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Alaska Eskimo Footwear
By Jill Oakes Rick Riewe University of Alaska Press
Copyright © 2007 Bata Shoe Museum Foundation
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-889963-80-8
Chapter One
Introduction
I find ancient needles, scrapers, knives and other tools when I work in the garden. People have lived here since time began. Hazel Gatoonga, Unalakleet, Alaska, 1990
ALASKA'S FIRST PEOPLES
The Eskimo and Aleut peoples inhabit the largest range of any traditional hunter society in the world, extending from the east coast of Greenland westward across northern Canada and Alaska to the eastern shores of Siberia. Across this vast territory these people have displayed diverse cultural adaptations that have allowed them to thrive where other cultures would vanish. Nowhere across these circumpolar lands is the cultural and environmental diversity as great as it is in Alaska. In northwestern North America the landscapes and seascapes are so diverse and fertile that the area has supported much larger populations of indigenous peoples than anywhere else in the Arctic. Here, sedentary coastal whale hunters, migratory inland caribou hunters, coastal salmon fishers, hunters and herders inhabiting offshore islands, and residents of magnificent forested fiords thrived historically, and adapted their traditional cultural values to contemporary modern lifestyles. Today their material culture, including tools, clothing, and footwear, nonverbally communicates their cultural values and lifestyles.
The coastal region of Alaska is inhabited by several distinct cultural groups: Inupiat, Yupiit, Central Yupiit, Aleut, and Alutiit (refer to Appendix I for a discussion of the languages spoken by these peoples and the preferred spellings of their names). The Inupiat live in the northern coastal lowlands as well as inland close to the Brooks Range; the Siberian Yupiit live on St. Lawrence Island and on the easternmost tip of Siberia; the Central Yupiit inhabit the vast wetlands of the Yukon-Kuskokwim river system; the Aleut inhabit the storm-swept Aleutian Islands which extend almost to Asia; and the Alutiit reside in the coastal mountains of the North Pacific. South of the Aleut and Eskimo peoples live the Tlingit and Haida, and in interior Alaska live their neighbors, the Athapaskans.
EARLY TRADE
Items were traded among Native peoples from both sides of the Bering Strait, including domestic reindeer skins, sealskins, wood for constructing tools and weapons, articles of clothing, figurines, bowls, masks, and pipes (Burch 1988). These people traded for items not found in their own territories; for example, people living along rivers traded fish and caribou skins for walrus ivory and skins of bearded seals harvested by marine hunters. Many of the trade materials were incorporated into their clothing. These complex early trade networks created opportunities for social, technical, and spiritual exchanges within an economic framework (Fitzhugh and Crowell 1988).
RUSSIAN AND EUROPEAN CONTACT
It was the valuable furs of the sea otters, fur seals, and arctic foxes-known as "soft gold" in Russia (Forsyth 1992)-that initially attracted Europeans to Alaska. In 1648, Semën Dezhnev, a merchant-navigator and Cossack, was the first European to sail around the Chukchi Peninsula into the Bering Sea. Peter the Great commissioned Danish captain Vitus Bering to explore the coastline of the Bering Sea and to identify potential sources of furs. On this trip in 1728, Bering never saw North America. During a second voyage in 1741, Bering landed on the North American coast and encountered Native peoples' camps but did not meet anyone. These trips, however, inspired more traders to search for furs. After 1750 small Russian trading forts were established along the southwestern coastline of Russian America where otter skins were exchanged for knives, beads, needles, fabric, and other items. Sea otter pelts were especially valuable as they were traded for highly sought after tea from China. Captain Cook between 1776 and 1780 and Captain Vancouver between 1790 and 1795 explored the southern reaches of the Yup'ik and Alutiiq territories (Black 2004; Cook and King 1784; Vancouver 1798; VanStone 1984a; Fitzhugh and Crowell 1988).
In 1799, Russia chartered the Russian-American Company to trade for furs and to administer the Alaskan Territory for the czar. The company surveyed the area north to Norton Bay. These expeditions provided contacts with Yupiit and Inupiat which became extremely lucrative for the company. For the first fifty years, only a few Russian-American trading posts were located north of Kodiak Island. As wildlife became scarce, the Russian traders moved northward and inland. Russian naval captain Otto von Kotzebue (1821) and the British naval captain Frederick Beechey (1832), explored the northern Alaskan coast but provided little information on the Inupiat. In the 1840s, the Russian Lavrentii Zagoskin explored the Yukon, Kuskokwim, and Koyukuk rivers, redirecting trade into those areas.
By 1849 hundreds of American and British whaling and trading vessels had moved into Alaskan waters. The wildlife was soon overharvested, and Russian interests in North America were threatened by the Americans and the British. In 1867 Russia was financially stressed due to the Crimean War and sold Alaska to the United States for $7.2 million. Americans then assumed that all of Alaska legally belonged to them, an assumption that Russia had also made based on the fact that it had small trading posts scattered along the southwest coast. Many Native peoples strongly felt that it was their land, belonging to neither the Russians nor the Americans. To this day Russian influence is seen in many aspects of the people's architecture, lifestyles, clothing designs, and tourist items (Mitchell 1997; VanStone 1984a).
Between 1867 and 1884 Alaska fell under the jurisdiction of the American military. The military outposts were manned by soldiers who caused trouble with the indigenous residents, alcohol being but one of the problems the soldiers introduced (Burch 1988; Forsyth 1992; Golder 1922-1925; Langdon 1987; Mitchell 1997).
MISSIONARIES
Along with the explorers, whalers, and fur traders, missionaries also dramatically influenced the material culture and lifestyles of the Alaskan Eskimos and Aleut. Russian Orthodox missionaries moved into southern Alaska in the 1700s, converting Aleut and Yupiit to Christianity (VanStone 1984a). In the late 1800s, Presbyterian, Congregational, and Episcopal missionaries opened schools in other parts of Alaska, offered medical services, and converted the Inupiat to Christianity. Influences from these denominations continue to this day.
By the late 1800s, with the wildlife populations having been devastated by overharvesting, the Eskimo and Aleut livelihood was threatened. In 1892, in hopes of rectifying this problem, Sheldon Jackson, a Presbyterian missionary working on behalf of the U.S. Bureau of Education, and Michael Healy, captain of the U.S. Coast Guard cutter Bear, introduced reindeer herding. Herds were purchased from Siberia, and a few Chukchi herders were enticed to come to Alaska and teach herding skills to the Eskimos. After a few years most of the Chukchi wished to return home. The U.S. government then persuaded Sámi herders from northern Norway to move to Alaska and continue with the training (Ray 1979; VanStone 1984a). Ownership of the herds passed to the Inupiat and today there are herds on Seward Peninsula as well as St. Lawrence, Nunivak, St. Paul, Kodiak, Umnak, and Atka islands. Eskimos and Aleut continue to harvest reindeer, consuming the meat, using the hides (the white skins are highly sought after for fancy skin parkas, pants, and footwear), and, until recently, selling the antler velvet to the Orient.
ALASKAN ENVIRONMENTS
Aquatic Environments
The northern Pacific Ocean is one of the richest marine environments in the world (Freeman 1988). These waters do not experience much seasonal variation-temperatures hover around the freezing point year-round. South of the Bering Sea the waters are usually ice free due to the Japanese Current. These open waters provide ideal habitat for marine phytoplankton, which are the base of the marine food webs supporting vast populations of invertebrates that in turn sustain the fishes, seabirds, and marine mammals. The marine wildlife populations are much more stable than the terrestrial species, particularly the caribou whose populations are constantly fluctuating. It is the marine species that supply the majority of the nutrients and materials to the relatively large populations of coastal Eskimos and Aleut. The marine waters teem with a variety of shellfish, particularly clams, periwinkles, mussels, and limpets, which are exploited primarily in late winter or during times of scarcity. Shrimp, king crabs, chitons, octopuses, and algae are likewise harvested (Clark 1984; Lantis 1984b; VanStone 1984b).
Fish The rich Alaskan coastline and freshwater systems are inhabited by roughly five hundred species of fish (Froese and Pauly 2000). The most important are the five species of Pacific salmon (pink, chum, coho, sockeye, and chinook), which are vital to most of the inland and coastal peoples. Other important marine fishes used by the Eskimos and Aleut include halibut, which may grow to more than 550 pounds (250 kg), as well as the plentiful herring, smelt, capelin, eulachon, mackerel, sculpin, tom cod, ling cod, flatfish, and pollock (Freeman 1984).
Birds This region is home to millions of seabirds that migrate to these northern waters to gorge on the vast schools of fish and zooplankton. A large variety of marine birds as well as freshwater and land species provide meat and eggs, adding welcome diversity to the Eskimo diet. The skins of cormorants, eiders, murres, and oldsquaws were often used to make parkas when caribou skins were not available; bird beaks, feathers, and feet were also used as ornaments and decoration on skin clothing (Clark 1984).
Haired Seals The marine mammals inhabiting the waters of Alaska have been the mainstay of the coastal Aleut and Eskimo economies. Haired seals are those seals that have short, stiff hair but lack underfur; their insulation is supplied by a thick layer of fat or blubber stored beneath the skin. In Alaskan waters there are several species of haired seals, including the ringed, harbor, spotted, ribbon, and bearded seals (known locally as mukluk). The ubiquitous ringed seal inhabits all the marine waters north of the Aleutian Islands. It is the smallest seal in the region, averaging about 100 pounds (45 kg), yet it is one of the most important animals for the Eskimos. Using numerous ingenious techniques, ringed seals are hunted year-round. Their meat is used for humans and dogs; their skins for clothing, tents, and rope; and their blubber for food and fuel (Freeman 1984; Nelson 1969).
Harbor seals, close relatives of the ringed seals, are the most common marine mammals between southern Alaska and the Aleutian Islands. These seals have at times been hunted for their pelts and at other times for a bounty put on their heads because of their propensity to feed on fish caught in commercial fishing nets.
Spotted seals are medium-sized seals weighing between 220 and 310 pounds (100 and 140 kg) and commonly found in the Bering and Chukchi Seas. During the breeding season in March and April, they are rarely found in groups of more than two or three, but during the rest of the year spotted seals are gregarious. These seals are also hunted for their pelts, oil, and meat (Nelson 1969).
Ribbon seals have striking pelts marked with contrasting black and white ribbons or bands around their bodies. Ribbon seals are about half the weight of spotted seals and also inhabit the Bering and Chukchi Seas. Not many ribbon seals are taken by hunters because the seals inhabit a region in the Bering Sea where there are few settlements (Nelson 1969).
The largest and one of the most important haired seals for the coastal peoples is the bearded seal, which grows to as much as 770 pounds (350 kg).
These large solitary animals are prized for their heavy, durable skins, which are used by the Eskimos for the soles of their skin boots as well as harpoon lines and ropes. The bearded seal is the most widely distributed seal in Alaska and is generally closely associated with sea ice, as are the ringed seals (Foote 1992; Nelson 1969; Scheffer 1958).
Sea Lions, Fur Seals, and Walrus In addition to the haired seals, Alaskan waters are home to three other groups of seal-like creatures: sea lions, fur seals, and walrus. The Steller sea lion is yellowish brown with short, coarse guard hairs and like the haired seals has no underfur. Large bulls may be over 13 feet (4 meters) in length and weigh more than 2,200 pounds (1000 kg). Females are much smaller, about 6 1/2 feet (2 m) long and weigh about 660 pounds (300 kg). These colonial animals inhabit large rookeries along the coastal waters of southern Alaska up to the Pribilof Islands and Bristol Bay. In the past the Steller sea lion was harvested for its flesh, intestines for waterproof clothing, and hides for making skin boots and boat coverings (Landon 1987; Maxwell 1967; Scheffer 1958).
The northern fur seal, which occupies roughly the same waters as the sea lion, is the only seal-like animal in Alaskan waters that has a fur pelt. Their soft, durable, silky underfur is overlaid with long, glistening guard hairs. These pelts were so highly sought after by commercial hunters during the 1800s and early 1900s that the fur seal nearly became extinct. About 80 percent of the fur seals congregate on the Pribilof Islands during the summer months where they are harvested commercially by the Aleut. The fur seal bulls are the size of female sea lions, while female fur seals are only about 5 feet (1 1/2 m) long and weigh about 90 pounds (40 kg) (Maxwell 1967; Scheffer 1969).
Walruses are giant seal-like creatures weighing up to 4,400 pounds (2,000 kg) with a body length of up to 10 to 13 feet (3 to 4 m). These huge beasts are virtually hairless and are easily recognized by their massive ivory tusks that may grow up to 3 feet (1 m) in length on large bulls. Walruses inhabit the Bering and Chukchi seas where they are closely associated with the sea ice. In the past every part of the walrus had a use: The meat was considered excellent, particularly for dog food; the stomachs made ideal drum heads; while the stomach contents, consisting of partially digested clams, were considered a delicacy; the intestines were made into water- and windproof garments; the skins were split and used to cover skin boats or made into skin boot soles; the ivory was carved into tools, weapons, and figurines. Today walrus ivory continues to be carved into figurines for the tourist trade (Foote 1967; Nelson 1969).
Whales Since Alaskan waters are so rich in plankton and fish, it is not surprising that there are several species of baleen and toothed whales inhabiting the region. Baleen, or whalebone, refers to flexible plates that hang from the upper jaws of some species of whales. These fringed plates strain plankton and fish out of the water. There are eight species of baleen whales in Alaskan waters; however, most species were rarely hunted because they either swam too swiftly for the hunters to capture or the whales traveled outside the hunters' ranges. Bowhead, and less frequently gray whales, were the only large baleen whales taken by the Eskimos. The female whales are usually larger than the males; a large female bowhead may grow to 66 feet (20 m) in length and weigh up to 110,000 pounds (50,000 kg) (Rearden 1981).
Twelve species of toothed whales also flourish in the Alaska marine environment, but it is only the beluga whale that has been important to the Eskimos. Alaska Natives have traditionally hunted belugas for their meat, muktuk, and oil from Bristol Bay to Point Barrow. Adult males may grow to 13 feet (4 m) and weigh 3,500 pounds (1,600 kg); females are somewhat smaller (Rearden 1981).
Polar Bears From St. Lawrence Island northward the seas are home to the polar bear, which dines primarily on ringed seals but will also hunt or scavenge other marine mammals (Nelson 1969). The polar bear may weigh up to 1,500 pounds (700 kg) and is capable of killing a beluga whale with a single swipe of its huge paw. In the past, polar bears were hunted by the Inupiat with lances and dogs; today they are shot with rifles. Killing a bear increases a hunter's status because of the danger involved. Bear meat is eaten; the skins are used for boots, pants, sled robes, mittens, and ruffs are sold or traded.
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Excerpted from Alaska Eskimo Footwear by Jill Oakes Rick Riewe Copyright © 2007 by Bata Shoe Museum Foundation. Excerpted by permission.
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