ALASKA NATIVE EDUCATION
1953 – 1973
A PROFESSIONAL MEMOIR

BY
TOM (THOMAS) R. HOPKINS
© 2008

A BRIEF HISTORY OF EDUCATING ALASKA NATIVES 1867 TO 1953

Introduction

The history of Alaska Native education has been written by several authors. However, according to Brewton Berry (1969) and his “Review of the Literature,” the formal, published works, are sparse while the unpublished works of graduate students, etc. are voluminous. When I wrote my Masters thesis I referenced two unpublished works on Alaska Native education which were helpful to me. These are Byrdie McNeill’s (1940) thesis on the history of Native Education and Cumming’s (1955) dissertation. McNeill was a teacher at Mt. Edgecumbe when I was completing the thesis during the summer of 1958 and I was able to have several helpful discussions with her.

Though I do not know the specific number, I do know that there have been additional histories of Native education written since 1959. Two that should be noted are Charles Ray’s (1973) “Alaskan Native Education – An Historical Perspective,” and more recently Carol Barnhardt’s (1985) “Historical Status of Elementary Schools..” Both cover the time I also covered, 1867 to 1953, go beyond, include some of the same events as well as some I do not. I am also aware that there are even more recent Alaska Native education histories (Alton, 1998) available which I have not read.

Early Russian and U.S. Schools

The first school established in Alaska was founded on Kodiak Island by the Russians during the last decade of the eighteenth century for the purpose of giving instruction in the Russian language, arithmetic, and religion (U.S. Bureau Education 1877). During the last three or four decades of the Russian-American Company's domination of Alaska, it was compelled by its charter to provide a school for each trading post, but education here was extended primarily to White and Creole students with few full-blood Natives in attendance (Cook 1936). At the time of the purchase of Alaska, Russia maintained seventeen schools with annual appropriations of $20,000 for schools and other extraordinary expenses (Nichols 1924). Most of these schools were maintained for that portion of the population which helped in gathering furs for the Russian Fur Company in Alaska. This would include primarily the Aleuts of the Aleutian Islands and the Indians of the Southeastern region, but would leave virtually untouched the majority of Alaska's Native population, the Eskimo.

Alaska's first seventeen years, 1867-1884, under the United States are generally described as a period of stagnation and anarchy. This came about because of the absence of a code of laws or civil organization by the United States Congress for the territory or district, as it was then called. The educational situation was as bleak as any ever recorded on the frontiers of the North American continent. The education of the Alaskan Natives during this period can be divided into three areas: the Sitka schools, the Pribilof Island schools, and the missionary schools.

Development of U.S. Schools

Immediately after the purchase of Alaska there was a great influx of United States citizens into Alaska. Most of them had as their destination Sitka, the center and chief port of the Russian-American Company, and capital of Russian-America. From all appearances Alaska was to grow and thrive as the other western territories of the United States had done. A few weeks after the United States took over:

. . .stores, drinking-saloons, and restaurants were opened, vacant lots were staked out, were covered with frame shanties, and changed hands at prices that promised to make the frontage of the one street which the capital contained alone worth the purchase money of the territory of Alaska (Bancroft 1886).

At this time the city of Sitka organized a civil government and established schools. These schools were for Whites and Creoles and were maintained under the military control of Alaska. Creoles are described as half-bloods, a mixture of White and Native marriages usually involving White men marrying Native women. However, it is recorded that there were some full-blood Indians in attendance at the Sitka school of this time.

By 1869 a few supplies for schools had been shipped to Sitka and a teacher had been hired at a salary of $75.00 a month. Part of this salary was paid by the Army and by 1872 the teacher's salary had been cut to $25.00 because the Army withdrew its support. The last existing records of this school are dated February, 1873 (Andrews 1945).

The failure of the Sitka schools of this time stemmed from a population decrease and the general Congressional neglect of Alaska. Most of the people who moved to Alaska in anticipation of its growth soon left as they were prohibited by law from staking mineral claims or homesteads. At this time it was actually against United States law to organize civil governments and schools in Alaska. Indeed, there was no property available on which to construct school buildings. With the exodus of the White people from Sitka also went the traditional educational heritage that goes with every United States citizen. The Indians of the area were not aware of being "uncivilized" and were accustomed to traditional Russian neglect. The closing of the school had very little effect on their everyday life since but a small number were in regular attendance.

The schools on the Pribilof Islands of St. Paul and St. George were in operation simultaneously with the public schools in Sitka. The Pribilof Island schools were established to fulfill a clause in the contract let to the Alaska Commercial Company for fur seal rights on the Pribilof Islands. The clause stated that the Alaska Commercial Company was to establish and maintain a school for the Native population for the entire length of its twenty-year contract. The schools were to run for an annual term of eight months. Oddly enough, this report was submitted annually through the Treasury Department along with the amount due the government as a result of sealing on the Islands. This is an excellent example of the confused administrative authority exercised by the United States in Alaska for the first fifty years.

The school on the Pribilof Island of St. Paul was opened in August of 1870 with an enrollment of eighteen students. This school was for the Native population of this island which included full-blood Aleuts, half-blood Aleuts, and Creoles. The school was generally well attended during the first two years of its existence. However, in the year 1873 there was a marked decrease in the enrollment due to the belief by the people that learning the English language was weakening their religious ties with the Russian church. As a consequence of this belief the school did not grow or enjoy regular attendance again until a compromise was reached in 1878. The compromise resulted in teachers' teaching the school during the morning hours in English and during the afternoon hours in Russian. The school prospered from this time on (Jackson, 1886).

Day-to-day attendance at the school on St. Paul Island was controlled by Special Agent to the Seal Islands, Henry A. Glidden. He combated in-attendance resulting from parental disinterest by moderate punishment in the form of fines on the neglectful parents. This could be done since the company controlled the income and money of the people.

Attendance was also affected by the making of "quass" or whiskey by the Native population. This was regulated by rationing sugar and giving it only to the sick at the request of the physician in charge. As a result of these two measures attendance records, over the two year period in question, show ninety-eight per cent attendance and not a single unexcused absence. The quality of the instruction goes unrecorded

The schools on the Pribilof Islands have continued from 1870 until the present day. It is probable that the Pribilof Island schools are the oldest continuously operating ones in Alaska. They were sponsored until 1890 by the Alaska Commercial Company, and from 1890 until 1910 they were supported by the American Commercial Company. At the termination of the American Commercial Company's contract in 1910 the Islands were taken over by the Federal Government. In 1910 the schools were changed over to the United States Bureau of' Education.

In 1960 while an administrator at Mt. Edgecumbe High School, we received a letter from the Juneau Area Office. The St. Paul teachers had written wanting to know if all the children could be removed from the homes. Seems that the debauchery and dysfunction of the families were having a very negative affect of the education of thechildren. I wrote a letter for the Area Director’s signature to the effect that such a condition was not new to St. Paul and that some local initiative by the St. Paul people themselves might be the most effective remedy. Shipping the children off to boarding schools was not a permanent solution, even if this were possible, which it was not. It was communicated to me that the Area Director did send a letter which contained most of what I suggested.

The Development of Missionary Schools

Religious missionaries were the first organized groups to become interested in educating the Natives of Alaska. Since the first schools were established by the Russian church on Kodiak Island, missionaries have had an interest in the civilizing process of the Alaskan Native.

The first American missionaries did not appear on the scene until 1877 when Dr. Sheldon Jackson, head of the Presbyterian Western Board of Home Missions, Rocky Mountain Division, brought Mrs. A. R. McFarland to Fort Wrangell. They established a school at this village. Mr. Jackson, after a short stay, returned to the United States to start a campaign for education in Alaska. The next year, 1878, Mr. John G. Brady and Miss Fannie Kellogg were sent to Sitka and established schools there (Jackson 1903).

The missionaries represented a group of devoted and determined people and the condition of the Alaskan Natives presented a formidable challenge. Dr. Jackson was largely responsible for creating enough interest within the United States so that the Organic Act of 1884 was formulated and passed by the United States Congress. Very soon other religious denominations began to take an interest in the education of the Alaskan Native. In 1880 a group of religious societies met and divided Alaska into districts. Each group selected a portion of the territory to Christianize. The churches participating in this parley were the Presbyterian, Methodist, Moravian, Catholic, Episcopal, Swedish Evangelical Mission, Norwegian Evangelical- Congregational and Friends (Quakers). It is interesting to note that these boundaries were tacitly respected even when we worked at Barrow in 1953-54.

While we were teaching in Pt. Barrow, an old Presbyterian stronghold, in 1953- 54, the Catholics were trying to establish a church. The Presbyterian missionary was bitterly opposed to the Catholics and quoted the 1880 conference as justification for his opinion. The Presbyterian missionary claimed, in our presence, that it was, “Illegal,” for the Catholics to establish a church in Barrow. We said nothing to his very heated pronouncement and maintained a studied silence. Since this time not only have the Catholics moved into Barrow but also the Seventh Day Adventists, Baptists and no doubt others..

From 1877 until 1885 the Presbyterian missionaries dominated the educational scene in Alaska. This included both White and Native education. Sitka was the leading city or settlement in the territory. The Presbyterian schools there from 1878 until 1885 had a sporadic but determined life. They were primarily for the Native and attendance, the ever present problem, was a problem in this school.

The Army, which had been in control of Alaska, was moved out in 1877 to fight Indian Wars in the western territories of the United States. The United States Navy was then placed in charge of the District of Alaska.

Captain Beardslee and his successor, Captain Glass, were very much in support of the missionaries' work at Sitka. Captain Glass is given much credit for cleaning up the Indian part of the village and helping to secure a steady attendance at the missionary school. His method was similar to that used on St. Paul Island.

Captain Glass had every house in the village numbered. A corresponding number was put on a small tin tag and placed around the neck of every child in the village. If a child was caught outside of school during school hours his/her name was turned over to Native policemen. The child's parents were brought in for questioning and fined or put in jail for the offense. Attendance rose as high as 250 and on one day reached 271, including adults.

The Native boarding school at Sitka, which has evolved into the present Sheldon Jackson College, had an interesting beginning. One night seven Indian boys knocked on the door of Miss 0linda Austin, the teacher, and asked if they could live at the school. They said there was so much talking, carousing, and drinking at home that they could not study. They were given an old vacant government room in which to live. All the boys brought with them were their blankets. Soon after, other boys arrived with the same intent and the boarding school was a reality.

Government Schools

The Sitka Schools, the Pribilof Island Schools, and the Missionary Schools were institutions utilized for the education of the Alaskan Natives before the Organic Act of 1884. This act, in general, established civil government in Alaska. Education of the Native population in Alaska was not considered separately in the educational provisions of the bill. Education in Alaska was to be as stated in the following excerpt from the Organic Act of 1884:

The Secretary of the Interior shall make needful and proper provision for the education of children of school age in the Territory of Alaska, without reference to race, until such time as permanent provision shall be made for the same and the sum of twenty-five thousand dollars, or so much thereof as may be necessary is hereby appropriated for this purpose. (Nichols 1924)

The bill also called for the appointment of a special agent for education for Alaska. The first agent for education in Alaska was the Presbyterian missionary, Dr. Sheldon Jackson. Dr. Jackson assumed his duties on April 11, 1885, and began to formulate a plan for public education in Alaska.

Sheldon Jackson

Dr. Jackson is an important person in the history of the education of the Alaskan Native. For many years his ideas about what should be done regarding the education of Natives held sway for the Territory (Stewart 1908).

Dr. Jackson was born May 18, 1834, in the village of Minaville, New York. Shortly after his birth his father, a doctor of medicine, moved ten miles south of Minaville to the town of Esperance, a small Huguenot settlement. Dr. Jackson went through the public schools of Esperance, finished at Union College in 1855, and received his degree April 27, 1858, from Princeton Seminary. Early in life Dr. Jackson was interested in missionary work and in the spring of 1858 applied to the Presbyterian Board of Missions for a position in Syria which he didn’t receive. He apparently suffered from dyspepsia of the stomach. With missionary work his desire, he went to work teaching Choctaws in the Oklahoma Territory. In time he was appointed to the Denver based Rocky Mountain unit of the Presbyterian church. While occupying this job he made several field trips to the Southwest, now the states of New Mexico and Arizona, to round up Indian children and ship them to boarding school back East, probably Carlisle in Pennsylvania. Suffice it so say Jackson was not a stranger to Indian boarding schools when he ventured north to the Territory of Alaska. Menaul School, a boarding school, located in Albuquerque, NM and currently still in existence, was, among a few others, established by Sheldon Jackson.

Jackson appeared to think Alaskan Natives had an equal right to education, which differed from that of the Governor(s) and the White establishment in Alaska. Once when he had a load of school materials on a steamer the Governor had him arrested for trespassing as he walked a trail from the Sheldon Jackson School to the dock. He was kept in jail long enough for the steamer to depart with the construction materials but without Jackson.

Jackson, like many Alaskan school administrators (even today, so I am told), had his headquarters far removed from Native villages. His was mostly in Washington, D.C. It seems that the upper echelons of education administrators have historically set up their offices in locations removed from the villages of the Alaskan Natives. Somehow, the personal comfort of administrators wins the office location decisions when compared to the rigors and all too often culturally different situations of village life.

Philosophically, Jackson and his fellow missionaries were most concerned with the souls of the Natives. This concern led them to embrace the philosophy of, “Levels of Civilization.” Staying in one place was considered more civilized than a traditional migratory life. Farming was not a very good option for Natives, though gardening was tried. What Jackson did was transplant reindeer from Siberia to Alaska and start the reindeer industry. To have Alaskan Natives herding reindeer in a pastoral manner was a step up on the civilization ladder. Never mind that it represented a drastic cultural change for the Natives.

The reindeer industry was for several decades an important responsibility of village teachers. While at Shungnak, we learned that the teachers of the 1910 to 1930 era had to close school once during the winter and dog team to the reindeer herd to make a count. Though we did not learn the specifics, it was obvious that some sort of report was required of the teachers.

In the spring of 1905 Frank C. Churchill was assigned by the Secretary of the Interior to make an investigation into education and reindeer affairs conducted by the U.S. Government in Alaska (Churchill 1906). The Churchill investigation was the first real evaluation of Alaskan Native education. Churchill focused on school records and especially those related to the reindeer industry. There has always been an historical gap between actual village school activities and the higher up administrations policies and oversight. Churchill observed this very wide gap between Washington and the Alaskan bush. Even though he studied coastal villages, only, he found that once teachers were installed at a village, they exercised tremendous discretion on the school program and even missionary work. The separation of church and state was not even blurred, it simply did not exist. Since school was out in the summer during his visit, he did not cover the instructional program at all. As for the reindeer industry, it was not possible to separate the government records from those of the churches. While Mr. Churchill was greatly disturbed by his findings, it is doubtful that anyone at the village level paid much attention to them. Since Churchill’s findings would resonate in Washington, it is not surprising that Jackson resigned in 1907. Churchill reported basic school level accounting discrepancies as well as program conflicts most of which were related to the reindeer husbandry program which, educationally, was supposed to elevate Natives from wanderers to stationary herdsmen. Being a “Number Cruncher” Churchill was totally unaware to the philosophic direction of the Education program under Dr. Jackson.

Table 1, below, shows money appropriated to Alaska education 1884 – 1935. Funds included Alaska Native education.

The BIA Takes Over Native Education

The “Alaska Native Service (ANS),” as it came to be known under the Bureau of Education, was transferred to the Office of Indian Affairs March 16, 1931. This transfer was made because of a change in policy within the Administration. At that time it was decided that the Office of Education would, in the future, concern itself with research and education information and be absolved of all administrative duties in the operation of schools. The only administrative duty of this nature which the department had had concerned the Alaska branch, and this had been its responsibility since the Organic Act of 1884 (Hamilton 1931).

With the beginning of the new administrative organization under the Office of Indian Affairs the education of the Alaskan Native was considered the responsibility of the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). It maintained the name, "Alaska Native Service (ANS),” and the teachers merely found themselves being paid out of another pocket of the federal government. Indeed, when I taught at Barrow and Shungnak, 1953-56, supplies were still addressed to “ANS Teacher, Shunknak, AK.” Having become a part of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the Alaskan Natives were likewise involved in and affected by the legislation and investigations of the 1930's germinated in the Meriam report of 1928 (Meriam 1928). From 1931 on, then, Alaskan Natives did not occupy a unique spot in the organizational set-up of the government, but were cast into the melting pot of the long-debated and changing policies of the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

Ironically, organizationally, at that time, 1931, and until the 1970’s, the BIA within the Interior Department was an administrative unit under the Bureau of Land Management. The Congress perceived Indian Affairs as a “Land” program, not a human program. In 1968 I was assigned to explain a BIA Education budget increase request for Bilingual Education to Mr. Edwards, an Agronomist by profession, and a top civil servant in the Bureau of Land Management. Mr. Edwards was the main person for representing the BIA Education budget before Congressional committees. Basically, I had been assigned a hopeless task and was never able to get my point across to Mr. Edwards who kept referring to Indian and Alaskan Native children as if they were attending neighborhood schools in the D.C. area.

From 1931 on until the State of Alaska assumed responsibility for all of Alaskan Education, the fate of the education of the Alaskan Native was ambiguous. At one point the Commissioner of Indian Affairs was for expanding the educational system and spending more public monies on small day schools. Indian administration was to become " decentralized and democratized" (Collier 1933). Territorial educational conventional wisdom of the 1950’s assessed any territorial school as superior to those of the BIA. This assessment, of course was, without any evaluation or research data.

In the 1950’s, the Alaska Branch of the Bureau of Indian Affairs conducted 75 day schools and two boarding schools, and had a total of 126 teachers, excluding administrative, maintenance, and custodial personnel (USBIA 1957). This is a far cry from 1886 when Sheldon Jackson was valiantly attempting to establish a few schools against what appeared to be insurmountable odds. The Native of Alaska today accepts the village school as a necessity and no longer attends for amusement but rather to gain tools to aid him in making a living in the state of Alaska. The 1957 student count was as follows:

Table 2 - BIA Student Count 1957

Organizational structures do reflect the scope of programs. When the BIA assumed control of Alaska Native Education in 1931 they inherited the structure illustrated in Figure 1 on the following page. By 1953 and 1957 the BIA had changed the structure according to Figures 2 and 3.

It is important to note the absence of Health Services in Figure 2. When we went to Shungnak in 1954 Native Health was the responsibility of the BIA. In 1955 the U.S. Department of Health assumed responsibility for Native Health. As a result of this change, there was an almost immediate improvement in conditions of Native health services especially regarding tuberculosis care. More importantly, regardless of the unit of government responsibility for Native Health, health care also remained a very big set of responsibilities for BIA village teachers.

The BIA Juneau Area issued a printed policy statement that started with “. . . the point of view that Natives, as citizens of the Territory, are entitled to the same educational services and advantages as other citizens of Alaska.” (USBIA 1957b) The Policy Statement continued to express that the education of Natives was the responsibility of the Territory but until that time when the Territory could provide schools and teachers for Natives, the BIA would do so. This policy reflected the policy on Indian Affairs of the 1950’s when public schools were perceived as a panacea for Indian education. The policy also described the preference for vocational education at the high school level with academic preparation for college reserved for the public schools of Fairbanks. The policy statement at that time was only partially accurate, or mostly inaccurate. When I went to Mt. Edgecumbe in 1958 there was a major faculty uprising when an academic curriculum replaced the traditional vocational curriculum. While we were aware of the booklet, “We Teach In Alaska,” we also understood that it was seemingly always out of date and barely applicable to guide teachers and administrators regarding basic education policy. Regarding Native health responsibilities of teachers, the message was “Watch Out for Nits.”

The Principal-Teacher was perhaps the key employee-administrator of the entire Bureau of Indian Affairs operation in Alaska. The duties of the Principal-Teacher as outlined by the "Position Description (PD)" form were:

a. Directs enrollment of grade placement of all students attending the schools.

b. Exercises administrative and technical supervision over other teachers within the school through the issuance of course objectives, the review as considered to be necessary for their course outlines, lesson plans, testing material and related teaching material and through class visitations to observe student progress.

c. Teaches approximately 30 Native children in the elementary grade levels, including some who may have a limited English vocabulary in the elementary field in the (name of village) school.

d. Maintains necessary school records with attendance reports, progress charts and grades of pupils in the classes .

e. Administers standardized and other approved tests, including those developed on own initiative for the purpose of evaluating the educational program and the students’ program.

f. Supervises the preparation and serving of a simple noon-day meal.

g. Responsible for the maintenance and operation of the school buildings and. related facilities through the issuance of instructions and review of the work of custodial employees.

h. Maintains and submits required reports, records of school inventories, supply requirements, etc. to his supervisor. (US BIA, 1957c)

It is interesting that the responsibilities for the health of the village were not mentioned in the PD as they occupied large amounts of time and concern, including daily shortwave radio contact with a doctor. Health concerns, like the upkeep of facilities, were assigned at the school level to the “Special Assistant,” which did not require any college education. But, health responsibilities could rest heavy on a teaching couple, one a Principal-Teacher and the other the Special Assistant

Looking back on our time in the Territorial bush schools it was apparent that there was a vast disconnect between the upper echelons of administration, be it the Bureau of Education or the BIA, and village schools. By “Disconnect,” I mean that what went on at the school level was only basically and minimally related to what went on at the top. Examples of the disconnect will be described as I cover our experiences at Barrow, Shungnak and Mt. Edgecumbe.

My work experiences in Alaska Native education covered the time from September of 1953 – June of 1956 and July of 1958 through the calendar year 1963. Then from January 1964 through calendar year 1973, I continued an official role in Native education from the Washington Office level of the BIA. During this time there were basic developments in Native education. In retrospect the developments could be reduced to the following needs:

1. Providing sufficient and adequate school facilities. From 1950 – 1963, Mt. Edgecumbe High School was the only high school available to Native village 8th grade graduates.
2. Providing sufficient professional teachers and more Native teachers for village schools.
3. Increasing the number of Native college graduates.

Ray points out in his history that the primary policy of the Territory, State and Federal Governments concerned establishing a single public school system for all Alaska citizens, including Natives. Barnhardt carefully records the establishment of rural elementary schools for all Alaska citizens and reports the dates BIA schools were transferred to the Territory and the state until the single public school system has now been established. It appears that the real concern for Native education from 1950 – 1985 has been achieving the single system with minimal concern for teacher quality and Native college graduates.

As a final historical effort on my part, I entered BIA 1953 – 1977 enrollment statistics into the computer and provided a record of them (Hopkins 2006). The summary of the BIA enrollment statistics is provided below in Table 3 and Figure 4.

Table 3 – Total Enrollments and Average Daily Attendance By Fiscal and School Years

TOTAL ENROLLMENTS AND AVERAGE DAILY ATTENDANCE BY FISCAL AND SCHOOL YEARS

Figure 4, BIA School Enrollments 1953 - 1977