AHS Blog
2018 AHS Conference Call for Papers
CALL FOR PAPERS
Gold-seekers and their building materials at Nome City, 1899. Alaska State Library, Clarence L. Andrews Collection (P45-1054).
Tundra & Ice: History in Alaska’s Arctic
Alaska Historical Society Annual Conference
September 12-15, 2018 in Nome, Alaska
Alaska’s Arctic is fertile ground for historical inquiry. Northern topics abound like whaling in the Arctic Ocean, the gold stampedes to Nome and Kotzebue Sound, the Prudhoe Bay oil strike, and the rich history of Inupiaq and Yupik people and their contributions to environmental protection and civil rights in Alaska. This year we look northward and contemplate ways to preserve our histories and share them with the world. As always, presentations on all Alaska history topics are welcome.
This year the Alaska Historical Society and Museums Alaska will hold their conference in Nome (a first for AHS), and this year’s theme—Tundra & Ice: History in Alaska’s Arctic—invites reflection on the people, landscapes, and events that have shaped Alaska’s higher latitudes. Our featured speaker will be Dr. Lorraine McConaghy, public historian at Seattle’s Museum of History & Industry and Washington State History Museum, who has many years of experience wrangling with questions of whose stories are told and how we tell them.
You are invited to submit proposals for papers, panels, and poster sessions. Presentations are limited to 20 minutes. Presenters must be registered for the conference.
To submit a proposal, please send your presentation title, an abstract (<100 words), and two sentences about yourself to Chris Allan, Program Chair, sprucetip105@gmail.com.
Proposals are due May 15, 2018.
For more information, go to “Conference Information” and “How To Shape Proposals and Presentations” on the AHS website.
Unlocking McNeil’s Past: The Prison, The Place, The People Exhibit Opening, January 26, 2019
From January 26 to May 26, 2019, the Washington State Historical Society in Tacoma is hosting the exhibit Unlocking McNeil’s Past: The Prison, The Place, The People. McNeil Island is where many Alaskans were incarcerated during territorial days.
This exhibition presents the larger history of McNeil Island as a place, and the prison that opened there 143 years ago. The prison operated far longer than the better-known Alcatraz island prison. When the state’s correctional center on McNeil Island closed in 2011, it was the last prison in the nation only accessible by air or water.
From its beginnings as a territorial prison through its tenure as a federal and state penitentiary, the story of McNeil illuminates how incarceration in the U.S. has changed over time, as seen through the evolution of the prison facility, itself.
Unlocking McNeil’s Past: The Prison, The Place, The People presents history through accounts from prison staff, inmates, and residents of the island. It explores McNeil’s connections to significant state and national events. It examines the evolution of prison practices through territorial, federal, and state lenses, as well as the physical landscape of the prison itself and how its structure reflected these changes. Stories of early settlement and the unique relationship between the prison and its island community are also shared through this exhibition.
For more about the exhibit, see the Washington State Historical Society’s webpage.
Listen to the six part podcast Forgotten Prison created in collaboration between KNKX.org and Washington State History Museum – airing weekly on 88.5 FM beginning Tuesday, January 22.
The Forgotten Prison podcast has been supported through a storytelling grant from Humanities Washington.
MUYBRIDGE IN ALASKA Exhibit Opening, January 26, 2019
GRAND OPENING OF MUYBRIDGE IN ALASKA: 1868
Circumpolar World Music Festival
The Alaska Native Heritage Center celebrates the opening of Muybridge in Alaska: 1868, an unprecedented traveling exhibition of iconic photographer Edward Muybridge’s historic Alaskan views. The exhibition opens on Saturday, January 26, 2019 at 10:00 a.m. in the Hall of Cultures.
Also on January 26, at 4:00 p.m., the Alaska Native Heritage Center will host a public forum to discuss the photographs, their context and meaning. Panelists will include Tlingit authority Tom Harris, celebrated Tlingit artist and musician Preston Singletary, University of Alaska anthropologist Dan Monteith and exhibition organizer and award-winning documentary filmmaker Marc Shaffer. UAA professor of Native Studies Maria Williams will serve as moderator.
Muybridge in Alaska: 1868 features original Muybridge photographs of Fort Tongass, Fort Wrangle (sic), and Sitka, taken in August 1868. These are the first photographs taken of Tlingit people, and the first of Alaska widely seen. Visitors will be provided with stereoscopes through which they can view the dual stereo views in 3D, as originally intended.
Muybridge in Alaska: 1868 is organized by Inside Out Media and curated by Marc Shaffer. The images are on loan from the private collections of Leonard Walle and Mary Everson. The exhibition is supported by the Atwood Foundation, in part by a grant from the Alaska Humanities Forum and the National Endowment for the Humanities, a federal agency, and by a Harper Arts Touring Fund grant from the Alaska State Council on the Arts. Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this exhibition do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Muybridge in Alaska: 1868 grows out of a major documentary on Muybridge being directed by Marc Shaffer entitled Exposing Muybridge. For more information, visit www.muybridgethemovie.com.
Muybridge in Alaska: 1868 will be on exhibit until March 27, 2019 at the Alaska Native Heritage Center, Anchorage. It will then travel to the Sheldon Museum in Haines for April and May, before finishing its tour in Sitka in June and July.
The Circumpolar World Music Festival will be held on the same day in the Gathering Place. Schedule includes:
10:45am Alaska Native Heritage Center Dancers
11:15am Tlingit and Haida Dancers
11:45am Alaska Native Guitarist: Owen Parduhn
2:15pm The Whitney Youngman Trio
1:30pm Alaska Native Heritage Center Dancers
3:00pm Khu.éex’ Band
3:45pm Meet the Artists
4:00pm Muybridge Discussion Panel
Alaska Native Heritage Center is a nonprofit organization that preserves and strengthens the traditions, languages, and art of Alaska’s Native People through statewide collaboration, celebration, and education. It is located at 8800 Heritage Center Drive in northeast Anchorage, just off Muldoon Road North near Bartlett High School. For more information about other events and programs, visit www.alaskanative.net
Putting History to Work in Alaska: Public History at UA
100th Anniversary of the Princess Sophia Tragedy
October 25th was the 100th Anniversary of the sinking of the SS Princess Sophia in Lynn Canal, Alaska’s worst maritime accident. Go to the podcast “Stuff You Missed in History Class” to learn more about this event.
SS Princess Sophia Memorial, Skagway
The public is cordially invited to the SS Princess Sophia Memorial & Storyboard Dedication Saturday, October 20, 2018 • 2 PM
White Pass & Yukon Route Depot & Skagway Centennial Park
Introduction by emcee Jeff Brady, SS Princess Sophia Committee
Welcome by Skagway Mayor Monica Carlson
Welcome by White Pass & Yukon Route – Tyler Rose
Guest Speaker: David Leverton, Maritime Museum of British Columbia
Unveiling of SS Princess Sophia Memorial at Centennial Park with reading of the names of known victims by SS Princess Sophia Committee members
Closing Remarks by SS Princess Sophia Committee Chair Carl Mulvihill
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During this special event, the SS Princess Sophia Exhibit from the Skagway Museum will be on display at the WP&YR Depot in front of the ticket office.
Special thanks to Hamilton Construction for donation of the memorial rock, and to the Skagway Public Works crew for installation.
Please join us at 7 PM on the Railroad Dock for a wreath-laying ceremony.
