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T H E CHEM AWA AM ERICAN
OUR STRANG E PEO PLE TO THE NORTH
By Frank G. Carpenter
(C o n tin u ed from last issu e)
As it is now, nearly every family in H ydaburg has
stock in this trading company, and the people are
rapidly growing well-to-do. Nearly every one has
his gasoline launch and all have comfortable homes.
The town elects its own officers. It has a mayor and
councilmen and the business of the place is transacted
in English. One of the first co-operative works was
the building of a sidewalk. There was no money in
the village treasury, but the young men brought in
the proceeds of their season’s fishing, and the Indian
girls had a basket social, at which the food was
charged for, the proceeds to go to the sidewalk. At
that social $290 was realized. This bought the lum
ber and the men gave their labor without charge.
That sidewalk is the best in Southeastern Alaska.
It is ten feet wide and more than half a mile long.
Since then the citizens have erected a municipal
dock, which is 440 feet long, with a front of 55 feet.
The co-operative store has created a hunger for busi
ness training, and business methods are taught in the
school. The village has town meetings, at which all
matters of public interest are discussed and the pop
ular vote determines what shall be done.
The Haidas are not Thlingits. They belong to a
different Indian family and for a long time their only
home seems to have been on Queen Charlotte Island,
in British Columbia. Eater some of them moved to
the west coast and about 200 years ago, according to
their traditions, they drove the Thlingits out of a part
of Prince of Wales Island and settled there. They
have always been considered a superior Indian, and
have had the reputation of being the best painters,
carvers and canoe builders of Southeastern Alaska.
Iu the past they hollowed their canoes out of single
logs of cedar and they built houses with cedar beams
and planks, which were worked out with adzes of
stone. At one time there were something like 8,000
of them, but during our possession of Alaska the num
ber in the United States territory has never been more
than six or eight hundred.
The Thlingits are scattered everywhere throughout
the Alexander archipelago and there are tribes that
live on the mainland. Klukwan is a village of the
Chilkats, on the Chilkat river not far from Skagway.
The town is said to be 300 years old and to have once
had a population of a thousand souls. Its people were
traders, exchanging dried fish and oil for furs with the
Athapascans of the interior. The Chilkats are great
trappers. They have divided their hunting grounds
among the various families and these rights extend
from generation to generation. They have been noted
for their skid in the various industries. They wove
blankets a century ago. They also forged copper and
did beautiful carving. Much of this skill has departed
with the advent of civilization, but they now make
moccasins and cut out totem poles and other things
for the tourists.
The Chilkats are not as advanced as the Haidas,
but the settlement of Klukwan has a co-operative store,
which has just paid a dividend of 35 per cent. The
store is so gocd that it gets much trade from the
whites, and it is said that the Indians come a distance
of a hundred miles to buy there. Klukwan has its
m en’s club, which holds meetings every week at which
m atters of town interest are discussed. Now the boys
are talking of forming a clubhouse, with reading room,
toilet and bath. The reading room will be large
enough to hold meetings in. Magazines will be sub
scribed for and books added from time to time.
The government is trying to induce these Indians
to go into canning and some canning machinery has
been sent there. The school teachers advise that a
sawmill be installed. They say that the boys are
quick to learn carpentry, and they are now making
chairs, tables and sleds in the school shops. East
year they began to work in sheet metal and made air
tight stoves which sold from $3.50 to $5 each. Their
sleds bring from $7 to $10 and cost about half that to
make.
Among the other movements to better the Indians
of Southeastern Alaska is that of school farming.
Both children and adults are shown how to make gar
dens, and some of the villages are growing vegetables
and berries of various kinds. At Klukwan they are
are raising turnips, potatoes and carrots, and also
cabbages, peas and lettuce. One of the teachers re
ports that he has supervised the making of seventeen
native gardens inside the Artie circle, and that he has
four large school gardens doing well. There are In
dian gardens at Eagle, Fort Yukon and Klawock, and
one has been started at Unalaska in the Aleutian is
land.
The government is doing all it can to improve the
sanitary conditions among the Indians. The teachers
are cleaning up the towns and the doctors and nurses
of the Bureau of Education go from village to village
and give directions for the care of the sick and how to
keep the well healthy. It is estimated that 30 per cent
of the natives have more or less consumption and that
8 per cent of the deaths are due to tuberculosis. Sani
tary camps should be provided and means of prevent
ing the spread of the disease inaugurated. The doc
tors have recommended a tuberculosis camp in Pan
handle. They want one established in the Chilkat
valley between Haines and Klukwan.
Of late the Indians have taken up the fad of feed
ing their infants from the bottle. Many of them are
doing that now. The women know nothing about
the preparation of artificial food, and many of the
children come out of the nursing stage feeble and
scrawny. The school children are being examined
for trachoma, adenoids and other diseases. They
are taught to take care of their teeth and are warned
against the using of tobacco and alcohol.
Alcohol is the great curse of the Indians of Alaska.
Its sale is forbidden by law, but nevertheless whiskey
is sold to the Indians, and it will continue to be sold
as long as saloons are allowed in the white settlements.
Of late there has been a strong prohibition movement,
and the probability is that the territory will sometime
vote itself dry. Congress is now appropriating a small
amount per year to suppress the liquor traffic among
the Indians, and it has its special employes who are
working to do this, under the direction of the marshals
and police.