Posts Tagged ‘Native Histories’
People of the Noatak, by Claire Fejes
In 1946, Clair Fejes moved from New York City, where she had been exhibiting in the A.C.A. Gallery, to Fairbanks, Alaska. She ultimately became an artist in a pioneering community, and traveled to a Noatak hunting camp on the edge of the Kotzebue Sound, where she was irrevocably inspired by the people and landscape of…
Read MoreVillagers, by Claire Fejes
The Natives of Alaska, the Athabaskan Indians, are facing a momentous crisis. Their traditional way of life is being threatened with extinction by the culture of the white man. What changes have been wrought in the lifestyle of the Indians? How are they meeting the challenge to their heritage? In Villagers (224 pages), Claire Fejes–a resident…
Read MoreDreaming Bears, by J. Michael Holloway
Dreaming Bears (208 pages) is the true story of the rare friendship that develops between a young medical student with deep roots in the South and an elderly Indian couple in the wilds of northeast Alaska. In 1961, Mike Holloway, his brother Ted, and a college friend set out from South Carolina to spend the…
Read MoreThe Tlingit Indians, by Aurel Krause
In 1881, two German geographers were on their way to the continental United States from the Bering Sea Coast when they came upon a Native population in southeast Alaska that had formed a society far more complex than those of most other North American tribes. Upon return to Germany, Aurel Krause published “The Tlingit Indians.”…
Read MoreCold River Spirits, by Jan Harper-Haines
Cold River Spirits (192 pages) is a wryly humorous and inspirational story about a proud Alaska Native family struggling to survive in two worlds. Sam and Louise Harper and their ten children make a soul-grinding transition into a modern white-dominated society where they face bigotry, poverty, and illness. Yet, Louise, the Athabascan matriarch, remains in…
Read MoreEskimo Star, by Lael Morgan
The blazing marquee of the plush Astor Theater in New York City billed the 1933 premier of “Eskimo” as “THE BIGGEST PICTURE EVER MADE,” propelling an 27-year-old Inupiat Eskimo from Candle, Alaska, to overnight stardom. The handsome actor was not only the first Alaskan to become a Hollywood movie star but also the first non-white…
Read MoreRed Thunder, by David Matheson
Red Thunder (280 pages) is a memoir of a People. The story draws from the oral history of the Schi-tsu-umsh Indians, now called the Coeur d’Alene Tribe in Northern Idaho. This unique portrayal of pre-European Native Americans is an authentic work displaying the rich cultural teachings behind Native American life. Red Thunder is not only about courage, love…
Read MoreMoments Rightly Placed, by Ray Hudson
Along a thousand-mile chain of treeless and windswept islands, Unalaska is perched at the end of the world, or, as some prefer to say, the beginning. In 1964, Ray Hudson, 22, landed in Unalaska village with a brand-new college degree, eager to teach. The Aleuts had seen many outsiders who had come but seldom stayed…
Read MoreRaising Ourselves, by Velma Wallis
Born in 1960, the sixth of thirteen children, Velma Wallis comes of age in a two-room log cabin in remote Fort Yukon, Alaska. Life is defined by the business of living off the land. Chopping wood. Hauling water from the river. Hunting moose. Catching salmon. Trapping fur. Taking care of the dogs. For a thousand…
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