Thu, July 17, 2014
By: J. Pennelope Goforth One of the first salmon canneries to open in Alaska incited a riot before the ship had even offloaded a single tin can. The incident, involving locals and imported labor, was the first of many such conflicts in Alaska over the rights to the seemingly endless resource of salmon. The fracas epitomizes the classic Pacific Coast fisheries struggle of indigenous subsistence users and capitalized ‘outside interests’ boosted by technology. Alaska historian Patricia Roppel references this incident...
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Wed, June 25, 2014
The tradition…or, um, marketing gimmick…of flying the first Copper River salmon of the season to Seattle makes for good news copy every spring.If this photograph from the May 1929 issue of Pacific Fisherman is to be believed, the very first Alaska salmon flown directly to Seattle by airplane was this 34-pound king that made the trip from Juneau on April 21 that year.According to the magazine, “While it is not expected that aircraft will be a regular factor in the...
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Wed, June 18, 2014
(The following is taken from “Mrs. Jeanice Welsh Killed in Yakutat Earthquake,” Pacific Fisherman (August 1958): 47. The earthquake in which Jeanice Welsh perished also triggered a landslide and the subsequent giant wave at Lituya Bay. Thanks goes to James Mackovjac for sharing this.)Mrs. Jeanice Welsh Killed in Yakutat Earthquake. Mrs. Jeanice Welsh Walton, who was generally known in the salmon industry as Jeanice Welsh, and as the only woman who ever owned and personally operated a salmon canning business, died in...
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Wed, June 18, 2014
(The following is taken from “Mrs. Jeanice Welsh Killed in Yakutat Earthquake,” Pacific Fisherman (August 1958): 47. The earthquake in which Jeanice Welsh perished also triggered a landslide and the subsequent giant wave at Lituya Bay. Thanks goes to James Mackovjac for sharing this.) Mrs. Jeanice Welsh Killed in Yakutat Earthquake. Mrs. Jeanice Welsh Walton, who was generally known in the salmon industry as Jeanice Welsh, and as the only woman who ever owned and personally operated a salmon canning...
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Sun, June 01, 2014
By: Steve Henrikson, Curator of Collections at the Alaska State Museum (Note: This article was republished from the Alaska State Museum's Bulletin 41 with the permission of the author.) Though famous for our isolation and uniqueness, the scattering of Alaskan material culture around the globe shows the extent of our engagement in the world economy. Years ago I was in Manhattan, on the “museum crawl,” and took a few minutes to browse an antique mall in the Garment District. The...
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