your “legal” right over a territory.  His maps of the area would also allow England to follow up with forts and trading posts. Most of the trading posts that Britain established were in the interior due to successful trade routs through Canada.

Spanish Names and contact points in Alaska

Britain and Russia was not the only European country interested in Alaska. Spain not to be out done by its rivals attempted to establish it only control by moving up the coast from the California area where it had missions. When the Pope finally resolved the dispute between Spain and Portugal in 1493 it gave Spain all of the territories west of Brazil.  Now no country was really following this Papal Bull by the 18^th century but Spain sure wanted people to. So not to be out done the Spanish king sent many different expeditions throughout the lower part of Alaska. Most of the expeditions just mapped the area looked for the Northwest Passage but some did come in contact with the Russian trading posts.  All the interactions were peaceful and in the end Spain realized that an Alaska colony was nonstarter so left and ceded its claim on the area to the United States in 1819.

See if there is one or more maps or images you'd like to post on your blog.  

 

Early Map of North and South America  http://vilda.alaska.edu

The reason that I picked this first map is that I am always amazed to think that people would sail out into the unknown with maybe a map as basic as this and hope to come back.  They would go out and fill in those blank spaces.  Maybe strike it rich or go down in history but the majority would remain unknown.

English map of Russian voyages. http://vilda.alaska.edu

I chose this one with thought this was great propaganda for the Russians.  Here is a map printed in English showing where their explorers have gone and what area they have claimed.  The other thought that I had is how detailed it is.  All done by hand and with none of the modern recording technologies.

Others Blogs

Educational Exploration in AK 

This site did an exceptional job of explaining culture.  I like the parts about resistance and Assimilation. These sections fit right in with this weeks module on Russian influence. One has to ask yourself what would I do in that situation.  I would like to say that I would resist but what are the other options?

 Learn Alaska or Bust

A very good description of what Alaskan culture is.  I am myself and part of the skin according to his 3 branches.  He did well in compressing all of the different aspects of Alaska in to a easily readable format.

Exploring Alaska's Cultures

 I agreed on her take on what her culture was.  I liked the part of work ethic being something that she identifies with.  That was something that I found was different in the village.

Reflections

This subject was a very important one for my community due to the large amount of contact that the Russians had with them. The resources that were provide did a good job of painting the whole era.  I like the links to the maps and have spent a lot of time looking around the digital archives.  Now that I have a few weeks under my belt with this blogging thing I think that I am getting better at it.  Will I every want to blog for fun? No! 

Ok update I have been trying to upload this for an hour now.  I have a flight and I HATE this stupid program.   I