Contributions to

Circumpolar Anthropology 4

National Museum of Natural History

Smithsonian Institution

2003

Arctic

C^enter

(Constructing (Cultures

^hen and !\]ow

(Celebrating f^ranz £)oa5 and the Jesup

North faclhc Expedition
Smithsonian

t ^

Institution

X^^ir^ Libraries

Gift of

IGOR KRUPNIK

ARCTIC STUDIES CENTER
Constructing Cultures Then and Now

Celebrating Franz Boas and the

Jesup North Pacific Expedition
Vancouver International Airport in Vancouver, B.C., greets passengers with two "Welcome Figures" created by

Salish artist Susan Point (1996). Photograph courtesy Bill McLennan.
(Constructing (^.ultures

~]~hen and i\jow

Celebrating Tranz 5oas and the

Jesup j\Jorth pacific Expedition

LAUREL KENDALL AND IGOR KRUPNIK, EDITORS

^.-Tw^^ Published by the /^^^^k Arctic Studies Center

I B^^'^B National Museum of Natural History

\jm^j^W Smithsonian Institution — Washington, D.C.
©2003 by the Arctic Studies Center, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution Washington, D.C.

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America

ISBN 0-9673429-4-5

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Constructing cultures then and now : celebrating Franz Boas and the Jesup North Pacific Expedition / Laurel Kendall and Igor Krupnik,

editors.

p. cm. — (Contributions to circumpolar anthropology ; 4) Revisions of papers originally presented at the conference

"Constructing Cultures Then and Now: Celebrating Franz Boas and the Jesup North Pacific Expedition" held at the American Museum of Natural

History, New York City, in 1 997.

Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 0-9673429-4-5 (pbk. : alk. paper)

1 . Jesup North Pacific Expedition (1 897-1 902). 2. Ethnological

expeditions— Russia (Federation)— Siberia— History. 3. Ethnological

expeditions— Northwest Coast of North America— History. 4. Boas, Franz,

I 858-1942.5. Ethnology— Russia (Federation)— Siberia. 6. Indians of North America— Northwest Coast of North America—Social life and

customs. 7. Siberia (Russia)— Social life and customs. 8. Northwest

Coast of North America— Social life and customs. I. Kendall, Laurel.

II Krupnik, Igor. III. Arctic Studies Center (National Museum of Natural History). IV. Series. GN635.S5C65 2003

305.8'00957—dc22 200301 5439

°°ThG paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard

for Information Sciences— Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials.

Technical editor: Kathryn A. Malm

Cover and series design: Anya Vinokour

Production editors: Iris Hahn and Elisabeth Ward

Printed by United Book Press, Inc., Baltimore, MD

This publication is Volume 4 in the Arctic Studies Center series, Contributions to Circumpolar Anthropology, produced by

the Arctic Studies Center, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution.

THIS SERIES IS MADE POSSIBLE IN PART BY THE JAMES W. VANSTONE (1 925-2001) ENDOWMENT

Front cover; Franz Boas posing for exhibit group displaying Canadian Eskimo clothing and harpoon (AMNH 3220)

Back cover.' An elderly Chukchi lady and her granddaughter in front of the traditional Chukchi skin tent erected for the

local festival in the town of Tavaivaam, Chukotka, Russia. Photographer, Igor Krupnik, 1996

6f\l

(,3 5

'^0 3 y
/ \

( NOV 2 4

j

1 CO

Contributors vii

List of Tables x

List of Figures xi Abbreviations xiv Note on Cyrillic Transliteration xv FOREWORD XVll

INTRODUCTION: A CENTENARY AND A CELEBRATION

Laurel Kendall and Igor Krupnik 1 part One 1 00 Years of Jesup: The Intellectual Legacy ofthejesup Expedition

"THE AIM OF THE EXPEDITION . . , HAS IN THE MAIN BEEN ACCOMPLISHED": WORDS, DEEDS, AND LEGACIES OF THE JESUP NORTH PACIFIC EXPEDITION

Igor Krupnik and Nikolai Vakhtin 1 5

THE SO-CALLED "ESKIMO WEDGE": A CENTURY AFTER JESUP Don E. Dumond 3 3

FAILING AT BERING STRAIT? JESUP NORTH PACIFIC EXPEDITION AND

THE STUDY OF CULTURE CONTACT

Peter P. Schweitzer 49

DIFFUSION AND COLONIAL ANTHROPOLOGY: THEORIES OF CHANGE IN THE CONTEXT OF JESUP 1 Molly Lee and Nelson H. H. Graburn 79

THE JESUP EXPEDITION AND ITS ANALOGUES: A COMPARISON

Stanley A. Freed, Ruth S. Freed, and Laila Williamson 89

part ~]~wo Anthropologies and Histories: Jesup Participants Then and Now

FRANZ BOAS AND THE MUSIC OF THE NORTHWEST COAST INDIANS

Ira Jacknis 1 5

BEYOND BOAS? RE-ASSESSING THE CONTRIBUTION OF "INFORMANT"

AND "RESEARCH ASSISTANT": JAMES A. TEIT Wendy Wickwire 123

FRANZ BOAS AND AN "UNFINISHED JESUP" ON SAKHALIN ISLAND: SHEDDING NEW LIGHT ON BERTHOLD L^UFER AND BRONISLAW PILSUDSKI

Koichi Inoue 1 35
LOUIS SHOTRIDCE AND INDIGENOUS TLINCIT ETHNOGRAPHY:

THEN AND NOW

Nora Marks Dauenhauer and Richard Dauenhauer

BILINGUAL/BICULTURAL INFORMANTS AND INTERPRETERS OF THE JESUP

EXPEDITION ERA

Sergei Kan

ree

165

185

People, Animals, and Land: A Jesup Theme Revisited

THE JESUP EXPEDITION AND THE MODERNIZATION OF NORTH PACIFIC NATURAL

HISTORY

Robert S. Hoffmann 201

THE LANGUAGES OF THE NORTH PACIFIC RIM, 1897-1997, AND THE

JESUP EXPEDITION Michael E. Krauss 211

GENETIC PREHISTORY OF PALEOASIATIC SPEAKING POPULATIONS OF

NORTHEASTERN SIBERIA AND THEIR RELATIONSHIPS TO NATIVE AMERICANS

Theodore G. Schurr and Douglas C. Wallace 2 39

THE POST-JESUP CENTURY OF RESEARCH INTO THE PREHISTORY OF

NORTHEASTERN SIBERIA Sergei A. Arutiunov 259

LIFE IN LOST VILLAGES: HOME, LAND, MEMORY AND THE SENSES OF LOSS

IN POST-JESUP KAMCHATKA

David Koester 269

fartTour Curators, Collectors, and Consumers

HERITAGE ANTHROPOLOGY IN THE "JESUP-2" ERA: EXPLORING NORTH

PACIFIC CULTURES THROUGH COOPERATIVE RESEARCH

William W. Fitzhugh

ALEUT ARCHAEOLOGY AND CULTURAL HERITAGE: THE LEGACY OF THE

JESUP NORTH PACIFIC EXPEDITION Stephen Loring and Douglas W. Veltre

IN MEMORY OF VLADIMIR IVANOV-UNAROV, 1937-2000

Marjorie Mandelstam Balzer

THE REVITALIZATION OF THE TRADITIONAL CULTURE OF NORTHEAST

SIBERIAN PEOPLES: THE ROLE OF THE JESUP EXPEDITION

Vladimir Kh. Ivanov-Unarov and Zinaida I. Ivanova-Unarova

THE INVENTION AND PERPETUATION OF CULTURE: THE BOASIAN LEGACY

AND TWO 20"' CENTURY WOMAN TOTEM POLE CARVERS

Aldona Jonaitis

CONSUMERS, THEN AND NOW

Gloria Cranmer Webster

287

307

334

336

349

361

vi
contributors

Sergei A. ArMt/wMov works at the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology in Moscow as Chair of the Department of the Peoples of the Northern Caucasus. He is a leading Russian expert in ethnology of the Russian North and

Far East, as well as a specialist on Japan and South Asia, the archaeology of the Bering Sea region, and Eskimo art.

During the 1 980s, he was the Russian team leader for the Crossroads of Continents exhibit project.

Nora l\/larks Dauenhauer was born in Juneau, Alaska. She is internationally recognized for her fieldwork,

translation and explication of Tlingit oral literature. From 1983 to 1997, she was Principal Researcher in Language

and Cultural Studies at Sealaska Heritage Foundation in Juneau. She is married to Richard Dauenhauer, with whom

she has co-authored several volumes of Tlingit language and folklore material. Richard Dauenhauer, born and raised in Syracuse, NY, has lived in Juneau, Alaska since 1969. Much of his

professional work has focused on applied folklore and linguistics in the study, materials development, and teacher

training in Alaska Native languages and oral literature. From 1 983 to 1 997, he was Director of Language and

Cultural Studies at Sealaska Heritage Foundation, Juneau. Don E. Dumond is Professor Emeritus of Anthropology and Director Emeritus of the Museum of Natural History

at the University of Oregon, Eugene. For more than forty years he has focused on archaeological fieldwork in

southwestern Alaska. He has written widely on the prehistory of Alaska.

William W. Fitzhugh is Director of the Arctic Studies Center and Curator at the Department of Anthropology,

National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, in Washington, DC. His interests include circumpolar

prehistory and archaeology, maritime adaptations, and culture contacts. He has organized several special exhibit

projects such as Inua; Crossroads ofContinents; Ainu; and Vil<ings. Ruth S. Freed \s a Research Associate in the Division of Anthropology at the AMNH in New York. With Stanley

A. Freed, she has co-authored papers on the Washoe, Mohave, and Navajo as well as on thejesup Expedition (also

with Laila Williamson). She has taught at New York University and Seton Hall University.

Stanley A. Freed '\s Curator Emeritus in the Division of Anthropology at the AMNH in New York. A staff member

at the AMNH since 1960, he was in charge of North American ethnology. He has helped to create or renovate a number of permanent and temporary exhibitions dealing with the Northwest Coast, the Arctic, the Plains, and the

Eastern Woodlands.

Nelson H.H. Graburn is Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley and Curator of North

America at the Phoebe Hearst Museum. He has published extensively on art and culture in the North, on the anthropology of tourism, and the anthropology of Canada and of Japan.

Robert S. Hoffmann is Curator Emeritus at the National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC, and specializes in adaptation and evolutionary biology of northern land mammals. Formerly the

vii
Director of NMNH and Provost of the Smithsonian, he has worked closely with North American, Russian, Mongolian,

and Chinese colleagues in the circumpolar and North Pacific regions.

Koichi Inoue is Professor of Ethnology at the Slavic Research Center of Hokkaido University in Sapporo, Japan.

He specializes in the ethnology of indigenous peoples of Siberia and of Northern Eurasia, in general. He did extensive

fieldwork in the Russian Far East and Siberia. His current research interests include indigenous reindeer economies;

theory of ethnos; and the life and work of Bronislaw Pilsudski.

Vladimir Kh. Ivanov-Unarov (1937-2000) was one of the leading Sakha/Yakut scholars of the cultures of

northern minority peoples of the Sakha Republic/Yakutia. He was a Department Chair in the Institute of the Problems

of the Minority Peoples of the North in Yakutsk, Sakha Republic, Russia. Between 1 992-97 he worked onjochelson's

Yakut, Yukagir, and Even collections at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, and he initiated a

recent Russian translation of Jochelson's monograph on the Yukagir (1 926).

Zinaida I. Ivanova-Unamva is a professor at Yakutsk University in Yakutsk, Sakha Republic, Russia. Originally

from a northern Sakha village, she has written extensively on women master artists and on shamanic influences in

Siberian Native art. She authored several books on Sakha art and worked with her late husband, Vladimir IvanovUnarov, on the Jesup Expedition collections in New York.

Ira Jacknis is Research Anthropologist at the Phoebe Hearst Museum of Anthropology, University of California

at Berkeley. His research interests include the art and culture of the Native peoples of Western North America, the

history of anthropology, museums, and photography. He is the author of The Storage Box of Tradition: KwakiutI Art,

Anthropologists, and Museums, 1881-1981 (2002).

Aldona Jonaitis, is Director of the University of Alaska Museum. Prior to her current position, she was Vice

President for Public Programs at the American Museum of Natural History. She has taught at the University of Alaska

Fairbanks, SUNY at Stony Brook, and Columbia University. She has authored numerous books, papers, and publications and exhibit catalogs on Northwest Coast Native art.

Sergei Kan is Professor of Anthropology and Native American Studies at Dartmouth College in Hanover, NH. Most of his publications deal with Tlingit culture and the history of Russian Orthodox Christianity in southeastern

Alaska. Recently he has been writing a book about Russian anthropologist Lev Shternberg discussing Shternberg's

relationships with Franz Boas and other members of the Jesup Expedition.

Laurel Kendall \s Curator of Asian Ethnographic Collections at the American Museum of Natural History. She is

best known for her writing on shamans, ritual life, and gender issues in Korea. Kendall was Project Director for the AMNH Jesup Centenary celebration and co-editor of a catalog of the photographs of the Jesup Expedition, Drawing

Shadows to Stone (1 997), with Barbara Mathe and Thomas Ross Miller David Koester '\s a cultural anthropologist at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and a specialist in the peoples

of the circumpolar North. His publications, based on long-term fieldwork in Iceland and Kamchatka, Russia, have

focused on the ideological, social and material mechanisms associated with socio-cultural change and continuity.

Michael E. Krauss is the former director of the Alaska Native Language Center, University of Alaska Fairbanks. He is a leading specialist in the preservation and survival of the Native languages of Alaska, Siberia, and the circumpolar area. His latest contributions include a detailed map of Native language areas for the Inuit-Yupik-Aleut Region

and a report on the status of indigenous languages of the North for UNESCO.

Igor Krupnik, Arctic Ethnologist at the Arctic Studies Center, Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC, is

currently coordinator of various international projects studying the impacts of global climate change and the

viii
preservation of cultural heritage and ecological knowledge of Native peoples. He writes extensively on Arctic

peoples, modernization, and minority issues. Molly Lee holds a joint appointment at the University of Alaska Fairbanks as Curator of Ethnology at the

University of Alaska Museum and Professor of Anthropology. She has written extensively on indigenous basketry

and art in the North, including most recently Eskimo Architecture (2003), with Gregory A. Reinhardt. Stephen Loring is Museum Anthropologist with the Arctic Studies Center, Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC. In addition to caring for the Arctic and Sub-arctic collections, he facilitates access to the collections for

visiting indigenous researchers and promotes Native community interests. He has conducted archaeological and

ethnohistorical research with Innu and Inuit in Labrador, and has worked in the Aleutian Islands, Peru, and Argentina. Peter P. Schweitzer is Professor of Anthropology at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. Since the mid-1 980s,

Schweitzer has focused his research activities on the Russian North, conducting fieldwork in Chukotka and the Sakha Republic (Yakutia). His areas of interest include politics, kinship, history, and hunter-gatherer studies. Currently

he is writing a book on the history of Siberian anthropology

Theodore G. Schurr is Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology, University of Pennsylvania. He

has researched the genetic prehistory of Asia and the Americas through studies of mtDNA and Y-chromosome

variation in Asian, Siberian and Native American populations. His current projects apply these techniques to modern Aleuts, indigenous peoples of south-central Siberia, and archaeological populations from the Lake Baikal region.

Nikolai Vakhtin, is a professor at the European University at St. Petersburg, Russia. He teaches courses in field

linguistics, sociolinguistics, and the cultural anthropology of Siberia. He has done extensive research on Native

languages and modern culture change among the minority peoples of northern Russia. He has written several books and articles on the languages and cultures of the northern indigenous peoples of Siberia. Douglas W. Veltre is Professor of Anthropology at the University of Alaska Anchorage. He has conducted field

research in the Aleutian and Pribilof islands since 1 971 . Much of his work has focused on prehistoric and historical

archaeology, but he has also researched contemporary and historical subsistence economies and oral history.

Douglas C. Wallace has conducted studies in human biology for the past 25 years. His pioneering work in

mitochondrial DNA genetics and biochemistry has led to numerous important insights into human origins and

migrations, including the peopling of Siberia and the Americas. He is currently Director of the Center for Molecular

and Mitochondrial Medicine and Genetics at the University of California, Irvine.

Gloria Cranmer Webster ^as born in Alert Bay, British Columbia, Canada. She is a member of the Nimpkish

Band of the Kwakwaka'wakw (KwakiutI). She founded the U'Mista Cultural Centre at Alert Bay, British Columbia in

1 980, where she served as Director and Curator. Her many cultural projects include the production of two documentary films and a series of Kwakwala language books and educational materials for local schools. Wendy Wickwire is Associate Professor in the Department of History and School of Environmental Studies at

the University of Victoria, British Columbia. Her research interests include the oral traditions of the aboriginal peoples

of south-central British Columbia and the history of anthropology in British Columbia, most notably the work of James A. Teit.

Laila Williamson is Senior Scientific Assistant for North and South American Ethnology at the AMNH in New

York. She is a specialist in North American collections and helped renovate permanent exhibitions of Northwest

Coast, Plains and Eastern Woodlands cultures at the AMNH. She has co-authored (with S.A. and R.S. Freed) several papers on thejesup Expedition.

ix
ist of tables

Table 1 Selected Radiocarbon Ages for Bering Strait Sites 42

Table 2 Total Number of Recognized Land Mammal Species in Beringia at the End 20 3 of the Nineteenth Century

Table 3 Numbers of Shrews, Marmots, Ground Squirrels, and Grey Voles Recog- 204

nized in Beringia, End of Nineteenth Century

Table 4 Total Number of Recognized Land Mammal Species in Beringia, Mid- 20 5 twentieth Century

Table 5 Number of Shrews, Marmotines, and Grey Voles Recognized in Beringia, 206

Mid-twentieth Century

Table 6 Total Number of Recognized Land Mammal Species in Beringia, End of 207

Twentieth Century

Table 7 North American Languages Current Status, Sequenced from the Columbia 21 6

River toward the Bering Strait Table 8 Northeastern Asian Languages Current Status, Sequenced from the Bering 2 1 7

Strait toward the Ussuri River Table 9 Siberian Populations Analyzed for Genetic Variation 240

Table 10 Haplogroups in Native Siberian and East Asian Populations 241

Table 1 1 CR Sequence Sublineages in Siberian and Native American Populations 24 2 Table 12 Haplogroup Frequencies in Eastern Pacific Rim Populations 243

Table 1 3 Haplogroup Distribution in West Pacific Rim and Siberian Populations 244

Table 14 Sequence Divergence of Siberian and Native American Haplogroups 24 5 Table 1 5 Distribution of Haplogroup A,C, and D Sublineages in Siberian and Native 247

American Populations

X
I c:4" t^i I left I <^

Title: Susan Point's Welcome Figures, 1996 ii 1/ Jochelson's team traveling with the expedition collections, East Siberia, 1902 xvi 2/ "Woman's Potlatch " in Fort Rupert, British Columbia, June 1 898 xvlii 3/ Boas, Bogoras, and Shternberg at the 21 st International Congress of Americanists, 1 924 1 2 4/ Field of Proposed Operations of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition, 1 898 1 7

5/ Northeast Asia and the adjacent northwesternmost section of North America 35

6/ Segment of the original map of the Jesup Expedition activities in the Bering Sea area 54

7/ Jochelson's first expedition camp at the village of Kushka on the Sea of Okhotsk Coast, 1 900 63

8/ The transport of the JNPE collections near Yakutsk, East Siberia, spring 1 902 64

9/ Waldemar Bogoras with the expedition freight at Mariinsky Post, Siberia, 1901 65

1 0/ Jochelson's reindeer team with the JNPE collections. East Siberia, 1 901 66

11/ Jesup Expedition Siberian collections displayed at the AMNH 67

1 2/ Example of old Eskimo twined basketry (pack sack) issran (Central Yup'ik), 1952 68

1 3/ Coiled willow-root basket. Sledge Island, Norton Sound, 1 878-81 68

14/ Closeup of grass-coiling technique 69

1 5/ Closeup of twined-grass technique 69

16/ IVIiner Bruce basket from Kotzebue Sound 69

1 7/ Early coiled beach-grass basket, northern Alaska, 1 887 70

18/ Coiled willow "tobacco basket", with attached sea-mammal hide bag, Pt. Barrow, 1881-3 70

1 9/ Eskimo in skin boats ready to trade with the passing ship, Port Clarence, Alaska, 1 899 71 20/ North Pacific-Siberian-Alaskan Trade Systems, circa 1797-1900 72-3

21/ Saint Lawrence Island coiled beach-grass tray, 1912 74

22/ Chukchi basket, JNPE collection, 1 900-1 74

23/ Beach at Port Clarence, Alaska, with several whaling ships anchored in the harbor, 1 899 75

24/ Koryak coiled grass basket, JNPE collection, 1900-1 76

25/ Koryak coiled willow root basket, JNPE collection, 1900-1 76

26/ Chinese tea basket, bamboo with porcelain tea cups, JNPE collection, 1 898-99 77

27/ Ainu basket from Hokkaido, 1901 77

28/ Koryak basket makers at work, 1900-01 78

29/ Dina Jochelson-Brodsky steps out of the expedition's winter headquarters, 1901 102

30/ KwakiutI Indians dancing at the Chicago Worlds Fair, 1893 143

31/ Franz Boas, with George Hunt and his family. Fort Rupert, B.C., 1894 144

32/ Musical notation by Franz Boas: Song of Ha'mshamtses 145

33/ Hamatsa skull rattle, Quatsino, B.C., 1 899 1 46

34/ Pit house, Spences Bridge, B.C., 1 897 1 46

35/ Wax cylinder machine: Edison Standard Phonograph with horn, circa 1900 147

xi
36/ Lucy Antko, wife of James Teit, 1 897 1 48

37/ James Teit and two friends in Lerwick, Scotland, prior to his departure to Canada 1 49

38/ James Teit's uncle John Murray in British Columbia, circa 1 888 1 49

39/ Spences Bridge, B.C., 1 887 150

40/ Spences Bridge, circa 1890 1 50

41 / Drying salmon on the beach on the north side of the Thompson River, B.C. 1 5 1 42/ James Teit and his wife Lucy Antko, 1 897 1 5 2 43/ James Teit in his cabin at Tswall Creek 1 5 3 44/ James Teit and George Tomaxkain on the banks of the Thompson River, 1 890 1 54

45/ James A. Teit and Harlan I. Smith's pack train, Spences Bridge 1 5 5 46/ Bronislaw Pilsudski, three "Oltchi" (Ulchi) men, and a local settler 1 56

47/ Sakhalin's Ainu bear festival 1 5 7 48/ Sakhalin Ainu women 1 57

49/ Sakhalin Ainu bear festival 158

50/ Tlingit dagger, with a sheath collected by Louis Shotridge in Sitka, 1918 171

51/ Yendaayank' - the last direct descendant of the Tlingit chief Eagle Head 1 71 52/ Sergei Kostromitinov, circa 1900 190

53/ A group of the "forest" Yukagir on the Yassachnaya River, fall 1 901 1 98

54/ Waldemar Jochelson, Norman Buxton, and Waldemar Bogoras in San Francisco, spring 1900 22 3 55/ Norman Buxton, a local Russian officer, and his secretary in Gizhiga, Siberia, spring 1901 224

56/ Buxton's cabin in Gizhiga, Siberia, spring 1 901 22 5 57/ Shestakova, a Koryak winter settlement at Penzhina Bay, Siberia, winter 1901 22 5 58/ Native dog-teams in Markovo, Anadyr River valley, winter 1901 226

59/ The town of Markovo, Anadyr River valley, winter 1901 226

60/ Mr. Nikolai Sokolnikov, commanding officer of the Anadyr District, in Markovo, winter 1901 227

61/ Dried salmon on the sled, used for both human and dog food, Markovo, winter 1901 2 27

62/ A group of Yakut (Sakha) children, 1 902 2 2 8 63/ A group of Maritime Koryak children, 1900 229

64/ Itelmen poet Anatoly Levkovsky, with his wife Tatiana and son Nikolai 2 30

65/ Itelmen elder and educator Tatiana Petrovna Lukashkina 231

66/ The village of Kovran in 1 994 from across the Kovran River 2 32

67/ Store closed, Verkhne Khairiuzovo, February 1994 2 32

68/ The remains of the Kovran clubhouse {dom kul'tury) 2 3 3 69/ The village of Verkhne Khairiuzovo, summer of 1 992 2 3 3 70/ Itelmen elder Tatiana Petrovna Lukashkina speaks to a group of children, 1 995 2 34

71/ Itelmen elders from Kovran, at an Itelmen gathering in 1995 23 5 72/ The site of the now closed village of Moroshechnoe as it appeared in 1996 2 36

73/ Aleksander Tolman in the once abandoned village of Kirganik, reoccupied in the 1 990s 2 3 7 74/ Afanasii Reshetnikov, one of Kirganik's elderly resettlers, in front of his house, 1 997 2 3 7 75/ Family of the Chief of the Tundra Yukagir band, winter 1 902 2 38

76/ Neighbor-joining tree for aboriginal Siberian and East Asian populations 248

77/ Neighbor-joining tree for aboriginal Siberian populations 249

78/ Neighbor-joining tree for Native Siberian and East Asian populations 251

79/ Map of Kamchatka, showing local communities and abandoned villages 2 74

80/ King Island Inupiat dancers perform at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, 1988 2 84

xii
81 / The American Crossroads of Continents team in St. Petersburg, Russia, 1 983 2 86

82/ Jim VanStone demonstrates a Tlingit war lielmet from the MAE collection, 1983 30 5 83/ Aleut laborers working for the Jochelsons excavate an Aleut barabara on Umnak Island 3 06

84/ George Tsaroff, soon after starting to work at the Smithsonian Institution, ca. 1 878 309

85/ Crossroads of Continents exhibit at the Anchorage Museum of History and Art, 1 991 3 1 9

86/ Sergei Serov (1 940-1 992), Russian Crossroads exhibit coordinator 320

87/ The North American Crossroads team at the MAE in 1 983 3 20

88/ Andres Slapinsh, Latvian film producer, among the Evenk people in East Siberia 321

89/ The Mini-Crossroads team departing on its tour to Siberia from Nome, 1 990 321

90/ Mini-Crossroads exhibit being unloaded from a Russian Yak-40, Vladivostok, 1997 322

9] / Mini-Crossroads in Russia: school tours at the exhibit, Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, 1997 322

92/ Jochelson s display of his Aleut collection at the Imperial Russian Geographical Society 32 3 93/ Aleut children photographed by Waldemar Jochelson 32 3 94/ Waldemar Jochelson with Aleut laborers on Umnak Island, 1 909 3 24

95/ Excavations at the Margaret Bay archaeological site dated to 3100 B.P. 324

96/ A portion of the village of St. Paul in the Pribilof Islands 32 5 97/ The Atka Dancers (Atxam Taliigisnikangis) at the Aleut Elders' Conference, Unalaska, 1 996 32 5 98/ Sakha/Yakut artisan, Anna Nikolaeva dressed in a fur coat or buuktaal<h son 326

99/ Same fur coat, back view 3 26

100/ Birch-bark container (woman's storage box). Made by Anna Nikolaeva 327

101/ Woman's fur coat. Created for characters in the Sakha/Yakut opera Nyurgun Bootur 327

102/ Musqueam house post purchased by Harlan Smith, 1898 328

103/ Susan Point's House Posts, 1997 32 8 104/ Masset village, Haida, 1879 329

105/ Alert Bay, Kwakwaka'wakw, 1910 3 30

106/ Ellen Neel (1916-1966), 1950 331

107/ Mungo Martin (1880-1962) 331

1 08/ Ellen Neel's Tbtem/anrfPo/e, 1950 3 32

109/ Matthias Joe Capilano's Thunderbird Dynasty Pole, Vancouver, B. C, 1936 3 32

1 10/ Susan Point (b. 1952), 1997 333

111/ Susan Point, Common Thread, 2000 3 3 3

I 1 2/ Vladimir Ivanov-Unarov (1 937-2000) 3 34

I I 3/ Sakha (Yakut) ysyakh festival at the village of Churapcha, May 1 902 3 3 5

1 1 4/ Susan Point's Spindle Whorl, Vancouver International Airport, 1 994 348

xiii
abbreviations

AMNH American Museum of Natural History, New York, NY

AlVINH-BTC American Museum of Natural History, Department of Anthropology Archives, Boas-Teit

Correspondence

AMNH-DA American Museum of Natural History, Department of Anthropology Archives

AFS American Folklore Society

ANB Alaska Native Brotherhood

ANCSA Alaska Native Land Claims Settlement Act, 1971

A/PIA Aleutian/Pribilof Islands Association

APS-BP American Philosophical Society, Franz Boas Papers

ARCA Alaska Russian Church Archives, Manuscript Division (microfilm). Library of Congress,

Washnigton, DC

ASC Arctic Studies Center, Department of Anthropology, Smithsonian Institution BAAS British Association for the Advancement of Science

BAE Bureau of American Ethnology, Washington, DC

BCPA British Columbia Provincial Archives, Vancouver, British Columbia

BIA Bureau of Indian Affiars, Department of the Interior, Washington, DC

GNPR Greater North Pacific Region

IREX International Research and Exchange Board

JNPE Jesup North Pacific Expedition, 1897-1902

LC Library of Congress, Washington, DC

MAE Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnology (Kunstkammer), St. Petersburg,

Russia

NAA National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC

NAGPRA Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, 1990

NEH National Endowment for the Humanities

NIMA National Image and Mapping Agency

NMAI National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC

NMNH National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC

NSF National Science Foundation

RAG Russian-American Company

RBCM Royal British Columbia Museum, Vancouver, Canada

SITES Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibit Service, Washington, DC

UBC University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada

UPM The University Museum, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia

xiv
note on CMnl ic

transiiterarion

Two coexisting systems are in use in the United States

for transliterating Russian Cyrillic letters into English:

that of the Library of Congress (LC), and that of the

National Image and Mapping Agency (NIMA, formerly

the U.S. Board of Geographic Names). The LC system is used for bibliographic references; the NIMA system applies to geographic names (place names) and to most

ethnic names.

All Russian or Siberian geographic names are

transliterated here according to the NIMA system,

which uses ya, yu, and yo for Cyrillic >?, /o, and e

(Yakutsk, Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, etc.). Throughout this volume, Native Siberian ethnic names are transliterated in accordance with the Peoples of the Soviet

Union map produced by the National Geographic

Society in 1989, which basically adheres to the

NIMA system (Yakut, Yukagir, Koryak, Nanay, etc.). Most of these ethnic names are already established

in Western anthropological literature—thanks largely

to the Jesup Expedition's pioneering publications.

This system also results in names reminiscent of several Native American group titles familiar to North

American readers: Yurok, Maya, Yup'ik, Eyak, Yokut,

Yakutat Tlingit, and so on. Furthermore, the NIMAbased spelling of ethnic and geographic names is

similar to the Russian/Cyrillic transliteration system

adopted in England and Canada and to the one commonly used by modern Russian authors when writing papers in English. The NIMA-based system is also applied here for transliterating a few Russian or

Native Siberian personal names, words, and ethnographic terms in individual papers.

In contrast to the NIMA system, the Library of Congress transliteration system uses ia, in, and io for the

Cyrillic fi, /o and e and an apostrophe for the Russian

soft sign (b). Because today's highly standardized electronic library catalog formats are based on the LC system, names of Russian authors and all titles of items in

the bibliographic reference sections in this volume adhere to the LC system. Using two transliteration sys- tems in a single book may be inconvenient, but every

effort has been made to adhere strictly to each of

these patterns in its designated application in order to

establish a high level of consistency for all future Arctic Studies Center publications. For the convenience of

readers, an alternative NIMA-based transliteration of

Russian authors' names is sometimes provided in parentheses in those cases where such a pattern has been

established by earlier publications (for example, the

original Jesup Expedition series; Antliropology of the

North: Translations from Russian Sources). Despite all

our efforts, we may not have been able to eliminate all

potential cases of confusion or the occasional idiosyncratic usage. We are grateful to our colleagues Pavel llyin (U.S.

Holocaust Museum), Michael Krauss (Alaska Native Lan- guage Center, University of Alaska), and Marjorie

Mandelstam Balzer (editor, Anthropology and Archeol- ogy of Eurasia) for their advice on transliteration practices for ASC publications.

XV
I 7 2-jr

//Jochelson's team traveling with tlie expedition collections along the Tos-Khayakhtakh mountain range, East

Siberia, winter 1902 (AMNH 1725)
I

orc\Nor

This volume marks another important step in the ongoing international effort to explore the legacy of the

Jesup North Pacific Expedition of 1 897-1 902, referred

to by its participants as "Jesup 2". This book illustrates, once again, the fruitfulness of broad partnerships when

pursuing North Pacific studies, a tradition that began

with Franz Boas' pioneering enterprise, and it demonstrates how that has developed over the last 1 00 years.

If one were to seek for the roots of Jesup 2, it be- gan in 1977, when the U.S. -Soviet ethnographic exhibition, Crossroads ofContinents: Cultures ofAlaska and

Siberia, was first proposed. Over the past twenty-six

years, these efforts have progressed through a series

of exhibits, international conferences, workshops, research exchanges, collection sharing programs, fellowships, and publications. Overtime, the balance of these

activities gradually shifted from major museums and

research hubs in Washington, New York, Moscow, and

St. Petersburg to smaller museums and centers in the

North Pacific region. This shift also meant increased

participation by local North Pacific area scholars and

Native cultural activists in bringing objects, photographs, and knowledge recovered by the JNPE back

into the homelands where the project originated. Such

efforts helped make the Jesup Expedition familiar to hundreds and thousands local residents in Siberia and

North America alike.

But the largest effort of Jesup 2, and the inaugural

event for this volume, was the Jesup Centenary Confer- ence at the American Museum. I am greatly indebted

to Laurel Kendall and the American Museum of Natural

History in New York for creating, funding, and hosting

so skillfully and graciously this grand international convocation that brought together many North Pacific area

scholars and representatives of Native Nations to celebrate the centenary of the Jesup Expedition in 1997.

I also wish to thank Igor Krupnik for his perseverance in keeping the spirit of this venture alive by encouraging

and heartening its participants over the years. The appearance of this volume—from the opening

of that conference to its appearance under the Arctic

Studies Center (ASC) series. Contributions to Circumpolar Anthropology—took about the same length of time

to complete as it did for Boas to conduct the JNPE

fieldwork a century ago. All in all, it was not until the proceeds from the recent Smithsonian exhibit catalog,

Vikings: The North Atlantic Saga, accumulated that it became possible for the ASC to start a publication

series of its own. Here we found a fitting home for this

volume, in a series which began with another Jesup 2

conference collection. Gateways: Exploring the Legacy

ofthe Jesup North Pacific Expedition, 1897-1 902, based on a panel held in 1 993 and published in 2001

.

Matters 'anthropological' around the North Pacific no longer inhabit the dark recesses of our mu- seum archives and collection cabinets. Newly con- served and stored, they are finding their rightful

places both as ideas and as cultural treasures. And

with the Jesup 2 effort in its third decade, we are

hopefully inching toward that enigmatic "Volume

1 2 " of Boas' original series, the expedition's "Summary and Final Results."

William W. Fitzhugh, Director

Arctic Studies Center

xvii
2/"VJoman's Potlatch" in Fort Rupert, British Columbia, June 1 898. Photographer, Harlan I. Smith (AMNH 42992)

xviii
introduction

/A C^entenart) and a (2,eiebration

LAUREL KENDALL

AND IGOR KRUPNIK

This volume examines the living legacy of the American Museum of Natural History's Jesup North Pacific

Expedition (1 897-1 902) and the work of Dr. Franz Boas,

the founding father of American anthropology. The

Jesup Expedition, as orchestrated by Boas, was a research project of such scientific importance and geographical scope that some regard it as the most ambitious venture in the history of American Anthropology.

Named after Morris K. Jesup, then the president of the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) and the

project's key sponsor, the expedition set out to investigate the cultural and biological links between indig- enous peoples living in both the Old and the New

World—in order to prove that the first Americans had once crossed over to North America from Asia. During

a span of more than five years, the expedition field crews studied, recorded, and collected from several

Native nations across the Greater North Pacific Region.

Their efforts were focused upon a huge area, which

extends like a giant arc from the Northwest Coast of

North America to the Bering Strait and along the Pacific Coast of Siberia to the cultural borderlands of China,

Korea, and Japan. The chapters in this volume began

as papers given at a conference held at the American

Museum of Natural History in 1 997 to mark the Jesup

North Pacific Expedition's Centenary. They reflect the enormous scope of the original expedition in both their

breadth of geographic coverage and the range of issues they tackle,

Franz Boas (1858-1942), a German-born natural

scientist, who became the leading American anthropologist of the early 20th century, was a pioneer in

the study of culture, race, and ethnicity. His notion of

"culture," as distinct from "race" and "language," is presently taken for granted in contemporary American thinking. Indeed, culture has become a core concept of the

social sciences and an everyday word frequently in- voked in public discourse. While anthropological notions of "culture" have evolved over the intervening

century, popular understandings hew to a Boasian

notion of culture as the essential configuration of beliefs, social practices, and material and artistic products that define a people.

Today, most anthropologists regard culture as a more mutable construct, anchored within rather than

above historical circumstance and mediated by the

particular experiences of gender, class, race, and the

unfolding of colonial and neo-colonial encounters. But

if the old Boasian notion now seems unfashionably

"essentialist" and "a-historical," it is worth recalling the

historical contingencies of its own construction. The

culture concept, which claimed relative worth for every human society, was a radical departure from the supremacist and social-evolutionary thinking of Euro- American science in the late 19th and early 20th centuries where hunters, gatherers, and herders—so-called

"primitive people"—were cast on the lowest rungs of an evolutionary hierarchy (Sanjek 1 996).

1
Franz Boas saw anthropology as a holistic enterprise and the Jesup Expedition was conceptualized following his founding vision of the comprehensive anthropological survey as an integrated scholarly en- deavor (Cole and Long 2001; see also Krupnik and

Vakhtin, this volume). A single trained fieldworker, or a

small crew of a few professionals, studied social life,

folklore, linguistics, prehistory, and biology while also assembling museum collections and documenting significant activities for reproduction as museum exhibits

(Miller and Mathe 1 997). Boas himself epitomized these

multiple endeavors in his own fieldwork as did several

otherjesup Expedition participants. Because Jesup scientists encountered many Native peoples who had

been badly decimated by epidemics and were under

heavy pressure to assimilate to the customs and mores of the Russians or Anglo-Americans, members of

the expedition believed that they were recording, collecting, and preserving the last traces of vanishing cultures. Boas enjoined expedition anthropologists to make as comprehensive portraits of the peoples they

studied as could possibly be accomplished under local conditions and using the recording technology

available to them at that time. Following his instructions, Jesup ethnologists documented local material

culture, observed daily life and social rites, reproduced

decorative patterns and artistic motifs, and recorded

songs, stories, and myths for linguistic and comparative analysis. They took measurements of people, objects, and buildings, and collected artifacts. They also

took numerous photographs, literally hundreds of them,

in order to preserve an "authentic" image of people

they surveyed. This was, in its day, cutting-edge field- work for a newly professional anthropology.

Returning from remote regions in Siberia and northern North America (Figs.l and 2) to the American Mu- seum in New York, expedition anthropologists brought

back their written observations as well as tangible

objects, visual images, and recordings of Native lan- guages and on this basis, recomfrwcfet/ Native cultures

for scholarly and popular consumption. They produced

a shelf of ethnographies and folklore collections considered "classics" today. Their collections fill the American Museum's Hall of Northwest Coast Indians and

the Siberian section of the Gardner D. Stout Hall of

Asian Peoples. Thousands more objects are housed in

the Museum's storerooms and are now publicly accessible via the worldwide web. The Jesup Expedition

archives include participants' notes and diaries, letters from the field, transcriptions of folklore texts, photographs, wax cylinders, and forms for physical measurements.' Through such comprehensive documentation. Boas and his colleagues constructed cukures as

theory, field sites, configurations of processed data,

topical monographs, and museum exhibits aimed at

reproducing an idealized pre-contact then, spurred on by the mistaken belief that these cultures were rapidly

disappearing. With the irony of history, the JNPE

fieldworkers preserved invaluable cultural treasures, such that one hundred years later (now) the Jesup

Expedition's legacy is an unsurpassed resource for

scholars as well as for peoples of the North Pacific

region who are actively engaged in reconstructing and

revitalizing their cultures in a meaningful present tense.

The Centenary: 1897-1997

The Greater North Pacific Region studied by the Jesup

Expedition—from northern Japan to the edges of Siberia at the Bering Strait to Alaska to the Northwest

Coast—has been a fertile area of cultural development,

innovation, and intercontinental exchange for thou- sands of years. The JNPE teams intended to document

the biological and cultural links between northern

peoples, and to investigate the ecological and spiritual relationship between these people and their harsh

environment as well as religious and artistic traditions which defined them. All these issues are of crucial importance today as the region copes with the outcomes

of reckless commercial exploitation of its natural resources and acute environmental degradation during

much of the 20th century. Similarly, Native people on

both sides of the intercontinental and political divide

2 INTRODUCTION
at the Bering Strait's crossroads are seeking to revitalize their ethnic and spiritual identities after de- cades of cultural suppression and forced assimilation.The collections, publications, and archives produced

by the Jesup Expedition offer a rich resource to address these and related issues as part of a global scientific and philosophical conversation. The Jesup Expedition team assembled by Dr. Franz Boas mixed educated academic professionals with new recruits, sometimes drawn from the local residents, and by including

people of Native and mixed origin, former political

exiles, and women. In this, as well as in many other

aspects of the Expedition's work, Boas's pioneer design laid the groundwork for the present-day multifaceted "Jesup constituency" that now includes scientists from many disciplines and nations. Native scholars, artists, cultural activists, film-makers, educators,

folk-art performers, museum workers, and a large

and diverse public audience. Much of this diversity

is reflected in the community brought together by

the centenary conference and whose work is represented in this volume.

Over the intervening century, all of the sub-fields of anthropology envisioned by Boas as the tools of one

single discipline—ethnology, linguistics, archaeology,

folklore, biological anthropology, and museum collecting and research—have become highly specialized. They

have introduced sophisticated new methods, and, in many instances, have challenged the premises established by Boas, perhaps nowhere more intensely than

around the core concept of "culture." New technologies and field techniques now dominate the field of archaeology and physical anthropology. Some, like ra- diocarbon dating, DNA research, and computer data

processing, were not even foreseen in Boas' time. New

knowledge, such as the biological anthropologists' use of genetic data, paleoenvironmental research,

and the dating of hundreds of excavated prehistoric sites, altered profoundly the way we now study

ancient human migrations and construct cultural as

well as biological interactions. In a broader and more

philosophical sense, both North American and postSoviet anthropologists have spent the last several

years engaged in a thorough questioning of the

many established dogmas in their professional domains; in one instance, reconfiguring a scholarly field once intended to serve the interests of Soviet Marxist

doctrines, in the other—under rubrics broadly labeled

as "post-modernism"—challenging anthropology's truth

claims as a positivistic science. Native scholars and

political activists have leveled more fundamental

challenges to many core notions and practices of

anthropology, in some instances arguing that the

non-native observer is incapable of understanding

Native culture, in others that such observations are themselves violations of basic human dignity. Disputes over the proper domain of Native cultural properties

currently housed in museums have been particularly

contentious. For nearly two decades, critiques and

soul-searching have reverberated both within and

outside the academy. The Jesup Expedition Centenary

thus occurs at a particularly pregnant moment in anthropology where a backward glance at who we were

and how we have changed might contribute to the

larger debate over who we are now and what we

might become.

TheJesup Expedition centenary conference and this

resulting volume are among the products of a larger

initiative named Jesup 2 in honor of the initial Jesup

Expedition and aimed at encouraging coordinated research activities in the Greater North Pacific Region.

Its critical goal is in the dissemination of new knowledge, approaches, and perspectives in the study of

cultures through scholarly publications, museum exhibits, academic symposia, and public programs.

Spearheaded by the Arctic Studies Center at the

Smithsonian Institution, these efforts have been carried out since 1 992 by an informal consortium of scholars and institutions (Fitzhugh and Krupnik 2001 :7-l 0;

see also AAAS 1992; AAA 1993; Fitzhugh 1996; Fitz- hugh and Krupnik 1994; lARPC 1995: 22-24; Vakhtin

L. KENDALL AND I. KRUPNIK 3
1 993). Like the original expedition, Jesup 2 is a holistic

enterprise, now sustained by a scattered community

of international scholars who have come together to

address issues of common interest. Unlike the original

venture, the new Jesup 2 program does not have a

single sponsor but reflects the combined effort of several institutions. The American Museum of Natural History (AMNH), as the major storehouse of the Jesup

Expedition's resources and of Franz Boas's legacy in

North Pacific research, has been a critical resource in

this effort. Boas and his colleagues collected about half of

the American Museum's 1 6,755 Northwest Coast artifacts under the auspices of the Jesup Expedition. Al- though the numbers themselves are noteworthy, it is

their diversity, comprehensiveness, and documentation that make the Jesup Expedition acquisitions so

valuable. The American Museum's Northwest Coast

collection is generally regarded as the world's strongest, holding artifacts from every known group and

nation in this culture region. For over 100 years, this

collection has been studied by almost every anthropologist, art historian, and historian engaged in research

of any magnitude on the Northwest Coast native cultures. As a result of AMNH's first fruitful collaboration

with Russian scholars during the original Jesup Expedition, extensive ethnographic collections were also made

in Siberia. These are similarly considered among the

world's richest, particularly with regard to several groups in northeast Siberia. Their value was subsequently boosted by several key scholarly monographs

on Siberian indigenous peoples published in a series of

jesup Expedition Publications/Memoirs ofthe American

Museum of Natural History as well as by many other

Jesup-based publications promoted by Boas and his

colleagues (see Krupnik 2001). These collections and numerous archival materials and photographs now

housed at the American Museum of Natural History

constitute the single richest stock of museum resources on Native Siberian cultures outside the Russian Federation, if not worldwide.

The role of thejesup Expedition collections in documenting and preserving the legacy of Native Siberian peoples is particularly noteworthy. For many years—in

fact, for almost all of the 20th century—Siberia was

closed to American researchers. Thus, for much of the

Soviet period, the Jesup Expedition's various collections and publications were the single largest body of

anthropological information on Siberian cultures available to Western researchers. While some hesitant contacts with Soviet anthropologists resumed in the late

1 950s, it was the Smithsonian Institution's monumental 1 980s joint exhibit, Crossroads of Continents: Cultures ofSiberia and Alaska that finally marked the collapse of the barrier that had separated scholars and

Native people on both sides of the North Pacific

(Fitzhugh and Crowell 1988; Fitzhugh, this volume).

The exhibit, produced by a team of North American

and Russian curators, marked a new era of scholarly

cooperation and reawakened awareness of the value

of thejesup Expedition's resources, particularly for and

among Siberian indigenous people.

Since that time, the American Museum of Natural

History, the main depository of the JNPE legacy, has

been experiencing an unprecedented call on its collections and archives. On a single memorable day in

1993, Nikolai Vakhtin from St. Petersburg was perusing the Expedition's documented chronicle stored in

letters and diaries at the Museum archive. In another room, Stephen Ousley, then from the University of Tennessee, worked with the Jesup Expedition's biological

data; a Danish film-maker examined Yukagir materials

as background to a film project; and a scholar from

Japan researched the Nanay (Cold) and Nivkh (Cilyak)

collections from Sakhalin Island and the Amur River.

Native Siberian scholars have been prominent among

the researchers who have made their way to AMNH,

beginning with the Sakha ethnologists, Vladimir and

Zinaida Ivanov-Unarov from Yakutsk. Some of the results of these studies are contained in this volume and

elsewhere (V. Ivanov-Unarov and Z. Ivanova-Unarova,

this volume; Ousley andjantz 2001; Vakhtin 2001).

4 INTRODUCTION
The Celebration

Given these developments, it seemed both necessary and appropriate to mark the centenary of the Jesup

North Pacific Expedition with a public acknowledgement, assessment, and celebration. In the fall of 1 997,

the American Museum of Natural History in New York

hosted several public events, including an exhibit of

expedition photographs, Drawing Shadows to Stone

curated by Barbara Mathe and Thomas Ross Miller; a program of public lectures; a Greater North Pacific Film

Festival; and performances by Native dance troops

from both sides of the Bering Strait. A catalog of several dozen historical photographs by the JNPE team

members was published (Kendall et al. 1 997), followed

by many articles in popular and academic journals. But

the centerpiece of this celebration, in the spirit of broad

scholarly inquiry as embraced by the original expedition, was a five-day international conference. Constructing Cultures Then and Now: Celebrating Franz Boas and

the jesup North Pacific Expedition. It brought together an impressive team of over 50 internationally-acclaimed

scholars, museum curators, and Native cultural workers who met face-to-face to discuss the history, current prospects, and possible futures of the peoples of

the Greater North Pacific Region.

The conference, featuring the legacy of Franz Boas and the Jesup Expedition, was held at the Museum in November 1 997, to mark the 1 00-year anniversary of

the Expedition's first printed report from the field, published in the October 1 897 issue of the journal

Sc/e/ice (Boas 1 897). The conference built upon Jesup

2 projects already initiated by the Smithsonian Institution, the American Museum of Natural History,

the University of Alaska, the National Science Foundation, and the National Park Service, in collaboration with numerous partners in Russia, Siberia, Canada,

Japan, and Europe. Both the conference and related centenary activities were amply covered by the press and hailed by the professional anthropological community (Anonymous 1998; Graburn 1998; Kendall

1997; Lee 1998; Rexer 1997; Shute 1997).

The centenary conference was one product of a

joint effort by five anthropologists: Laurel Kendall

(American Museum of Natural History), Marjory Mandel- stam Balzer (Georgetown University), William Fitzhugh

(Arctic Studies Center, Smithsonian Institution), Igor

Krupnik (Arctic Studies Center, Smithsonian Institution), and Nikolai Vakhtin (European University, St Petersburg,

Russia). The team assembled a broad range of scholars and local cultural experts who specialized in studies of peoples and cultures—both modern and prehistoric—and environments across the Greater North Pacific Region. The diversity of their perspectives is reflected in the twenty conference papers assembled in

this volume.

This team of experts was asked to consider a number of issues in light of contemporary scholarship. Are

the "cultures" as described and consrrwcfet/by the Jesup

Expedition participants relevant to the emerging new

identities of Native peoples in the region today? How

do modern culturally conscious peoples reconstitute

themselves, both politically and spiritually? Are the

records of ethnologists, folklorists, and linguists of a

century ago a valuable resource in this transformation?

Do museums and museum collections have a role to

play in this process? How do issues of environmental

exploitation play against local sovereignty and local conceptualizations of the land and its resources? These and other taunting issues necessarily include

the perspectives of Native people and the voices

of Native scholars. Intentionally designed to break

through international and interdisciplinary as well as

professional and political boundaries, this conference

provided one lively forum for dialogues that span the

Bering Strait.

Following Boas' founding vision of anthropology

as an integrated endeavor, the organizers adopted a

similar breadth of vision in defining the conference's framework as well as in inviting topics for individual

presentations and focused panel discussions. We were

also keenly aware that in the intervening century, many

sub-fields once skillfully aligned by Boas have become

L. KENDALL AND L KRUPNIK 5
highly specialized, shifted their boundaries orchanged

their professional allegiances. The conference presentations (recast as chapters in this volume) suggested

how new knowledge—such as the biological

anthropologist's use of genetic data, the vastly ex- panded vision of archaeology and comparative historical linguistics, or the anthropologist's attention to

the transcontinental colonial flows of goods, ideas,

and people—permitted new insights into questions once posed by the Jesup Expedition. Several speakers

revealed how very often the work of newly-recruited

disciples in the science of anthropology, like Boas and

his counterparts, was dependent upon and consequently enriched by the insights of local residents, who

acted as their field partners, knowledge experts, guides,

and interpreters. Many papers offered moving illustrations of how scholars worldwide continue to use materials collected by the Jesup Expedition to pose new

questions. Of particular significance, scholars com- mented on the value of the American Museum of Natural History's material and of the Boasian legacy as in- digenous peoples of the "Jesup area" engage in projects

of cultural revitalization. The full saga of the confer- ence has been described elsewhere (Graburn 1998).

The Volume

The 20 conference papers selected for this volume are

directly tied to the historical legacy of the Jesup Expedition, either by way of centennial reevaluation and

critique of its scientific premises and results or as a demonstration of how the Jesup Expedition's artifacts and data are used today to new ends. We believe that

with the publication of this "centennial" volume—the second volume to be published by the Arctic Studies Center on the Jesi^ip 2 theme (cf. Krupnik and Fitzhugh

2001) and in conjunction with several other recent monographs, collections, and catalogs featuring the

legacy of the JNPE and of Franz Boas (Cole 1 999; Fitz- hugh and Chaussonnet 1994; Fitzhugh and Crowell

1 988; Jacknis 2002; Jonaitis 1 988, 1 991 , 1 995, 1 999;

Kendall et al. 1997; Krupnik 2000; Shternberg 1999,

etc.)—we have raised a significant milestone on the ambitious Journey begun by Franz Boas and his team

over 1 00 years ago. The volume is organized into four thematic sections. Papers in the first section, Om Hundred Years of

jesup: The Intellectual Legacy ofthe Jesup Expedition Era,

look back over a century to evaluate the Expedition

from the perspective of its impact on the anthropology of the late 1 9th and early 20th century ("then") and

to re-evaluate its assumptions in light of today's understandings C'moiv"). The Expedition's multi-faceted research agenda offers a stimulating and varied "menu"

for such a re-examination. The section opens with the

chapter by Igor Krupnik and Nikolai Vakhtin, who ex- amine the saga of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition as

if it were a modern scholarly project. Though conceived

and executed in a manner consistent with the goals

and techniques of anthropological scholarship circa

1 900, the Jesup Expedition, according to Krupnik and

Vakhtin, meets most of the contemporary criteria of

successful interdisciplinary research by virtue of its well thought out scientific design, consistent methodological frame, publication and training agenda, and pro- motion of international scholarly collaboration.

In a more critical vein, Don Dumond concludes that

the post-Jesup century of work in the archaeology of

the North Pacific does not, in the main, offer evidence

for one of the key pieces of Boas' ethnogenetic theory,

the so-called "Eskimo wedge" hypothesis that as- sumed a late wedge-like intrusion of the Eskimo into

the chain of related cultures in the Bering Sea-Bering

Strait area. Under a similar revisionist agenda, Peter

Schweitzer queries why Boas' preoccupation with diffusion and culture exchange, and his later interest in

local history never materialized into a focused ethnohistory of Native peoples residing at the critical junction of trans-Beringian contacts, the Bering Strait area.

Molly Lee and Nelson Graburn suggest that for Boas at

the time of the Jesup Expedition (then), the diffusion of

material and non-material cultural traits was as much

of an exciting intellectual paradigm as the concept of

6 INTRODUCTION
"transnationalism" is for students of global cultural ex- change today (now). They argue that Boas' diffusionist agenda erred in excising from his consideration the

impact of international commerce on cultural exchanges

within the region. Finally, the AMNH team of Stanley

and Ruth Fried and Leila Williamson compares the Jesup

Expedition's logistics, planning, and research focus to

similarly monumental enterprises, such as the Lewis

and Clark Expedition (1 803-06), the U.S. Exploring Expedition (1 838-42), and the Cambridge Anthropological Expedition to the Torres Straits (1898-99).

Part Two, Anthropologies and Histories: Jesup Members TInen and Now, broadens our understanding of key

participants in the Expedition and related fieldwork. Ira

Jacknis illuminates an intriguing aspect of Boas' multifaceted personality, his musical skill and deep love of

music, which led him to undertake musicological research in the field. Other chapters in this section reveal many instances where the work of Boas and his counterparts was dependent upon and consequently enriched by the insights of local people, both Native and

long-term local residents, thus broadening our understanding of such collaborations beyond the well-docu- mented relationship of Boas and George Hunt who is

recognized today as an early Native anthropologist

(Berman 1 996). These papers suggest that today's anthropologists would benefit by more research and soul

searching as to how our scholarly predecessors had

typically incorporated the work of their local associates into their own academic publications. Wendy

Wickwire focuses on one of Boas' longest-standing and

most productive local collaborators in Northwest Coast

ethnography, James Teit, who—despite his voluminous

contributions to the JNPE research and publications

has been commonly regarded as merely Boas' "field

assistant." Koichi Inoue examines an uneasy narrative

of another contemporary "local" scientist, Bronislaw

Pilsudski, an enthusiastic and ethnographically astute

Polish exile living on Sakhalin Island whose brief career

intersected with the work of three members of the

Jesup Expedition team: Boas, Laufer, and Shternberg.

Nora Marks Dauenhauer and Richard Dauenhauer explore the legacy of Louis Shotridge, the first Tlingit,

and possibly the first Northwest Coast Native, with

training in linguistics and anthropology (primarily from

Boas). The first Native Alaskan to become a professional collector and museum curator, Shotridge made

invaluable and generally under-recognized contributions to the documentation of the Northwest Coast

cultures. Finally, Sergei Kan engages in ethnohistorical

detective work to retrieve a pattern of collaboration between the late 1 9th-century ethnographers and local Native American and "mixed-blood" (Creole, Metis)

interpreters, amateur historians, and informants. He

draws on his extensive research on Native-outsider interactions in southern Alaska during the late 1 800s.

Part Three, People, Animals, and Land: AJesup Theme

Revisited, offers a selection of modern perspectives by

scholars whose disciplines span the major fields of the

Jesup Expedition's activities. Robert Hoffmann describes

the biological and natural history work of the JNPE as an early example of the "correlated" multi-disciplinary

efforts that would characterize modern scientific expeditions. He offers a sober assessment of biological

diversity in the Beringian region today, arguing that such correlated efforts are urgently needed if the

region's endangered ecology is to be preserved.

Michael Krauss indexes shortcomings in the Expedition's efforts to document North Pacific languages,

attributing this to a lack of interest on the part of Expedition scientists in either the documentation of linguistic diversity or the last-minute salvage of dying

languages through extensive recording in the interest

of comparative linguistics or philological study. As

Krauss argues, only Boas appears to have given much

priority to that latter task, and even he mostly neglected

it during his briefJesup Expedition fieldwork. Theodore Schurr and Douglas Wallace describe how

modern molecular genetic data obtained from aboriginal populations provide an exciting cross-disciplinary

tool to test the old theories of the Jesup Expedition

era, a tool which could not have even been imagined

L. KENDALL AND I. KRUPNIK 7
by the original JNPE members. They argue that such

data can be used successfully to test the original JNPE

hypotheses regarding the origins and diversity of Native Siberians and their close evolutionary relationships

with Native Americans. The chapter by Sergei Arutiunov

records generational transitions within the Russian

school of Northeast Siberian prehistoric research; it also

offers some new insights on the scenarios of the earliest trans-Beringian interactions based upon methods

and approaches that were similarly not even envisioned

at the time of the Jesup Expedition (such as the study

of prehistoric adaptations; comparative historical linguistics; and analysis of dental features of the prehistoric and modern populations). Finally, David Koester

deals with the traumatic consequences of history, unveiling the drama of involuntary relocations and forced

separation of indigenous people from their ancestral

lands during the "post-Jesup" era. "History" here is not

quantifiable molecular or archaeological data, sifted from a perspective of distance, but the stuff of memory

and sentiment as revealed in the stories and poetry of

the "lost villages" of Kamchatka.

The last section of this volume. Curators, Collectors, and Consumers, describes some of the ways in which JNPE and other North Pacific museum resources have become part of local efforts to sustain the cultural heritage of the indigenous peoples of the Greater

North Pacific Region. William W. Fitzhugh brings to light

many memories, both sweet and sad, as well as the

intricacies of a 20 year-long effort in trans-national mu- seum cooperation, publication, and outreach that cul- minated in the exhibit Crossroads of Continents: Cultures ofSiberia and Alaska (1 988-92) and its follow-up

traveling venture. Crossroads Alaska-Siberia {] 993-97).

Stephen Loring and Douglas Veltre share the same vision of the changing role of anthropology (and archaeology, in particular) in protecting and enhancing cultural heritage, describing their own research contributions in the Aleutian Islands.

In the same collaborative spirit, two art historians and ethnographers from Russia's Sakha Republic

(Yakutia), Zinaida Ivanova-Unarova and the late Vladimir Ivanov-Unarov (1937-2000) offer a moving account

of a personal Journey undertaken from the Siberian

heartland to work with collections at the American

Museum of Natural History in New York and then share

the results of their study with Native artisans back

home. Their story demonstrates how materials collected by the original Jesup Expedition offer invaluable encouragement to the people engaged in cultural revival and revitalization efforts today. Aldona Jonaitis

looks at many intricate aspects of a related process:

the reclaiming of a traditional cultural legacy by innovative Native artists, including female artists, who are

constructing new cultural symbols. She uses the case

of a totem pole, the quintessential symbol of the North- west Coast cultures, and the example of two contemporary female carvers to illustrate how the early anthropological notion of Native art's "timeless traditionalism" has been turned on its head by the creativity of

living Native cultures of today. In what could be read

as a coda to the entire volume, Kwakwaka'wakw anthropologist and curatorCloriaCranmer Webster writes

a highly personal essay as the granddaughter of George

Hunt whose collaboration with Franz Boas made an

important contribution not only to the ethnographic

record, but to the preservation of Kwakwaka'wakw

culture. She presents the story of a long friendship

between the Boas and Hunt families constructed

through Kwakwaka'wakw idioms of name-giving and

feasting, an evocation of important "grandfathers" and

the inspiration they offer future generations.

Acknowledgments

The Jesup Expedition Centenary Conference of 1997 was supported by The Henry Luce Foundation, Inc., The Ford Foundation, The Rockefeller Foundation, The

Trust for Mutual Understanding, Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthroplogical Research, and the Chi-Mei Cultural Foundation. Ann Fitzgerald coordinated the complex logistics of an international conference, and AMNH

staff, including Ann Wright-Parsons and Alexia Bloch,

8 INTRODUCTION
then with the AMNH Department of Anthropology,

ensured that events ran smoothly. We are particularly

grateful to the many museum volunteers who offered

assistance before and during the conference and to a team of tireless interpreters provided by the Translation Center, Columbia University.

The story of this volume's preparation offers an

illuminating lesson that the publishing difficulties the JNPE team encountered 100 years ago still exist today. It was also an example of a successful institutional partnership, quite in the footsteps of the original

JNPE venture. Laurel Kendall spearheaded initial editorial work on the volume at AMNH, following the 1 997

centennial conference. Kathryn A. Malm helped edit

this ambitious bundle of papers into a cohesive manuscript. Eventually, the Arctic Studies Center (ASC) picked

up this collection under its recently established publication series, Contributions to Circumpoiar Anthropology, that had previously featured another jesup 2 vol- ume, Gateways. Exploring the Legacy ofthe Jesup North

Pacific Expedition, 1897-1902 (Krupnik and Fitzhugh

2001). The publication of both volumes was made

possible in part by an endowment from the late anthropologist James W. VanStone (1925-2001), who

was himself an inspiring symbol of partnership and inter-disciplinary collaboration in Arctic and North Pacific ethnological research.

At the ASC, Igor Krupnik and Iris Hahn carried on

the editorial work while Elisabeth Ward supervised

the process of layout and printing of the manuscript.

Marcia Bakry at the Smithsonian Institution's Department of Anthropology and Tam Thompson offered

invaluable assistance with graphic artwork. This collection follows a design pattern created by Anya

Vinokour for the ASC Contributions to Circumpoiar

Anthropology series and used for the preceding publications. We would like to commend all our volume

contributors for their trust, dedication, as well as for

patience during a seemingly interminable editorial

process. Special thanks go to Stanley Freed at the

AMNH, William Fitzhugh, the ASC Director, and to

Katherine Rusk for their helpful comments and editorial

suggestions to many volume papers at this final stage.

This book, as well as the preceding Jesup 2 volume

(ibid), is illustrated with numerous original photographs

from the Jesup Expedition era, including many taken

by the expedition field crews in Siberia and North

America. We are grateful to the expedition's host institution, the American Museum of Natural History, for

permission to reproduce the photographs and to Barbara Mathe, Head of Special Collections at the AMNH

Library, for her truly heartfelt assistance with the images. Several more illustrations, including historical photographs and images of ethnographic objects, come from other collections, such as that of the

Smithsonian Institution's National Anthropological Archives, National Museum of Natural History, National Museum of the American Indian; the University of Pennsylvania Museum, University of Alaska Museum, Alaska

State Library, American Philosophical Society, British Columbia Provincial Archives, University of British Co- lumbia Museum of Anthropology, Royal British Columbia Museum, and others (see List of Illustrations). We

thank all institutions as well as the curators, collection management staff, and archivists who granted us permission and assisted in selecting and securing the illustrations for this second JNPE memorial volume.

Finally, over the years since the initial New York

conference of 1 997, we have lost one of the most

devoted members of the Jesup 2 team, the Sakha

(Yakut) ethnologist and art historian Vladimir IvanovUnarov, who passed away in 2000. We regard this volume as a special tribute to Volodya's legacy—which

is honored here by Marjorie Mandelstam Balzer—as

well as to other colleagues and partners who did not

live to see the Jesup Expedition's centenary and to

take part in its celebration.

Note

1 . The original wax cylinder sound recordings produced during the Jesup Expedition were

eventually transferred to the Archives of Traditional

Music at the University of Indiana.

L. KENDALL AND \. KRUPNIK 9
References

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Anonymous

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Berman, Judith

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Cole, Douglas

1999 Franz Boas: The Early Years, 1858-1906.

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2001 The Boasian Anthropological Survey Tradition. The Role of Franz Boas in North American Anthropological Surveys. In Surveying the Record. North Ameri- can Scientific Exploration to 1 930. Edward C. Carter II, ed. Pp. 225^9. Memoirs of the American Philosophical Society, 231. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society.

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1 996 Jesup 2: Anthropology of the North Pacific. Northern Notes 4:4] -62. Hanover, N.H. Fitzhugh, William W., and Valerie Chaussonnet,

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1 994 Anthropology of the North Pacific Rim. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press. Fitzhugh, William W., and Aron Crowell, eds.

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Press. Fitzhugh, William W., and Igor Krupnik

1 994 Thejesup II Research Initiative: Anthropological Studies in the North Pacific. Arctic Studies Center

Newsletter. (Jesup II Newsbrief). Washington, DC: Arctic Studies Center, Smithsonian Institution. 2001 Introduction. In Gateways. Exploring the Legacy

ofthe Jesup North Pacific Expedition, 1897-1 902. Igor Krupnik and William W. Fitzhugh, eds. Pp. 1 -1 6. Contributions to Circumpolar Anthropology, 1 . Washington, DC: Arctic Studies Center Graburn, Nelson H. H.

1 998 Constructing Cultures Then and Now. Ameri- can Anthropologist 1 00(4): 1 009-1 3. lARPC (Interagency Arctic Research Policy

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1995 U.S. Arctic Research Plan Biennial Revision:

1 996-2000. Arctic Research of the United States 9

(Spring).

Jacknis, Ira 2002 The Storage Box of Tradition: KwakiutI Art, Anthropologists, and Museums, 1881-1981. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press. Jonaitis, Aldona

1988 From the Land of the Totem Poles. The North- west Coast Indian Art Collection at the American Mu- seum of Natural History. Seattle: University of Washington Press; New York: American Museum of Natural History.

1 999 The Yuquot Whalers' Shrine. Seattle: University of Washington Press. Jonaitis, Aldona, ed.

1991 Chiefly Feasts. The Enduring KwakiutI Potlach.

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1 995 A Wealth of Thought: Franz Boas on Native

American Art. Seattle: University of Washington Press. Kendall, Laurel

1997 Thejesup North Pacific Expedition. Rotunda

22(10):!. New York. Kendall, Laurell, Barbara Mathe, and Thomas R. Miller, eds.

1997 Drawing Shadows to Stone: The Photography of

the Jesup North Pacific Expedition, 1897-1902. New

York: American Museum of Natural History; Seattle: University of Washington Press. Krupnik, Igor

2000 Jesup-2: The Precious Legacy and a Centennial Perspective. European Review ofNative American

Studies 1 4(2), Special Issue. 2001 A Jesup Bibliography: Tracking the Published

and Archival Legacy of the Jesup Expedition. In Gate- ways. Exploring the Legacy ofthe Jesup North Pacific Expedition, 1897-1902. Igor Krupnik and William W.

Fitzhugh, eds. Pp. 297-3 1 6. Contributions to Circumpolar Anthropology, 1 . Washington, DC: Arctic Studies Center. Krupnik, Igor, and William W. Fizthugh, eds.

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1 998 Exhibition Review: Drawing Shadows to Stone. American Anthropologist 1 00(4): 1 005-09.

INTRODUCTION
Miller, Thomas Ross, and Barbara Mathe

1 997 Drawing Shadows to Stone. In Drawing Shad- ows to Stone: The Photography of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition, ] 897-] 902. Laurel Kendall, Barbara

Mathe, and Thomas Ross Miller, eds. Pp. 1 9-42. New

York: American Museum of Natural History; Seattle: University of Washington Press. Ousley, Stephen, and Richard Jantz

2001 500 Year Old Questions, 1 00 Year Old Data,

Brand New Computers: Biological Data from the Jesup

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1902. Igor Krupnik and William W. Fitzhugh, eds.

Pp. 257-78. Contributions to Circumpolar Anthropology, 1 . Washington, DC: Arctic Studies Center. Rexer, Lyie

1 997 Doctoring Reality to Document What's True. The New Yorl< Times, November 9, p. 25. Sanjek, Roger.

1 996 Franz Boas. In Encyclopedia of Social and Cul- tural Anthropology. Alan Barnard and Jonathan Spencer, eds. Pp. 7]-4. London: Routledge.

Shternberg, Lev,

1 999 The Social Organization of the Cilyak. Bruce

Grant, ed. Anthropological Papers of the American

Museum ofNatural History, 82. New York: American

Museum of Natural History.

Shute, Nancy

1997 Birth of a Science, Rebirth of a People. The

Jesup Expedition Turns 100. U.S. News & World Report. December 1 , p. 64. Vakhtin, Nikolai B. 1993 Jesup-2: Novaia programma sotsial'noantropologicheskikh issledovanii na Severe Qesup2: A New Program of Social and Anthropological

Research in the North). Kunstkamera. Ethnograficheskie

tetradi 1 :21 1-1 3. St. Petersburg.

2001 Franz Boas and the Shaping of the Jesup Ex- pedition Siberian Research, 1 895-1 900. In Gateways.

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Fitzhugh, eds. Pp. 71-89. Contributions to Circumpolar Anthropology, 1 . Washington, DC: Arctic Studies Center.

L. KENDALL AND \. KRUPNIK
3/LevShternberg, Franz Boas, and Waldemar Bogoras at the 21" International Congress ofAmericanists, 1924. Courtesy ofthe Museum Anthropology and Ethnography, St. Petersburg, Russia (original in the MAEcollection)
100 YEARS AFTER JESUP: THE INTELLECTUAL LEGACY

OF THEJESUP EXPEDITION ERA

"*y"he /\im of the Expedition... Mas in the

Main ^een /Xccompiishec!"

Words, [^eeJs, and Legacies of the Jesup |\jorti-i facific Expedition

IGOR KRUPNIK

AND NIKOLAI VAKHTIN

The Jesup North Pacific Expedition (JNPE), which took

place from 1897 to 1902, was a milestone event for

the entire domain of North Pacific/Siberian/North American research. To the field currently known as "Jesup-2

studies" (Fitzhugh and Krupnik 2001 ) as well as to the

expedition's host institution, the American Museum of

Natural History (AMNH), the Expedition's recent centennial and the many accompanying events offered a remarkable opportunity to evaluate key components

of its legacy, and to review transitions in anthropology and human sciences over the turbulent 20th century.

By modern standards, JNPE was a pioneer scientific

venture. It initiated a new pattern of large anthropological/museum surveys, with 1 7 team members from

four countries (the U.S., Russia, Canada, and Germany)

working in various combinations over five years on two continents.' The expedition's fieldwork was

matched by an equally ambitious publication program.

A preliminary JesL^p Bibliography compiled recently

(Krupnik 2001) lists about 200 publications produced

by JNPE participants over 50 years, including eleven major volumes and dozens of journal articles, and collections of folklore and language materials.

For 100 years following the JNPE, its design, out- comes, and publications have been reviewed many

times (Freed et al. 1 988; Fitzhugh and Krupnik 2001

;

Kuz'mina 1994; Vakhtin 1993; Fitzhugh 1996). It has

been called "a grandiose, brilliantly conceptualized, and

masterfully orchestrated attack on one of the most

important problems in American anthropology" (Fitz- hugh and Crowell 1 988: 1 4), one that initiated "a transvaluation of the entire field of anthropology, and hinted

at its development into the most humane of the hu- man sciences" Conaitis 1988:213). But the JNPE was

also labeled a "remarkable failure," a "disappointment

for Morris K. Jesup and for his museum" (Cole 2001 :48)

or, at least, a "fiasco" in some of its fields of activities,

areas surveyed, and/or postulated hypotheses. These

conflicting perspectives are illustrated in many papers

in this volume.

Many shortcomings of the Jesup Expedition project

have been well addressed, since the JNPE team and,

particularly, its leader, Franz Boas, neither produced a summary project monograph nor offered any extended

outline of cultural history of the North Pacific Region.

There are more than ample grounds for critique and

revisionism (see chapters by Dumond; Lee and Graburn;

Hoffmann; Inoue; Krauss; Schweitzer, this volume; also Ousley 2000; Ousley and Jantz 2001 ). As a monumental initiative conducted by many strong personalities,

the Jesup Expedition can be judged from various perspectives, according to the often conflicting visions of

its organizers, sponsors, and individual team members.

Some of these visions were openly debated in papers and letters; others have been personal and remained

hidden. While certain JNPE initial plans did materialize,

many more were abandoned during or after the field- work was completed. In addition, the JNPE legacy en- dured a long period of criticism during the 1 920s and

1 5
1930s, followed by decades of skepticism and abandonment (Krupnik I 998). It was not until recently that

the Expedition's legacy underwent a more balanced

judgment and a spectacular recovery (see various chapters in Krupnik and Fitzhugh 2001).

This paper introduces a new framework to consider the legacy of the JNPE project by testing it against some basic evaluation criteria commonly applied to

large research initiatives in contemporary social science. By no means do we aspire to assume the role of

present-day "peer reviewers" for a century-old venture.

Rather we would like to illustrate how the Jesup Expedition agenda, its field logistics, and publication plan

accomplished then can be viewed now in a centennial

perspective. For this purpose, we have selected five modern evaluation criteria: research integrity; contribution to "basic science"; international cooperation;

education and training; and public outreach. These criteria are familiar to every modern social scientist. By

applying today's standards to the original JNPE project, we deliberately contemporize its entire context in order to build a new vision of its legacy a century later.

Integrity of the JNPE Design

Despite the expedition's complex design and its nu- merous achievements, it is clear that the JNPE project

put forth a somewhat confusing message from the very start. It seemed to have been "packaged" and

presented differently to various constituencies and prospective audiences. In his articles, statements, and letters, Franz Boas, the project leader, delivered at least

three different perspectives on the general goals of

the JNPE, to say nothing of his many personal objectives revealed through his private correspondence.

The first declared objective of the JNPE was its focus on extensive ethnographic surveys and collecting. Boas advertised it as "[a] systematic exploration of

the cultures and languages of the peoples inhabiting

the coasts of the North Pacific Ocean between the Amoor River [sic] in Asia and Columbia River in America"

(Anonymous 1 897:455; Boas 1 898a:4). This objective

was fulfilled with astounding success (Figs. 1 -2, 7-1 0). One can feel the breadth of the JNPE efforts in Bogoras'

exuberant report on the outcome of his year-long field work in Siberia (1900-01) as quoted by Boas:

[T]he results of this work are studies of the ethnography and anthropology of the Chukchee and Asiatic Eskimo, and partly of

the Kamchadal and of the Pacific Koryak.

These studies are illustrated by extensive

collections, embracing five thousand ethnographical objects, thirty-three plaster casts of faces, seventy-five skulls and archaeological specimens from abandoned village sites and from graves. Other materials obtained

include three hundred tales and traditions; one hundred-fifty texts in the Chukchee,

Koryak, Kamchadal, and Eskimo languages;

dictionaries and grammatical sketches of

these languages; ninety-five phonographic

records, and measurements of eight hundredsixty individuals [the latter done mainly by

Mr. Axelrod in addition to some 770 photographs—I.K., N.V.]. I also made zoological

collection and kept a meteorological journal

during the whole time of my field-work (Boas

1903:1 1 5).

Despite a few gaps in the proposed itinerary and study

area, the expedition mostly followed its initial five-year

research plan as designed by Boas in 1897. This plan was presented very early in a form of a map, "Field of

Proposed Operations of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition." It was enclosed to the Annual Report of the AMNH

President Morris Jesup on the activities of the museum

during the year 1 897 (Fig. 4; Jesup 1 898; Krupnik and

Fitzhugh 2001 :xvi). This early blueprint for the JNPE fiveyear field operation reveals a remarkable agreement

with the actual surveys conducted by the expedition's

teams between the years 1 897 and 1 902. The only

exception was the fieldwork in western and southern

Alaska (that never materialized) and on the Aleutian

Islands. The latter was undertaken several years later by Waldemar and Dina Jochelson under a different

project, the Ryabushinski Expedition of the Russian

Geographical Society in 1909-1 1. The Alaska Yup'ik

and Inupiat Eskimo as well the Tlingit were dropped

from the initial research plan. According to Boas, this was done deliberately, in view of the recently pub100 YEARS/ EVALUATING ACCOMPLISHMENTS
lished monographs or the then ongoing studies by

Edward W. Nelson, John IVlurdoch, and George T. Emmons (Boas 1903:77).

However, several later surveys, such as John Swanton's study of the Tlingit in 1 904, Harlan Smith's trip to

the Columbia River valley in 1 903, and the Jochelsons'

trip to the Aleutians and Kamchatka in 1 909-1 1, were

conducted as direct extensions of the main expedscientific achievement, particularly if one considers the

distances and communication problems involved. One

has to acknowledge, however, that individual JNPE

surveys of certain areas and Native groups were quite

unequal in terms of the time invested and ethnographic

data collected (see critical reviews in chapters by Krauss,

Inoue, Schweitzer, and Wickwire, this volume; also Cole

2001; Krupnik 1996).

1897 1898 1900 1901

4/ Field of Proposed Operations of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition, 1 898 (adapted from American Museum

of Natural History, Annual Report of the President for the Year 1 897)

ition's field operations of 1897-1902. With this, the JNPE team members almost completed their announced

objective to cover the area "from the Amoor River in

Asia and up to Columbia Valley in North America." Altogether, the expedition field crews suPv/eyed 1 7 Native nations on the Northwest Coast^ and 1 nations

in Siberia.^ The task of supervising and coordinating

this Joint field plan of many individual researchers and field teams over several years was successfully

accomplished by Franz Boas, the JNPE's relentless leader.

It was and still remains an outstanding logistical and

As a result of these efforts, the map of Native nations of Northeast Siberia and Northwestern North

America was significantly amended. The American

Museum of Natural History garnered fabulous ethnographic and natural science collections that were

quickly put on display in its exhibit halls, which were

subsequently redesigned and expanded (Anonymous

1904a, 1904b; Jonaitis 1988; Fig. 11). Several ethnographic objects were true masterpieces of Native art,

ceremonialism, and ritual practices (Jonaitis 1 988, 1 991 ). The JNPE ethnographic and zoological collections (see

I. KRUPNIK AND N. VAKHTIN
Hoffmann, this volume) were matched by the invaluable folklore, linguistic, and anthropometric data as

well as by the unique historical photography of Native

people and local landscapes of Siberia and Northwestern North America (Kendall et al. 1997; Willey 2001).

And finally, albeit not as quickly as originally advertised, the JNPE did produce basic ethnographic monographs and the core folklore and linguistic data for most of the Native nations of the North Pacific. Of those,

several Jesup Expedition volumes, like Bogoras' threepart monograph on the Chukchi (Bogoras 1 904-9) and

Jochelson's study of the Koryak Oochelson 1908), re- mained the most complete reference ethnographies

and folklore collections on these peoples over the entire 20th century, despite generations of subsequent

anthropological research. The JNPE was far less successful in its second declared objective, "the [s]tudy of the early history of the

native races of the North American continent and their

relation to the Old World" (Anonymous 1 897:456; Boas

1903:91). This, we believe, was more a public-relations statement or an appealing project title, similar to

"the origins of the American race" (see Boas 1 898a:4-

5). Most probably, it was masterminded to attract public

interest and to generate funding and institutional support for the JNPE venture. Such a 'public-relations' task was, in fact, splendidly achieved, at least during earlier

stages of the project (Vakhtin 2001:74-5). Nonetheless, the issue of the early peopling of the Americas

never fully engaged Boas or most otherJNPE members.

Boas himself disclaimed it quite frankly in some of his

private letters (e.g. Boas to McChee, April 12, 1897),

as he was quite skeptical about the utility of archaeological and osteological materials for any large-scale

reconstruction of prehistory (cf.Jacknis 1996: 203).

In fact, such an objective was all but impossible to

fulfill at that time due to the infancy of contemporary

archaeological research and to its very limited technical and analytical capabilities. The time depth of the

peopling of the Americas from Northern Asia, as well

as the chronological span of the prehistory of the North1 8

west Coast and Siberia, was still primarily guesswork.

No reliable chronology had existed for this part of the world by the year 1900, nor was there any technical means available to build such a chronology. William

Dall (1877:93-5) argued for a prehistoric crossing on

ice at the Bering Strait, presumably during the "Ice Age"

period. Several other contemporary scientists favored

migration or migrations over a land bridge during an

interglacial retreat sometime between 10,000 and

100,000 years ago (cf. Wilmsen 1965:1 77-8).

To make things worse, comparative archaeological collections from both Siberia and North America were all but missing, and the limited budget and duration of the JNPE was too modest, if not totally inadequate, for the task. Harlan Smith, who almost singlehandedly carried out JNPE archaeological surveys on

the North American side, found no evidence of distinctive cultures dating to the time of the "original migration" (Thom 2001). His limited work, however, was re- garded as "[p]atently inadequate to help to clear the

cause of Early Man in America" (Wilmsen 1 965: 1 78). A

JNPE archaeological survey in the Amur River valley in

Siberia provided even fewer results. No doubt, it was

declared a "failure" even by the very person, whom

Boas put in charge of it (Fowke 1 906:297). It came as no surprise that the JNPE field operation produced hardly

any legacy for the study of early human migrations

from Asia to America and of the prehistory of the "(Native) American race," in particular.

Contribution to "Basic Science"

It was the third stated objective of the JNPE that generated major controversy, and it also contributed to

the bulk of later criticism aimed at Boas and the

expedition's overall accomplishments. Boas framed

this objective as "[exploring] what relations the native

tribes on the two sides of the North Pacific bear to

each other, and particularly what influence the inhabitants of one continent may have exerted on those of

the other.. .[w]ith a view to discovering as much as

possible of their history" (Boas 1 903:76).

100 YEARS/ EVALUATING ACCOMPLISHMENTS
TheJNPE members advanced three basic concepts,

in this regard, during and after the expedition field- work (see Boas 1903, 1910/2001), in developing the

general scenario of the peopling of the Americas from

Northeast Asia via the Bering Sea area. All three concepts addressed the issue of similarities between cultures on both sides of the North Pacific. These include:

1 . The so-called "Americanoid theory'thai claimed an American origin of certain Paleoasiatic groups

in Northeastern Siberia, such as the Chukchi,

Koryak, Kamchadal (Itelmen), and the Yukagir (see

reviews in Ousley 2000; Ousley and Jantz 2001)

2. The "Eskimo Wedge" theory that suggested a

relatively late arrival of the Eskimo to the North

Pacific area that subsequently bisected the once unbroken continuum of the Siberian "Americanoid" and Northwest Coast American

Indian groups (see review in Dumond, this volume).

3. The idea of a fundamental cultural and physical

gap between the North Pacific coastal ("salt- water") nations and their inland neighbors, like the Tungus, the Yakut (Sakha), and the Plateau

Indian groups (such as Thompson, Shuswap, and

others) in Siberia and North America, respectively.

These three paradigms were to become the pillars of

the JNPE and Boas' approach to North Pacific cultural

(pre)history. In fact, they were advanced very early in

the project, well before the entire corpus of the expedition's ethnographic, anthropometric, and linguistic data was processed and published (Anonymous

1897:455; Boas 1 898a:4, 1902/1940:526-9, 1903:

115, 1905:98-9; Bogoras 1 902:579-80; Jochelson

1904:414,425; Ousley and Jantz 2001:264-5, 275).

Later field data and publications notwithstanding, these hypotheses remained basically intact, and they were

recycled repeatedly over decades in many post-JNPE papers (cf. Boas 1928, 1 933; Jochelson 1926, 1928).

By 1925, the rapidly growing body of new data

and theories challenged most of the old Jesup Expedition's scenarios in Arctic/Eskimo/North Pacific prehistory. The main challenge came from the progress in

Eskimo archaeology in the Bering Strait area and in the Canadian Arctic (Krupnik 1998:203). New scenarios

for ancient cultural connections in the circumpolar area became popular; they featured circumpolar rather than

the Beringian/trans-North Pacific venues of cultural influences and migrations. Renewed interest in more

southern lines of cultural exchange between the North- west Coast and the Amur River area, including Japan,

China, and inner Asia has been expressed by younger

cohorts of scholars, including students of the original

JNPE team (Krupnik 1 998:203).

During the 1930s, criticism of the old JNPE para- digms was mounting from many directions. It was, however, the spectacular advance in North Pacific/Arctic archaeology—the field that was the least devel- oped at the time of the JNPE surveys of 1 897-1 902—

that eventually toppled its major theories in North Pacific cultural origins and connections (see Dumond, this

volume). But it still gave the work of the expedition

approximately twenty to twenty-five years of "theoretical pre-eminence" in the field.

Nevertheless, the core Jesup Expedition vision of

the arc of the North Pacific coastland of Siberia and

Northwest North America as an integrated culture area

has endured for decades. This perspective was used in many later studies of the mid-1 900s (e.g., Leroi-Gourhan

1 946; Heizer 1 943), and it has been revitalized in nu- merous anthropological, archaeological, and

paleoenvironmental projects, publications, and major museum exhibits of the last three decades under such names as Beringia, The North Pacific Rim, The Greater North Pacific Area, etc. (Fitzhugh and Crowell 1 988;

Fitzhugh and Chaussonnet 1994; Fitzhugh 1996; Fitz- hugh and Krupnik 2001 ; Hopkins 1 967; Hopkins et al.

1 982; Krupnik and Inoue 2003; Michael and VanStone

1983; Turner 1988; West 1981, 1996). Similarly, the

cornerstone of the JNPE methodological approach also

sustained—matching data on Native customs, folklore,

languages, physical types, material objects, and unearthed archaeological remains—to prove the age-old

cultural connections.

I. KRUPNIK AND N. VAKHTIN
With its emphasis upon an interdisciplinary approach, the JNPE laid the foundation for the many dominant patterns and paradigms in the Arctic/North Pacific anthropology of the 20th century. Since "Jesup

times" it has become a deep conviction that the saga

of North Pacific cultural history could be successfully

unveiled only by the concerted teamwork of field and museum ethnography, linguistics, physical anthropology, and archaeology. The recent re-evaluation of many

of the expedition's outcomes, publications, and collections will, we hope, rejuvenate certain components

of the JNPE legacy. Old theories often make a surprising comeback as new research technologies become

available to test and challenge earlier studies.

International Cooperation as the JNPE Legacy

One key field in which the JNPE made an unquestioned

and lasting contribution was international cooperation

in North Pacific fieldwork, academic contacts, museum

exchanges, and cultural research. By its very design,

the JNPE project pioneered a new format of coordinated and simultaneous cross-boundary anthropological and museum research by the nationals and institutions of the U.S., Russia, Canada, and Germany. It also

established for the first time the now common practice of concerted and highly coordinated use of international gatherings as long-term meeting places, presentation, and publication venues. And finally, it pro- duced a model for a publication series of several successive volumes, with former team workers of different origin, country of residence, and affiliation, who

delivered their contribution in a prescribed publication

format over several years.'' The JNPE operation in British Columbia in 1 897 was

started as a continuation of previous research and it

followed a shared program supported by the AMNH

and the British Association of the Advancement of

Sciences (Boas 1 898a:7-8). The five years of fieldwork

in Siberia (1898-1902) were carried out with the full cooperation and direct involvement of the Russian

Academy of Sciences and of its Permanent Secretary,

Prof. Vasily Radloff. Radloff secured a Siberian travel

permit for Berthold Laufer in 1 898 (Cole 200 1 :36; Freed

et al. 1988) and he introduced Jochelson and, later, Bogoras to Boas as prospective Siberian team members, who, in turn, introduced Leo Shternberg to Boas

as a potential contributor to the JNPE publication series (Kan 2001 :225-7; Vakhtin 2001 :76-83). The official backing of the JNPE operations in Siberia by the

Russian Academy and by Radloff, who also served as

the director of the Academy's Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (MAE) in St. Petersburg, was crucial in many aspects, including permission for traveling

in the field, getting support of the local officials, and

shipping collections across and out of Siberia (Figs. 8-

1 1 ). For these and several other reasons, Jochelson even

insisted that the Siberian team work under some sort

of Joint sponsorship by the American Museum, the

Russian Imperial Geographic Society, and the Russian

Academy of Sciences."^ Whereas Russian Government

support of the JNPE proved to be dubious at best (see

Freed et al. 1 988; Vakhtin 2001 :86-7), the Academy's

and Radloffs personal backing of the JNPE was absolutely unequivocal.

The Russians also urged that any duplicate speci- mens from the Jesup Expedition's Siberian collections were to be donated to the MAE in return for their cooperation (Anonymous 1907:68). When the Siberian

collections were finally sorted out in New York, Morris

Jesup presented approximately 300 specimens as the American Museum's gift to the Tzar's family. These

objects were promptly turned over to the MAE collection (Anonymous 1907:68; Mikhailova and Kupina

2002). Boas' interactions with Radloff and the Russian

Academy during and after the JNPE began a long tradition of exchanges between the American Museum and

the MAE (Kupina n.d.). The Jesup Expedition team's continuous use of the

International Congresses of Americanists as a meeting

and promotion venue for the 25 years following the

expedition is another illustration of the high value Boas and his Russian partners—Jochelson, Bogoras, and

20 100 YEARS/ EVALUATING ACCOMPLISHMENTS
Shternberg—assigned to international academic contacts. It also showed how strongly they tried to over- come the drawbacks of artificial separation and isolation caused by World War I and the political storms of

the 20th century (Kan 2000; 2001 ). Their professional

interactions forged during the preparation and field- work of the Jesup Expedition eventually developed into

personal ties, as Bogoras and Jochelson stayed for several months in New York in 1 903-4 while working on

their Siberian collections and preparing their monographs for the JNPE volumes. This, in turn, contributed

to more professional cooperation and to the orchestrated international promotion of the JNPE project. In

1904, Boas, Bogoras, Jochelson, and Shternberg delivered four Jesup-related presentations at the 1 4th International Congress of Americanists in Stuttgart, Germany

(Krupnik 1998:205). The JNPE team members contin- ued to use the Americanist Congresses as their main

international venue at several successive sessions,

including those in Quebec in 1 906 (Boas and Jochelson), in Vienna in 1 908 (Boas), and in London in 1912

Oochelson and Shternberg; see references in Krupnik

2001:300-7)

Personal contacts among the key Jesup Expedition

members, such as Boas, Jochelson, Bogoras, and

Shternberg, were rejuvenated at the 2 1 st International Congress of Americanists in 1924 (Fig. 3), after a decade-long gap created by World War I, two revolutions, and the Civil War in Russia. It blossomed again at

the 23rd Congress of 1 928 in New York where Boas,

Jochelson, and Bogoras met personally for the last time.

Several papers in Arctic/Siberian ethnology were also

contributed to the New York Congress of Americanists

(1928) by younger Russian students of Bogoras and

Shternberg (Bogoras and Leonov 1930; Dyrenkova

1930; Ivanov 1930; Vishnevsky 1 930—see Krupnik

1 998:206), and by Bruno Oetteking, a Boasian disciple

at the American Museum. At this time it appeared that

the bonds that were fostered during the JNPE years were about to be transmitted to a second generation

of students trained by members of the original Jesup

Expedition team.^ But a new partnership never materialized, because Russian-American academic contacts were severed after the years 1 936-38 due to political

purges in Russia and Bogoras' death. Soon much of

the Pacific Coast of Siberia became enmeshed in barbed

wire around GULAG labor camps and military installations, and the region became closed to international

research and cooperation for almost 50 years. However, the JNPE legacy in North Pacific cultural

studies made a surprising comeback when academic

contacts and exchange visits were gradually reestablished during the 1 960s and the 1 970s and new joint

studies were launched in prehistory, archaeology, ethnology, and museum studies of the North Pacific indig- enous peoples (Laughlin 1975, 1985; Michael 1979;

Anonymous 1981; Michael and VanStone 1983; Fitz- hugh and Crowell 1 988). Since that time Russian scholars have often called the Jesup-era partnership "the most productive international venture in Siberian/North

Pacific ethnography" (Gurvich 1979; Kuz'mina 1981;

Gurvic and Kuzmina 1985). In both the Russian and

North American academic tradition, the JNPE has a very

special image as a symbol and model of openness

and international collaboration (Fitzhugh 1994, 1996,

this volume; Fitzhugh and Crowell 1 988; Fitzhugh and

Krupnik 2001 ; Kuz'mina 1 994; Vakhtin 1 993).

This special aura of the Jesup-era partnership in

North Pacific cultural research was stressed repeatedly

in every new international exchange effort and research

cooperation, of which the Crossroads ofContinents exhibit, the Mini-Crossroads exhibit tour in Alaska and Siberia (1 993-7), the Jesup 2 program, and the Jesup Expedition Centenary conference in New York in 1 997

were the most successful examples. In fact, the Crossroads of Continents project, both as an exhibit and a

publication, was promoted in the 1 980s as a "delayed

summary volume of Franz Boas' Jesup Expedition series" (Fitzhugh and Crowell 1988:15; Fitzhugh, this

volume). But more importantly, it was seen as a beginning of a new era of cooperation, not a conclusion of

the one started by Boas and his team in 1 897.

I. KRUPNIK AND N. VAKHTIN
It was surely the charisma of the Jesup Expedition

field research and of its voluminous publications that

motivated so many Western anthropologists to dream

of field studies in Siberia for several decades after the

original JNPE surveys of 1897-1902. As soon as the

Cold War was over and the Ice Curtain in the Bering

Sea disappeared in 1988-90, scores of Western anthropology students flew to Russia to begin the first new series of ethnological studies in Siberia in almost

a century. Several of these pioneers—students of students of students of Boas—were among the participants of the Jesup Expedition centenary conference in New York in 1 997. Their field studies were often conducted with Russian partners who were similarly trained by students of students of Bogoras and Shternberg or were influenced byJNPE publications. This latter contribution to the lasting JNPE legacy is certainly another of

its notable achievements.

Education and Training

Any large research project in the social sciences today

is also tested against such "outreach" criteria as dissemination of knowledge, education, and training. The

JNPE clearly scores high along these lines. Its outstanding record of approximately 200 publications has been

already cited in this regard. What is more important.

Boas deliberately targeted certain periodicals, such as

Science, American Anthropologist, The American Museum

Journal, the AMNH Annual Reports, Proceedings of the

International Congresses of Americanists, and several German scientific Journals, to build an extended series

of Jesup-generated publications. Other Jesup Expedition team members, particularly Laufer, Smith, Bogoras,

and Jochelson followed his lead. For the first time in

the history of anthropology, the outcomes of an international research project were printed, edited, translated, and consistently disseminated over several years

in three languages—English, German, and Russian

across linguistic and state boundaries. With this, a new

pattern in public outreach and concerted dissemination of scientific knowledge was created. Thanks to

the JNPE, this new multilingual format became solidly

established in Beringian/North Pacific research, and has

been successfully implemented in later efforts, including the most recent "Jesup 2" program (see Fitzhugh

and Krupnik 2001).

The success of the JNPE in what is now called education and training is all the more appealing. The original expedition's field team was extremely diverse in terms of its professional and educational background.

It included several young people in their early to mid20s, such as Smith, Dixon, Axelrod, Buxton; freshlyminted Ph.D. graduates, like Laufer and Swanton; it also

featured far more seasoned Russians, who were former

political exiles with incomplete and aborted educations from decades earlier, such as Jochelson, Bogoras,

and Shternberg (and their wives), as well as self-educated local residents, like Hunt and Teit. The only person with an academic status and established publication record in anthropology was Boas himself. Of course,

there was also the project's nominal leader, Prof. Frederic W. Putnam, but he never went to the field and there is

hardly any evidence that Putnam played an active role

in the Expedition after 1 898. We know almost nothing

about his interaction with the JNPE members, other

than Boas and Smith. Hence, it was mainly up to Boas

to train his team members and to promote their scientific careers.

With this in mind, the team's post-expedition record

in professional achievement is worth acknowledging.

Bogoras, Jochelson, Laufer, Smith, Dixon, Swanton, and

Shternberg built recognized academic reputations and

became world-class anthropologists of their time. Several other Jesup Expedition participants had no less prominent life stories, such as Livingston Farrand, who

was later the President of Cornell University and of the American Red Cross, and DinaJochelson-Brodsky, who

became the first trained female North Pacific anthropologist, with a German Ph.D. on the physical anthropology of Native women in Siberia (1906). The outstanding role of local JNPE participants, such as George

Hunt and James Teit, was not fully recognized until

]00 YEARS/ EVALUATING ACCOMPLISHMENTS
recently (see Berman 200 1 ; Wickwire, this volume). What

then had been started as merely an array of enthusiastic students and self-made local experts is now unani- mously viewed as a team of professional "super-stars.

"

Over the years following the expedition, the JNPE

members also trained students of their own, and some

of these students built successful careers in expanding

and developing thejesup Expedition's legacy. The postJesup students of Boas—from Kroeber to Coldenweiser

to Sapir to de Laguna—eventually became the single

most powerful intellectual cohort in the history of North

American anthropology (Darnell 2001 ). Their exposure

to, and enrichment by, the Jesup-era experience of their

mentor, as well as his influence on the selection of

their Ph.D. research, has hardly been explored and re- mains to be documented.

The educational impact of the Jesup Expedition

experience upon the later anthropological research in

Siberia was even more striking. Here, the scientific "genealogies" leading from Boas and his JNPE Russian partners have been quite visible (Krupnik 1998:205-6).

During the 1920s, the two Russian members of the JNPE project, Waldemar Bogoras and Leo Shternberg,

trained dozens of younger Russian anthropology students, who followed the Boasian/Jesup Expedition intellectual paradigm that combined ethnology, linguistics, folklore and museum collecting within small and

well-defined research areas. These "post-Jesup" disciples

shaped the new face of Siberian ethnography. Many

were sent to the field to survey the areas and Native

groups once charted by their teachers from the first Je- sup generation. Erukhim Kreinovich (1 904-84) took up

Shternberg's work among the Nivkh on Sakhalin Island; Alexander Forshtein (1 904-68) was sent by Bogoras to study the Siberian Yupik in Chukotka; Sergei Stebnitskii (1906-42) worked among the Reindeer Koryak once surveyed by Jochelson; and Nikolai Shnakenburg

(1 907-4 1 ) studied the Chukchi of the northern Chukchi

Peninsula, who had not been reached in 1900-1 by

Bogoras on his JNPE tour (Krupnik 1998: 207). Others

surveyed the arctic and inland portions of Siberia.

Altogether, approximately 70-80 Russian scholars were active in studies of the cultures, languages,

and prehistory of Siberian Native populations during

the 1 930s (Krupnik 1 998:207). Almost all of them were

born between the years 1895 and 1910; the pattern

of anthropological fieldwork and research they fol- lowed was inspired, at least in some way, by the

Bogoras-Shternberg brand of field and theoretical an- thropology (also known as the "Leningrad School" of

Siberian ethnography). Though never acknowledged

in Russia as a Boasian or a Jesup Expedition legacy, it

strongly influenced the field of Russian and Soviet Siberian studies for almost 40 years. Unfortunately,

most of these post-Jesup students of Bogoras and

Shternberg became World War II military and civilian

casualties, as well as victims of the earlier political

purges of the 1930s (Krupnik 1998; Reshetov 1994,

1995a, 1995b, 2002).

JNPE as an Archive of Native Cultural Re- sources

The need to document Native cultures and to collect

pieces of this legacy before an anticipated demise under

the expanding industrial civilization (later called "sal- vage anthropology") was clearly on the Jesup Expedition agenda. It was also one of the primary personal

concerns of its many individual participants. As Bogoras

bluntly put it, even the Chukchi, then the most vibrant

Siberian Native nation, could endure "[ojniy if left alone

by civilization. As soon as the latter comes too near,

the Chukchee must follow in the way of so many other

primitive tribes, and die" (Bogoras 1909:733).

The destructive impact of acculturation was reportedly quite obvious to the JNPE researchers on the North

American Northwest Coast and in several places in

Siberia. By vigorously collecting Native specimens, excavating sites, casting and measuring human faces and

bodies, making photographs, and documenting folklore and languages. Boas and other JNPE members es- poused the pattern of "salvage anthropology" (see

Cole and Long 1999:236-7), which was framed

I. KRUPNIK AND N. VAKHTIN
according to the professional standards and positivistic values of the time. Hence, the various artifacts of

Native legacies were to be collected, displayed, and

preserved first and foremost for the sake of expanding

academic knowledge. During the Jesup Expedition era, which was so "obsessed with objects" (cf. Jacknis

1996:194), great museums like the AMNH and the

Smithsonian were seen as the main venues for the construction of anthropological knowledge and for its dissemination to the public at large. The latter then referred to the urban educated American and European

populace. Native people were not considered as potential users of the expedition's voluminous collections and publications; at least we do not see any indications in this regard.

It took almost 1 00 years for the JNPE collections to undergo a miraculous transition. Before our own eyes,

the expedition's various contributions are being trans- formed from a "corpus of scientific data" into "objects

of bright pride" (Wardwell 1 978) and finally into a new

"cultural resource" for the Native nations of the Jesup

area. This transformation has been amply documented

by the Chiefly Feasts exhibit produced from the Jesup

Expedition Northwest Coast collections at the American Museum of Natural History Oonaitis 1 991 ). It is similarly manifested in two recent catalogs of the traveling Crossroads Alaska-Siberia exhibit (Chaussonnet

1995:7) and the AMNH centennial presentation of

the Jesup Expedition photography of 1897-1902

(Kendall etal. 1997).

This transformation, in fact, has resulted in an un- precedented (and quite unexpected) increase in the

value of the expedition's data, publications, and mu- seum collections. It was as if old papers and photographs, linguistic and folklore texts, archival manuscripts

and hundreds of anthropological data sheets acquired

additional meaning and found a new constituency. As

the JNPE materials become "new resources" inspiring

cultural revitalization of the area's Native nations, they

do not cease to be objects of anthropological and museum science. Several papers in this volume explore

2 4

these new dimensions in the modern use of Jesup-era

ethnographic collections (see chapters by Fitzhugh;

Ivanov-Unarovand Ivanova-Unarova; Loring and Vettre; and Webster, this volume). They offer an inspiring perspective on how present-day people read early descriptions of their culture; how they enjoy century-old

photographs; and how the old folklore records and museum artifacts are used to develop modern art,

school curricula, and educate children. This was something the JNPE team members then hardly had in mind,

but nevertheless, due to their dedicated work, it be- came possible now, 1 00 years after their enterprise.

Conclusion

As these and other post-JNPE achievements are brought

together as parts of a single record, we believe we

have solid ground for a centenary celebration. But be- yond the list of the Expedition's accomplishments and

shortcomings there is a certain lasting charisma to the

original JNPE project. It continues to inspire anthropology professionals and local cultural enthusiasts much

in the same way it fascinated its prospective members, sponsors. Boas' colleagues, and the public at large,

when the expedition blueprint was first unveiled more

than 100 years ago (Cole 2001; Vakhtin 2001).

From a modern perspective, one could see the JNPE

as a fascinating experiment in scholarly planning and a

scientist's once-in-a-lifetime dream. For the first (and

in fact, the only) time during his long career, Franz Boas secured ample resources, an excellent team,

and the institutional support he needed to carry

out a research plan he could design, supervise, and

deliver almost exclusively at his discretion.' It also offered him a unique opportunity to project his personal

vision of anthropology, the "Americanist" tradition, in Regna Darnell's term (Darnell 2001 :1 0-20) on a multiyear research enterprise, and to advertise that vision in

the international scientific arena. That was an appeal

of tremendous power. Today one can still feel the

project's magnetism as palpably as many people did

1 00 years ago.

100 YEARS/ EVALUATING ACCOMPLISHMENTS
However, even the best-designed dreams rarely come true. The JNPE project eventually fell victim to

the intellectual battle Boas fought throughout his entire academic career. Since his early professional years,

he argued fervently in favor of a clear-cut distinction between two major approaches (or methods) in scientific research—one advocating the search for general

laws and the other aimed at scrupulous adherence to

facts. In several of his papers Boas repeatedly called

this distinction an opposition between the "comparative" and the "historical" method of inquiry (Boas 1 896,

1 940:2 7 1 -7), or the one between the "physicists" and

the "cosmographers" (Boas 1887, 1 940:642-^3; Jacknis

1 996:1 86-88; Stocking 1 996:5). And he made it clear

that he sought his own place firmly in the cosmographers' camp.

This vigorous academic partisanship was quickly

challenged by and tested against the very format of

the JNPE project. Boas was charged to design what we would call today the "JNPE overall program," including a project justification and fieldwork outline. Toward this end. Boas the physicist offered promises

that were tempting to prospective sponsors and public audience, because of the unprecedented general

implications of research he suggested (such as to "discover the origin and early history of the native American race"). Ironically, under the same scenario, Boas the cosmographer was assigned to develop a field pro- gram and to supervise the process of research, data

collecting, and publication down to the minute detail.

This worked well for the five years of field surveys and

for publication of the expedition's reports and its vari- ous collected materials—until the cosmographer was

pushed towards his last challenge: project synthesis

and historical generalization.

For Boas this must have been a tormenting experience, since he was destined to overstep the very principles he zealously advocated for almost two decades.

As he himself urged just one year before the Jesup

Expedition began and in citing the very Native cultures

of Alaska and Siberia it was supposed to survey, "[o]nly

when definite results have been obtained in regard to

this area [i.e., small and well-defined individual territories that form the basis of study—I.K., N.V.] is it permissible to extend the horizon beyond its limits; but the

greatest care must be taken not to proceed too hastily in this" (Boas 1896, 1940:277). With hindsight, we

must conclude that nothing in the expedition's volu- minous data rendered any assurance that the results

obtained were "definite," that "extensions beyond the

horizon" were now permissible, and that any move

toward generalization would not be "too hasty."

On the contrary, each Native culture studied and

each area covered by the JNPE revealed its never-ending story of cultural complexity and historical depth. It

is not surprising that Boas became increasingly reluctant to jump into extensive comparative speculation

across the North Pacific area.* He did produce several

short summaries of the expedition's results and/or some

broad overviews of the North Pacific cultural prehistory (Boas 1903, 1905, 1910, 1925, 1928, 1933). But he continuously procrastinated and, as we believe,

finally abandoned the idea of a concluding general

volume for the Jesup Expedition series, which he had

promised to Morris Jesup as a key component of the

project (Cole 2001 :42-3,48).'' To Boas this was by no means an intellectual failure but rather a deliberate

evasion, for he had once again realized that "[t]he solid work is still all before us" (Boas 1896, 1940:280). He

simply left the task to those who might possess better data and more extensive knowledge in the future

that is, to us.

Thus, the Jesup Centenary Conference of 1 997 and

this volume of proceedings marks just one more step

in the ongoing re-evaluation of the unique Boasian

design of the JNPE project. The very list of the confer- ence participants, which included ethnologists, linguists,

physical anthropologists, archaeologists, folklorists,

natural scientists, and museum curators; Americans,

Canadians, Russians, Japanese, and Europeans; professional academics. Native researchers, cultural workers,

and community leaders, was a roster with a distinctly

I. KRUPNIK AND N. VAKHTIN
Boasian outlook. As their papers presented here reveal, there is hardly any present-day inquiry concerning the peoples and cultures of the North Pacific area

that does not bear, in one way or another, an imprint

of the Jesup Expedition—whether it deals with Native

ethnic traditions, physical anthropology, myths, culture transformation, prehistoric relationships, cultural

objects, historical photography or museum collections.

Indeed, we have good cause to celebrate the centenary of the Boas' Jesup North Pacific Expedition and a memory of the person who introduced such a powerful model to anthropological science.

Acknowledgements

A shorter version of this paper was delivered as the opening address to the Jesup Expedition Centenary

conference in 1 997. We are grateful to William Fitzhugh,

Ira Jacknis, Sergei Kan, Laurel Kendall, Julia Kupina, and

William Sturtevant for their critical comments and helpful

suggestions. This paper as well as earlier historiographic

studies of the Jesup Expedition's legacy is an outgrowth

of the Jesup 2 program initiated in 1992.

Notes

1 . The list of contracted (enlisted) participants on thejesup Expedition includes: Franz Boas

(1858-1942), Alexandr Axelrod (1879-1945),

Waldemar Bogoras (1865-1936), Norman C. Buxton (1872-?), Roland Dixon (1875-1934),

Livingston Farrand (1867-1939), Gerard Fowke

(1855-1933), George Hunt (1854-1933), Filipp

Jacobsen, Waldemar Jochelson (1855-1937),

Berthold Laufer (1 873-1 934), John Swanton (1 873-

1 958), James Teit (1 864-1 922). Mrs. Sofia Bogoras

and Dina Jochelson-Brodsky (1 864-1 941 ) accompanied their husbands in the field and participated

in collecting and research activities; Dina

Jochelson's contribution was critical for the

expedition's success in physical anthropology and

photography in Siberia. Oregon C. Hastings, a pro- fessional photographer from Victoria, made doz- ens of photographs for the expedition in 1897;

Charles F. Newcombe, another Victoria resident,

participated in collecting and coastal surveys in

1 897 and 1 900. Frederic W. Putnam (1 839-1 91 5) officially supervised the project at the AMNH during the years 1897-98. Leo Shternberg (1861-

1927) and Bruno Oetteking (1 87 1 -1 960) joined

the JNPE publication program after the completion of fieldwork. Several people—local guides,

interpreters. Native informants, recruited dog-team

drivers, and local officers—accompanied JNPE team

members on their surveys across Siberia and North

America, though few are specially acknowledged

(see also Kan, this volume).

2. Haida, Tsimshian, KwakiutI (Kwakwaka'wakw), Heiltsuk, Bella Coola (Nuxalk),

Chilkotin, Nootka (Nuu-chah-nulth), Lilooet

(Sta'atl'imx), Thompson (NIaka'pamux), Quileute,

Chinook, Chemakum, and Quinault, with the

later addition of the Aleut, Tlingit, Shasta, and

Maidu.

3. Chukchi, Yupik/Asiatic Eskimo, Koryak,

Even (Tungus), Itelmen (Kamchadal), Yukagir, Russian Creole, Nivkh (Gilyak), Nanay (Gold), and Sakha

(Yakut), with three more nations, Ainu, Orok (Uilta), and Negidal visited on shorter trips.

4. Co-authored papers and volumes were the

only component of modern team work that was

missing in the JNPE publications, with the exception of two volumes of KwakiutI texts that had

both Boas' and Hunt's names on the cover, and a few minor pieces by Boas incorporated into contributions by Smith, Teit, and Jochelson. Even the

husband-wife field team of Waldemar and Dina

Jochelson did not publish anything under their two

names.

5. This can be seen from a letterhead printed on several of Jochelson's letters and field reports

from Siberia (now at the AMNH): Siberian Department of thejesup North Pacific Expedition fitted out by the American Museum of Natural History

with the assistance of the Russian Imperial Academy of Sciences and the Russian Imperial Geographic Society.

6. The best known example was Julia

Averkieva's fieldwork with Boas among the

KwakiutI in 1930-31 (Averkieva and Sherman

1 992). Averkieva (1 946: 1 02) mentioned five Russian anthropology students who went on ex- change fellowships to the U.S. in 1929. At least three American anthropologists and anthropology

students—Roy Barton, Emanuel Gonick, a former

]00 YEARS/ EVALUATING ACCOMPLISHMENTS
student of Kroeber, and Archie Phinney, a Native

American student of Boas—were studying or worl<- ing in Leningrad during the 1 930s on international

research fellowships arranged by Boas and

Bogoras (Krupnik 1 998; Willard 2000).

7. Thus, the Jesup Expedition has been rightly

credited as one of the stepping stones in what was called "The Boasian Anthropological Survey

Tradition" (Cole and Long 1999:234). All postulated tenets of this approach—anti-evolutionism;

the tilt toward diffusionist interpretations; the ethics of salvage ethnology; the collection of folk- lore and linguistic texts; the famous "four-field" focus of fieldwork; and the primary role of trained

professionals (ibid:234-6)—were amply displayed

in the JNPE organization, fieldwork, and publications.

8. Regna Darnell (2001:43) made a similar

point in her evaluation of the general shift in Boas' vision of anthropology that took place around

1905, obviously, or at least partly, as a result of

the JNPE experience. "Early in his career, perhaps

as a carry-over from his scientific training in physics and geography. Boas emphasized the possibility, albeit at some unspecified future time, of

arriving at "laws governing the growth of culture" (Boas 1 898b:2). [...]When laws analogous to those

of the natural sciences failed to emerge. Boas re- treated to a deconstructionist rhetoric of what

he considered premature generalizations distort- ing the increasing body of ethnographic data

against which potential "laws" could be tested

(see Boas 1906:642).

9. The plan to provide a summary report of

the JNPE surveys was first announced by Boas in his paper delivered at the Thirteenth International

Congress of Americanists (1 902). According to his plan, this would be accomplished as the final vol- ume of the Jesup Expedition series. It was featured

several times as "Volume 12. Summary and Final Results" on the cover pages of the subsequent

volumes under the Jesup Expedition series published during the 1 900s and 1 91 Os. The last time

it was mentioned in 1930 as the "forthcoming

Pt.3 of Vol. 1 1" ("Summary and Final Results") on

the cover page of Volume 1 1 , Pt. 1 (Oetteking

1 930). This summary volume was obviously never produced and probably never even started.

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I. KRUPNIK AND N. VAKHTIN

Ti^e 5o-Ca!!ec] "Hski'mo Wedge":

/\ (^enturtj after Jesup

DON E. DUMOND

A central accomplishment of the Jesup North Pacific

Expedition was the demonstration of systematic cultural similarities among Asian and American peoples

around the northern coastline of the Pacific Ocean.

Folklore, in particular, suggested a continuity from

Northwest Coast Indian groups on the east to PaleoAsiatic Siberian people such as Chukchi, Itelmen, and

Koryak on the west—but a continuity seemingly interrupted by Eskimo in Alaska and around Bering Strait. Bogoras (1902:670) and then Jochelson (1908:359-

60) were evidently the first to use the term "wedge" in

inferring a late intrusion of these Eskimo people to split

apart a formerly unbroken chain of the North Pacific

peoples, and both continued in this conception (e.g., Bogoras 1 925:225-26; Jochelson 1928:53-4).

Whoever actually originated this vision. Boas (e.g.,

1 905:98-9) found it to harmonize with his own previously expressed conviction that the Eskimo people

had moved to the Bering and Chukchi seas from a

place of origin farther east in North America (Boas

1 888:39). Thus, he remarked that:

So far as the available material allows us to judge, it would seem that the similarities between the Eskimo and the North Pacific Coast Indians are unimportant as compared

to the similarities between the Koryak and

Chukchee and these Indians. We must infer from these facts that the Eskimo are new

arrivals on the Pacific side of America, and

that they interrupted, at an early period, the communication between the Siberian and

Indian tribes (Boas 1905:98-9).

And the theme was set.

Bogoras (1 925:224-34) and Jochelson (1 908:358-

9) were more noncommittal with regard to a point of

origin for this "Eskimo wedge." Nevertheless, the cus- tom of arguing over American versus Asian origins of

the Eskimo and related Aleut peoples is an old one

(see, for example, summaries in Collins 1937:1-13,

1 95 1 :423-25) that has continued into recent decades.

At the same time, there is a shared opinion that the

historic Eskimo possessed the most successful of all

aboriginal adaptations to the winter-frozen seas lying

between northeast Asia and northwestern North

America. Bogoras, the ethnographer, for instance, belittled both Itelmen (Kamchadal) and coastal Koryak

when contrasted with Asiatic Eskimo in that regard

(Bogoras 1925:217, 226).

The notion of a wedge-like movement of Eskimo

to Bering Strait, however, was arrived at by Jesup researchers not only without direct field study of Alas- kan Eskimo people, but also in the complete absence

of any archaeological information pertaining to the Es- kimo region of Siberia and America. To cast light on

the development of Eskimo culture and of this postulated "wedge," I examine presently available archaeological evidence both of ancient linkages across the northernmost extension of the Pacific and of the de- velopment of that northern maritime adaptation which

the Eskimo people so well exemplified.

The Terminal Pleistocene

As is well known, there is no consensus regarding the

time and circumstance of the initial peopling of the

3 3
New World—generally presumed to have been by way

of the Pleistocene-age Beringian land platform that

united Asia and America when seas were lower. There

is more agreement that by sometime before 10,000

radiocarbon years ago,' when the Beringian platform

began to flood by rising waters that would form the

Bering and Chukchi seas (Elias et al. 1992; Fairbanks

1989), terrestrial hunters of pronouncedly Asian cast were present in what is now Alaska. These chippers of

blades, of bladelets ("microblades") pushed from small wedge-shaped cores, and of a few bifaces or spearpoint-like implements, have been referred to as the American Paleo-Arctic cultural tradition (Anderson 1 968,

1970), and in central Alaska to the Denali complex

(e.g., West 1 967, 1 996:546-7). In Northeast Asia (Fig.

5), the technological analog has been most commonly

termed the Diuktai culture, which was well represented

in the Lena River drainage a number of millennia before 10,000 years ago (Mochanov 1977; Mochanov and

Fedose'eva 1 984, 1 996), and at partly concurrent times

as far east as the territory of Russian coastal Primorye

[Far Eastern Maritime Region - ed.] (Larichev et al. 1 992),

as well as Hokkaido (Aikens and Higuchi 1982),

Sakhalin Island (Larichev et al. 1 992; Vasil'evskii 1 996),

Kamchatka Peninsula (Dikov 1977, 1996) and the

Chukotka (Chukchi) Peninsula (Dikov 1 993).^

In both Northeast Asia and Alaska this stage was

followed by, or developed into, another stage in which

somewhat broader blades were derived from less formally restricted cores, and bifaces were normally lacking (Ackerman 1 992; Mochanov 1 977; Mochanov and

Fedose'eva 1984). In Siberia this Sumnagin culture is dated as early as 1 0,000 years ago (Mochanov and

Fedose'eva 1984). In America the comparable manifestation is present by 8000 years ago, and perhaps some centuries earlier, at which time it would appear

that communication with Asia was continuing. People

of this stamp and perhaps their microblade-making

predecessors were present along the shores of the North Pacific in what is now southeastern Alaska

(Ackerman 1 992, with many references). Although faunal remains are scarce, one of the sites there has yielded

remains of mollusks and of both ocean and freshwater

fishes, in levels dated about 8200 years ago (Ackerman

et al. 1985).

By this time, also, there were people occupying

the Anangula Blade site, located on what is now an

islet near the coast of present Umnak Island, one of

the two largest of the Fox group of the eastern Aleutians (Aigner 1 978; Laughlin 1 975). It has been argued

that this location was already insular at the time of

occupation (Black 1 974). Although that view has been

challenged (Thorson and Hamilton 1 986), the site was

clearly positioned at the ocean edge on either an island or a salient peninsula. Again, significant faunal re- mains are lacking, but the extreme edgewater location alone is enough to suggest subsistence attention

to the seacoast.^

In Asia, however, sites of the same period appear

to have been oriented consistently toward terrestrial

resources. Although trade in obsidian from Hokkaido

through Sakhalin Island developed to its highest

point after the two land masses were separated by

the flooding of the strait between them (Vasil'evskii

1996), suggesting an ability to make serious use of

watercraft well before 7000 years ago, there is no

locational or faunal evidence of any serious focus on

marine resources (Yaroslav V. Kuz'min, personal communication, 1 997).

Whatever the case for communication between

Asia and America in the two or three millennia following the end of the Pleistocene, by about 6000 years ago paths between Alaska and Chukotka (Chukchi Peninsula) were closed by rising seas that established ocean currents in substantially their present pattern

through Bering Strait. At this date the earliest Neolithic cultures of Siberia (Mochanov and Fedos-e'eva

1984) show no resemblance to what, in the then

deglaciated northwestern America, is called the

Northern Archaic tradition (Anderson 1968), or to

the Ocean Bay tradition of the north Pacific shore

around Kodiak Island (D. Clark 1979).

100 YEARS/ THE "ESKIMO WEDGE"
Nevertheless, at this same time there are clear indications of an improved adaptation to the coast of the

North Pacific in Asia as well as in North America. Significantly, in both cases such advances occur south of

the region in which sea ice forms in winter. In Northeast Asia, the best information proceeds from the north- ernmost Japanese island of Hokkaido, where shell- mounds that may date as early as 7000 years ago

6000 years ago (David Yesner, personal communication, 1 997), although comparable sites are not known

to be numerous in the region for another two millennia

(Yaroslav V. Kuz'min, personal communication, 1997;

see articles in Vostretsov 1 998). All of these Asian sites, however, are south of 45° north latitude and more than

3000 km from the nearest point in Asia that was occupied by historically known Eskimo.

yield vertebrate fauna including sea lion, fur seal, dolphin, and whale (Nishimoto 1988; Okada 1998). By

6000 years before present some Hokkaido people were deriving as much as 50 percent of their dietary

protein from marine sources (Minagawa and Akazawa

1992). The great majority of relevant Hokkaido sites

are on coasts open all year, although one or two lie on

the northern shore, which is icebound in winter. On

the perennially open coast of Primorye [Russian Far

Eastern 'Maritime Region' - ed.] near Vladivostok, the

site of Boisman 2 (Popov et al. 1 995) has yielded a

substantial marine fauna possibly dated as much as

In America, the southern limit of icebound coasts

lies much farther north. Near Kodiak Island, at latitude

57", seas are open all winter, and sites dating shortly

after 6000 years ago have yielded not only plentiful

barbed harpoon heads, but faunal remains of harbor

seal, porpoise, sea otter, and Steller sea lion, as well as

shorebirds, waterfowl, and albatross, and fishes such

as cod, salmon, and halibut (C.H. Clark 1 977; Dumond

1998a). By 5500 years ago or shortly thereafter, an analogous complex was present along the open-water seas of the eastern Aleutians, at both Umnak and

Unalaska Islands of the Fox Island group, with remains

D. E. DUMOND
of seal, cod, and halibut at the latter (Davis 2001;

Knecht and Davis 2001; Knecht et al. 200); Yesner and Mack 1998). In contrast to contemporary maritime-related sites in Asia, these are some ten degrees

and a thousand kilometers farther north, and both are

within the region occupied by Eskimo-Aleut people at

the time of first contact with Europeans in the 18th

century.

Further, according to evidence now available, the

period following those first unmistakable indications

of maritime proficiency saw the peopling of the Aleutian Islands west of the Fox Islands group. This is indicated by a substantial body of radiometric dates, including many obtained by the U.S. Bureau of Indian

Affairs in the course of investigations pursuant to the

Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act. The pattern developed is one of human passage into the island chain

from east to west. After dates from the Fox Islands of 5500 years ago and earlier, multiple dates from

Amchitka in the Rat group of islands indicate occupation probably well before 4000 radiocarbon years ago, on Agattu and Shemya in the Near Islands by about

2600 years ago (Dumond 2001:301-2).^ The material

culture of all islands sampled is characterized by a variety of sea-hunting artifacts of organic materials including both barbed and toggling harpoons, many

with chipped stone insets; it also includes lip orna- ments or labrets, oil-burning lamps, and many other

implements chipped from stone (e.g., McCartney 1 984).

In short, this was a culture with unmistakable affinities

to that of the ethnographically known Aleut people,

as well as with many parallels with the lifeway of Es- kimo people farther north. Whatever the case with the

earliest inhabitants of the Umnak region 8000 years

ago, for at least the past 4500 years the record of

continuity in the Aleutian Islands is unmistakable.

In summary, it seems evident that even the Near

Islands were reached no less than 2600 radiocarbon

years ago, and perhaps considerably earlier. Despite

the lack of extensive faunal remains in small collections derived from a number of these tests, such re3 6

mains from the more extensive investigations, together

with the isolated insular character of the western Aleutians, confirm a mature maritime subsistence.

Behind the Ice-Fast Shores of Asia

North of the southern limit of sea ice, however, progress toward full utilization of the seacoast was slower. In

Asia, between 5000 and 3000 radiocarbon years ago

various Neolithic peoples had begun to move closer

to the coasts on Sakhalin Island and around the Sea of

Okhotsk, including the lower reaches of the Amur River,

and they spread into the interior hinterland of the north- western coast of the Bering Sea south of the Chukchi

Peninsula. These various "Neolithic" peoples, some of

whom now used ceramics while others did not, were

characterized by subsistence pursuits that emphasized

river fishing or the hunting of terrestrial animals. Whereas some of these folk did visit the seacoast, their use of

marine resources was evidently seasonal and sporadic,

forming no major focus of subsistence effort (Dumond

and Bland 1995, with references).

It was several centuries after 3000 years ago that

these seasonally ice-bound Asian regions first saw

peoples who made more serious use of the ocean

shore, establishing permanent settlements by the sea,

using implements such as toggling harpoons, and depending significantly on sea mammals and ocean fishes,

although in many cases being still seasonally interested

in the interior. The newer coastal peoples included

those of the Susuia culture of southern Sakhalin Island

(Shubin and Shubina 1 984; Vasil'evskii 1 996), which is

seen by some researchers as an initial stage of the

maritime Okhotsk culture, by others as a local predecessor; and they included those of the Tokarev culture

of the northern Okhotsk Sea (Lebedintsev 1990), and

of the Early Lakhtin culture of the Bering Sea coast (Orekhov 1 987). The appearance of these cultures was

fairly closely contemporary, between about 2700 and

2500 years ago. By 2000 years ago or not long after,

they were followed, respectively, by the Ozersk stage

of the Okhotsk culture, by the Old Koryak culture, and

100 YEARS/ THE "ESKIMO WEDGE"
by the "Paleometal" stage of the Lakhtin culture, all of which involved still more developed adaptations to

the coasts that freeze in winter (for tabulations of relevant dates, see Dumond and Bland 1995).

Nevertheless, as with the ethnographic Itelmen and

Koryak referred to by Bogoras, even those further de- velopments fell short of the Eskimo adaptation to the

icy coasts. For instance, of even the closest Lakhtinculture neighbors of the Eskimo, Dikov (1 979:256) re- marked that the bone and ivory technology was not

as a rule comparable to that found in early Eskimo

sites of the Bering Strait region. And on the coasts of

the Chukchi Peninsula later occupied by identifiable Eskimo people, he found no indications of any pre- Eskimo occupations exhibiting a maritime adaptation

comparable to those farther south just mentioned (Dikov

1993; see also Dumond and Bland 1995:430-4, with

references).'^

And the Frozen Coasts of America

In America, an analog of the a-ceramic Neolithic cultures of the east Russian interior appeared as the Arctic Small Tool tradition, which by 4000 years ago had

spread across northernmost Canada to Greenland.

These first people to inhabit the immediate hinterland

of the northernmost American coastline made use of

river and lake fish and terrestrial animals—especially

the caribou—and made seasonal visits to the coast,

for example for spring sealing (Maxwell 1 985:84-90).

Long known by researchers in Alaska as the Denbigh

Flint complex dating from times no earlier than 4200

years ago, recent work on the Seward Peninsula has

produced apparent Arctic Small Tool occupations

dated about 4700 years ago (Harritt 1 994:21 2, 217).

The specific place of origin of these newly appearing

people is not yet known, but the evidence presently

available strongly favors immigration from Asia. Al- though without ceramics, the stone assemblage of

the Denbigh Flint complex includes nothing that is unknown in various northeast Asian Neolithic cultures

(see, for instance, Irving 1 970), and it has been compared especially to elements of the Bel'kachi Neolithic

of the Lena River basin in northeastern Siberia (e.g.. Powers and Jordan 1 990). At the very least, then, the

Arctic Small Tool tradition appears to represent the

beginning of a second period in which contact be- tween Asia and America is attested. And this time,

with the rise in seas that had covered the former

Beringian land bridge, where currents move steadily

from south to north at a speed sufficient to disrupt

winter ice and render travel across it hazardous, the

contact must have been largely through open water.

In regions near the coast, this American culture vanished or was superseded by 3600 years ago in the

northwest, 500 years later in the southwest (Anderson

1984; Dumond 1984), although vestiges appear to have persisted for several centuries in some inland Alas- kan locations (e.g., Irving 1 964; Kunz 1 977). It was not

long after this disappearance in the north that the first

evidence of a people with an unmistakable marine subsistence focus is found in the Kotzebue Sound region.

On the beach numbered 53 at Cape Krusenstern on

the northern shore of the sound, a single settlement

yielding remains of a culture termed "Old Whaling" is

dated at about 3200 years ago. Five semi-subterra- nean houses and five more superficial camp or house

traces are interpreted as winter and summer dwellings

occupied for a short period, perhaps no more than a

single year. Chipped stone implements, stone lamps,

two pieces of polished slate, and a single toggling

harpoon head occur with seal bones, walrus ivory, and

a few bones of caribou. Whale debris is plentiful in the

vicinity (Ciddings and Anderson 1986, chapter 12); whether the people of the little settlement were themselves whalers or whether the whalebone in and around

the houses represents scavenged animals is not certain, but clearly they were deriving the bulk of their

subsistence from the sea (see Mason and Cerlach 1 995).

The origin of the people represented in this short- term settlement is undetermined. Although their artifacts have been compared by some researchers to

the much smaller collection from the site known as

D. E. DUMOND
Chertov Ovrag or Devil's Gorge, on Wrangel Island in

the Siberian sector of the Chukchi Sea (e.g., Ackerman

1984), which also yielded a single toggling harpoon

head and is dated at almost exactly the same time

(Dikov 1 988; Shilo et al. 1 979), no other Asian analog

is known. Rather, the only area anywhere in the vicinity of the Bering and Chukchi seas that at this date was demonstrably home to a significant population

of humans with specialized dependence on the seacoast is the Aleutian Islands and the adjacent northern

Gulf of Alaska. As indicated earlier, by this date the

Aleutians were certainly settled as far west as the Rat

Islands, and ancestral Aleut people may already have

reached the Near Islands. And as noted elsewhere

(Dumond 2000), contemporary stone assemblages of

the eastern Aleutian Islands and of the Old Whaling

settlement are not so dissimilar as to rule out a source

of the latter somewhere in these same Aleutians Islands. Of significance here, also, is the conclusion of

the linguist Knud Bergsland (1986) that the length of

separation between Aleut and Eskimo languages is

not more than about 3000 years. In other words, the

linguistic separation occurred at approximately the time

the Old Whaling settlement appeared.

Three thousand to 2700 years ago also dates the appearance of the Choris culture, again known principally from the region around Kotzebue Sound, but with

possible outliers as far east as the Mackenzie River

delta in northwest Arctic Canada (Sutherland 1 997).

The largest site collections include not only plentiful chipped stone implements, but other artifacts

strongly reminiscent of open-coastal Alaska to the

south: stone lamps, labrets, barbed harpoons, and

a modicum of ground slate. A few forms are comparable to those of the Old Whaling predecessors at Cape Krusenstern (Ciddings and Anderson 1 986, chapters 1 0, 1 1 ). The south Alaskan characteristics of these

two earliest of the maritime-focused people of north

Alaska, coupled with evidence of continuity in the

Aleutians and the Kodiak region and the relationship

between the two language families, Aleutian and

Eskimoan, seem to argue for a largely American origin for the later Eskimo.

But during this Choris period the first ceramics ap- peared on the American coast. Impressed on the surface with a paddle wrapped with cords or scored with

parallel linear grooves, these are clearly Asian in stimulus and reminiscent of ceramics reported from late

Neolithic sites of eastern Chukotka dating after 3000

years ago (Dikov 1993:1 51-2). Thus, although a clear

suggestion of southern Alaskan derivation appears in

this successor to the Old Whaling culture, there is evi- dence at least equally clear of contact across Bering

Strait. Meanwhile, as mentioned earlier, aspects of the

Arctic Small Tool tradition apparently continued in inland Alaskan regions to the east. Not long after 2500 years ago, and thus essentially contemporary with the earliest Okhotsk, Tokarev,

and Lakhtin cultures of the Asian shore, the Alaskan

coast north- and eastward from the Alaska Peninsula

at least as far as the present western border of Canada

(MacNeish 1 956) had become territory of people of Norton culture, who in northwestern Alaska have also been referred to as Near Ipiutak (Larsen and Rainey

1948). These people used linear- or check-stamped

ceramics still of northeast Asian type, as well as toggling harpoon heads of bone or antler; stone lamps for

burning sea mammal oil, lip ornaments, and polished

implements in the plentiful inventory of stone tools are

particularly reminiscent of southern Alaska. In all, characteristics of their sites show their strong interest in

the seacoast both as a subsistence area and as a

location for settlements, while they nevertheless still

harvested interior resources such as caribou and fresh- water fish (Dumond 1 982, 1 984). In this, they provide an obvious analog to the contemporary and semimaritime Tokarev and Lakhtin cultures of the Bering

and Okhotsk seas south of the Chukchi Peninsula, but

a much less close similarity in settlement and subsistence to those more landlocked contemporary Chukotkans whose sites have been reported thus far from

that peninsula itself.

100 YEARS/ THE "ESKIMO WEDGE"
In the Alaskan northwest, not long after 2000 years ago Norton or Near Ipiutak gave way to the Ipiutak

culture, of a seasonally coastal people with utilitarian

artifacts reminiscent of those of Norton culture, but who did not use either ceramics or oil lamps, and who

are known especially for their elaborate art of apparent Asian affinity (Larsen and Rainey 1948). In south- western Alaska, on the other hand, later stages of

Norton culture endured until nearly 1 000 years ago

(Dumond 1982, 1984). In both north and south, however, a significant proportion of the tool productions

of Norton people, like those of the Ipiutak site, have

been compared to artifacts included within the Arctic

Small Tool tradition. In the north, indeed, Anderson

expands the classificatory Arctic Small Tool tradition

to include not only the local Denbigh Flint complex,

but succeeding Choris, Norton-Near Ipiutak, and Ipiutak

as well (e.g., Ciddings and Anderson 1986:292-300).

Although such expansion has seemed unnecessary in

the south, typological continuity there is evident (e.g., Dumond 1 981 :1 83). Suffice it to say that the Nortonrelated cultures in their development drew evidently

from the Arctic Small Tool tradition as well as from

prototypes on the Alaskan Pacific coast and in Asia.

This is what one can reasonably term a continuation

and development of the second period of prehistoric

contact across Bering Strait.

The Appearance of Eskimo Maritime Culture

It is in this milieu that the heavily sea-mammal-oriented

Eskimo culture of the Bering Strait region appeared,

and this in turn had a decisive impact on the character

of all later Eskimo people. At present date, no direct

progenitor is recognized to have been spread throughout the portion of the Bering Strait region that was to come under Eskimo occupation. On the Seward Peninsula of the American side of Bering Strait there is evi- dence of the one-time presence of bearers of Norton

culture (e.g., Ciddings and Anderson 1986; Harritt

1 994), although no large sites on that peninsula north

of Cape Nome (Bockstoce 1 979) have been seriously

excavated. Nor is there a clear indication there of an

actual transition between Norton people and the later

maritime Eskimo, despite the designation of Ipiutak

and related folk as "Paleo-Eskimo" (e.g., Larsen and

Rainey 1 948: 1 82-3, using the term "Palae-Eskimo"). Typological continuity between Norton and later sites

has been claimed in regions bordering the southern

Bering Sea (Dumond 1 98 1 : 1 84), and overall continuity

and a transition between them is indeed demonstrated

with seeming conclusiveness in the low-lying lands be- tween the Kuskokwim and Yukon River mouths (Shaw

1 983); but these are well south of Seward Peninsula. On the eastern Chukchi Peninsula, as well as on the major islands in and near Bering Strait, no sites analo- gous to those of the semi-maritime Norton have been

reported. And yet this is where the maritime-oriented

Old Bering Sea and Okvik cultures seem to have appeared full-blown. However, my own recent examination of the material from the original Okvik site on one

of the small Punuk Islands located a short distance off

the east coast of St. Lawrence Island, showed five of

the sixty-three potsherds recovered to be of standard

Norton check-stamped type, the remainder plain or

bearing the expanded linear-stamp markings characteristic of the Old Bering Sea culture as it is known

from St. Lawrence Island. These few Norton potsherds

may suggest contact or a one-time Norton presence on the island, although the evidence of either is marginal, to say the least.

With regard to the version of Norton culture that was so plentiful on the Bering Sea coast of Alaska,

there is reason to suggest that its early stages were

not directly ancestral to the ensuing early Eskimo culture of St. Lawrence Island or, presumably, of that of

the nearby Chukotka littoral. Significantly, the decorated ceramics of the early Old Bering Sea and apparently the Okvik cultures, confined to the Bering Strait

islands and along the nearby Asian coastal fringe, are stamped with linear impressions somewhat broader

than, but reminiscent of, Choris and Near Ipiutak

pots, as well as of some early Norton linear-stamped

D. E. DUMOND
ceramics of the typesite of Norton culture located on

the shore of Norton Bay (Ciddings 1 964; Giddings and

Anderson 1 986; Larsen and Rainey 1 948)—that is, sites

generally north of the major Norton heartland of south- west Alaska. Apparently similar also are some ceramics of late Neolithic sites of the Chukchi Peninsula interior (Dikov 1 993: 1 5 1 -52). Lip ornaments or labrets, so common in Norton collections from the American coast

of the Bering Sea but possibly somewhat less so north

of Bering Strait, are lacking entirely in the early Old Bering

Sea-Okvik collections, notwithstanding the interpretation of Dikov (1979:1 70) that some Okvik anthropomorphic carvings illustrate the wearing of labrets in

addition to facial tattoos. These characteristics, like

evidence for some use of iron in Okvik-Old Bering Sea and Ipiutak collections (Arutiunov and Bronshtein 1 993:

67-8; Collins 1 937:1 46; Cusev and Zhilin 2002; Larsen and Rainey 1 948:83; Semenov 1 964), suggest an axis

of connection that ran through Bering Strait between

Chukotka and northwestern Alaska, placing the early

St. Lawrence Island and some Asian coastal people

somewhat closer in material culture to northern than

to southern Alaska, despite linguistic classifications that appear to align them more closely to Eskimoan Yupik

speakers of the Alaskan south (e.g., Woodbury 1 984).

Regarding the chronology of the developed Bering

Strait cultures—that is, those to which the term "wedge"

has been especially applied—there has been disagreement concerning the temporal relationship of Okvik

and early Old Bering Sea, with some researchers assigning temporal priority to Okvik (e.g., Dikov 1979:

1 75; Giddings 1 960), others denying it (e.g., Alekseev

et al. 1 972; Arutiunov and Sergeev 1 990; Rainey and

Ralph 1959; but see also Arutiunov and Bronshtein

1993; and Bronshtein and Plumet 1995), in apparent

opposition to claims linking Okvik to the Hillside site on St. Lawrence Island and to what Collins (1937)

termed the Old Bering Sea I decorative style. My own

study of the St. Lawrence Island collections at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History and

my examination of the sites around Gambell, at the

northwest extremity of St. Lawrence Island, indicate

to me that some cultural elements excavated by

Collins from two houses at the Hillside site are the

oldest of the materials he assigned to Old Bering Sea.

In significant part these predate the Mayughwaaq

(Collins's Miyowagh) site which produced the largest corpus of his Old Bering Sea material.

This conclusion rests especially on typology of

ceramic and stone artifacts, and to some extent on

geographic position. The Hillside site near Gambel, St. Lawrence Island, while located on a geomorphically

earlier formation than the Mayughwaaq site, is physically so close to it that occupation of the latter would

almost surely have deposited material on the former.

Understanding of the culture of the Hillside site has

been complicated by the course of research there. In

1939, J. L.Giddings excavated a third house, which

then became crucial to the conclusion of Rainey (1 941

)

that Hillside was a site of the Okvik culture (then known

chiefly from a collection from one of the Punuk Islands);

although this third prehistoric house was not then published in detail. In any event, the artifact assemblage

from this Hillside House 3 of Giddings, which I analyzed in 1 994 and published recently (Dumond 1 998b),

sets it apart from the bulk of culture represented by

the Mayughwaaq site and places it firmly with the

Hillside Houses 1 and 2 of Collins, from which it differs

only in the uneven survival of decorations on harpoon

heads—five heads having been recovered from House

3, virtually none from floor associations of the Collins Houses 1 and 2. One can further assert that the decorative style of House 3 is apart from, and hence possibly earlier than, other elements of the Old Bering Sea

style as known from St. Lawrence Island, and that it

has at least some (but not total) stylistic affinity to

certain artifacts illustrated for the Punuk Island Okvik

collection (Rainey 1941). Last of all, excavations at the

site in 1 973 by Swiss archaeologists evidently cleared one house (designated House 5 in Table 1 ) that yielded

definitively Okvik-style artifacts (Blumer 2002:86-7),

though results have not yet been widely disseminated.

40 100 YEARS/ THE "ESKIMO WEDGE"
The absolute dating of the Hillside site has unfortunately not been without problems. As is generally

known, the first application of the radiocarbon method

to the Hillside site produced a determination of 2258 ± 230 years before present (C-505), but later re-dating

of a sample of the same piece of wood by presumably improved technology in a different laboratory

placed it at 1420 ± 230 B.P. (P-70). None of the other

Hillside determinations run by that second laborator\' were in excess of 1641 ±65 years ago (Ralph and

Ackerman 1961). A few years later, H.-C. Bandi

(1969:67) reported having tested a fourth house at

the Hillside site, from which he obtained a C-1 4 age of

1 370 ± 60 years; again, no full description of the excavation has been published. His subsequent dating of

graves in the Gambell area that he believed on stylistic grounds to be early does not resolve the issue (Bandi

1984; see Table 1). Finally, materials from House 5, which yielded certain Okvik-style harpoon heads, have

been dated between about 1 800 and 1 500 years ago.

In general, determinations from this and other sites

yielding material identified as Old Bering Sea have sel- dom exceeded 1 700 years before present. Notable

exceptions are dates returned on material subject to

the carbon reservoir effect of the seas and thus dating

anomalously early—sea-mammal bone or ivory, or hu- man remains that because of heavy dietary dependence on sea mammals are subject to the same skewing factor.*" And because the Bering Strait region is

generally treeless, wood used by humans in either structures or as fuel can be expected to have been obtained as driftwood, and hence to be older than its

actual use.

Table 1 shows all Old Bering Sea age determinations of which I am aware that exceed about 1 700

years, together with some other newly obtained determinations. The human bone elements of sea-mammal-eating people from the Ekven site (SI-671 7, lEMAE705, SI-671 8, Table 1) must stand in need of correction for the reservoir effect for at least 500 years or so. That such a move is reasonable is suggested by the

series of 27 determinations from human bone of the Ekven site listed by Dinesman et. al. (1 999, Appendix

2), of which only three are in excess of 2000 radiocar- bon years, which when corrected suggest nothing

earlier than 1800 years before 1950, and perhaps a

century or so later. The only determinations in present

Table 1 not evidently suspect because of the reservoir

effect and that substantially exceed 1 800 B.P. are those shown from two sites on the north Chukchi Peninsula: at Seshan, about 100 km northwest of Cape

Dezhnev, and from Cape Dzenretlen, some 200 km

northwest of the same point. Whether these two determinations from charcoal actually indicate the pres- ence of Old Bering Sea people on the north shore of

the Chukchi Peninsula earlier than elsewhere, or whether

additional dates would fall more in line with those from

two other sites on the same coast, like the Uten site

(MAG-354), 50 km northwest of Cape Dezhnev, or Cape

Vankarem (MAG-352, which wants correction for reservoir effect), 350 km northwest of the cape, cannot now be answered. At least I am not aware of any

other evidence that would support such an early de- velopment along the northern Chukchi Peninsula. When I analyzed the material from the Ciddings

House 3 at the Hillside site, I was able to date three

uncataloged samples of wood stored with the artifact collection. One problem here is that deficiencies in

the documentation prevent one from ascertaining

whether these samples came from an integral place in

the house itself, from overburden, or even from the

exploratory trenching that led to discovery of the house

floor (Ciddings 1 967: 1 70-2). Only one of the three dated

older than, or even as old as, 1 700 years (Beta-782 1 3, Table 1 ). At about the same time, Michael Lewis, of the

University of Alaska Museum, obtained determinations on two pieces of walrus ivory included in the House 3

(Ciddings) collection, as well as on two ivory pieces

from the Punuk Island Okvik collection that he identified as bearing Okvik-style decorations (Table 1). Finally, in work with the Collins Hillside site collection at

the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in

D. E. DUMOND
Table // Selected Bering Strait Radiocarbon Ages"

SiteMaterial Age Lab. Number Reference

St. Lawrence I. Beach burials:

Burial 26 ('Okvik') wood 1410 + 60 B-3205 Bandi 1984:61

wood 1310 + 60 B-3206 Bandi 1984:61

Burial 34 ('Okvik') whale bone- 2450 ± 40 B-2877 Bandi 1984:61

Hillside site:

1 930 excavations:

House 1 wood 1 640 1 06 P-95 Rainey & Ralph 1959 nouse J wood Libby 1951

wood 1420 230 P-70'' Ralph & Ackerman 1961

1 973 excavations:

House 5 wood 1460 + 50 B-2871 Blumer 2002

wood 1470 + 80 B-2872 Blumer 2002

wood 1 750 + 50 B-2867 Blumer 2002

wood 1810 + 50 B-2873 Blumer 2002

1994 analysis:

House 3 willow 1 1 00 + 70 Beta-782 1 4 Dumond 1998b

UIILII/cHUcI 1 ? 1 n OV_/ Rpt;D.aS4Q DcLd OOH^I1 Dumond 1998b

willow 1 oUU yu beta- 1 OCX i Dumond 1998b

1995 analyses:

House 1 grass 1 770 40 Beta-931 60 Dumond 1998b

walrus ivory* 2500 + 50 Beta-1 13814 Dumond 1998b

walrus ivory* 2480 + 50 Beta-1 13815 Dumond 1998b

House 2 grass 1680 + 40 Beta-91 359 Dumond 1998b

walrus ivory* 21 30 + 60 Beta-1 13812 Dumond 1998b

walrus ivory* 2240 50 Beta-1 13813 Dumond 1998b

House 3 walrus ivory* 2560 50 Beta-81 492 M. A. Lewis, pers. com.

walrus ivory* 2660 + 50 Beta-81491 M. A. Lewis, pers. com. Mayughwaaq site:

1 930 excavations wood 1630 230 P-71 Ralph & Ackerman 1 961

wood 1 700 + 1 50 P-93 Ralph & Ackerman 1 961

Punuk Islands Okvik site:

1 993 analysis walrus ivory" o ^ ^ n + bU Beta-o 1 4o9 M. A. Lewis, pers. com.

walrus ivory lk:> / U — DU Beta-o 1 nyu M. A. Lewis, pers. com.

Asian Mainland

Uten charcoal 1600 + 100 MAC-41 7 Shilo et al. 1979

Chini, burial 5 wood, fur 1605 + 40 MAG-228 Dikov 1977:161

Chini, burial unknown baleen?* 1670 + 40 MAC-360 Shilo et al. 1977

Uten, burial 1 wood 1 750 + 100 MAC-354 Dikov 1 977:1 79

Cape Vankarem baleen* 1840 + 100 MAC-352 Shilo et al. 1977

Dzhenretlen charcoal 1990 + 190 MAG-233 Dikov 1977:194

Ekven, burial 143 human ribs* 1 745 + 75 SI-671 7 W. Fitzhugh, pers. com.

Seshan charcoal 2022 + 100 MAG-104 Dikov 1977:185

Ekven, burial 121^ human bone* 2153 + 110 IEMAE-705 Bronshtein & Plumet, 1995

Ekven, burial 63 human ribs* 2220 ± 65 SI-671 8 W. Fitzhugh, pers. com.

^ Determinations suggesting a so-called conventional age of I 700 years or more for clearly identified Old

Bering Sea or Okvik, plus recently communicated determinations. Omitted are most previously published C-14

determinations suggesting ages of less than I 700 years (6 from the Hillside site, 5 from Mayughwaaq, 4 from

the Asian mainland).

* Materials marked with an asterisk are deemed subject to the marine reservoir effect and thus date too early.

'° Two determinations from a single sample. See text.

^ Burial number reported by Dinesman (1999, Appendix 2), context by Bronshtein and Plumet (1995).

4 2 100 YEARS/ THE "ESKIMO WEDGE"
1995, I identified two samples of grass cataloged as

recovered in 1 930 from between the floor stones of houses 1 and 2 of the site, which were then dated by

the AMS method (Beta-931 59, -93160, Table 1). And,

as something of an afterthought regarding the magnitude of the marine reservoir effect in the Bering Sea, I

later was permitted to date bv the same method a

pair of samples of walrus ivory from each house floor

(Beta-113812 through Beta-113815) that could be

compared directly with the results of the determinations on grass from the same excavation units.

Table 1 illustrates the uncertainties that derive from

the various factors just mentioned. First of all, I believe

that the two determinations on grass, which must be

a local product of both the vicinity and time of occupation, are the least ambiguous dates for the Hillside

site. Given that House 3 on stylistic grounds stands

apart not only from the Mayughwaaq site but to a

lesser extent from the two houses of the Hillside site

excavated by Collins, from which it varies only slightly

in certain frequencies of the more common artifacts, I had come to accept that House 3 and, by extension,

at least portions of the collection from the Okvik site

of the Punuk Islands, were slightly older than houses 1 and 2. This supposed sequential relationship is supported by the radiocarbon determinations on walrus

ivory from houses 1,2, and 3 of the Hillside site, and

by one of the dates from the Okvik site (Table 1 ). On

the other hand, given the magnitude of the reservoir

effect suggested by the mixed suites of dates from

the floors of houses 1 and 2 (500 to 700 years; see Dumond and Griffin 2002), there seems no reason to suppose that any of the units of these sites exceeds

2000 years in uncorrected radiocarbon age (see also Blumer 2002). This conclusion, of course, provides a

relatively young age for the Hillside site and by implication for Old Bering Sea, which has been frequently

estimated to be at least as old as 2500 years (e.g., Arutiunovand Bronshtein 1993; Arutiunov and Fitzhugh

1988; Bronshtein and Plumet 1995; Giddings 1960). I

note, however, that this later dating accords well with

the archaeological sequence from southwestern Alaska

as I perceive it.

Concluding Discussion

What, then are the present conclusions as they relate

to those of researchers of the lesuo Exoedition? Foremost is the finding that the Eskimo population

forming the so-called "wedge"—once postulated by

Bogoras and Jochelson—was a fully autochthonous

development of the territories adjacent to the Bering

Strait region. This population developed linguistically

from American progenitors but clearly sharing with Asia

important artifacts and cultural practices. So far as ar- chaeology can show, there was no late and intrusive

"Eskimo Wedge." In fairness to Boas, however, one must

recognize that in later writings, while not repudiating

the idea of such a wedge, he did note linguistic evi- dence that Eskimo and Chukchi had long been neighbors (Boas 1933:369). And long before, even as he

expressed his enthusiasm for the notion of a late and

intrusive arrival of Eskimo people at Bering Strait, he

had accepted the possibility "that a more thorough

investigation of the Alaskan Eskimo may correct our

present conclusions as to the role that this tribe played

in communicating Asiatic culture to America, and

American culture to Asia" (1905:99-100). This tentative prediction has proven true, not only as demonstrated by archaeology but through reconsideration

of the body of myth, especially Raven myth, on which

the ethnographers of the Jesup Expedition relied most

heavily, together with the exploration of specifically

Alaskan Eskimo conceptions (e.g., Chowning 1962;

Meletinskii 1 979, 1 983). The lack of field study of Alaskan Eskimo societies by researchers of the Jesup Expedition must thus be accounted a serious omission that

contributed heavily to their erroneous postulation of a

recent wedge-like movement of Eskimo people into

the Bering Strait region, a notion that persisted (and

confused) well into the mid-twentieth century.

D. E. DUMOND
Secondarily, and not in special opposition to Boas,

for whom the "late" date of the Eskimo appearance

around Bering Strait was relative rather than absolute,

but in opposition to later commentators who have

ascribed absolute dates to the Eskimo development:

the Eskimo way of life developed fully no earlier than

2000 years ago, many centuries later than semimaritime peoples had appeared on both sides of

the Bering Sea. And among these latter, in differing

ways and degrees, were the various cultural, genetic, and linguistic ancestors of the historically

known Eskimo people.

Acknowledgments

I thank the University of Alaska Museum for the loan

of collections from the Hillside site, and the Department of Anthropology of the National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, for facilitating study

of their collections in 1995 with support of a

Smithsonian Senior Research Fellowship. I am grateful

to both for agreeing to my requests to allow dating of

items of their collections by the radiocarbon method.

Notes

1. Herein I use only uncalibrated radiocarbon ages.

2. I omit consideration of so-called "Alaskan

Paleoindian" remains, which appear to date from

about 10,000 years ago, appearing somewhat

later than traces of the early and apparently Asia- related peoples although in part contemporary

with them. These "Paleoindian" sites are characterized both by the absence of microblades and

the presence of lanceolate projectile points

strongly reminiscent of roughly contemporary ar- tifacts of terrestrially focused peoples of continental America to the south (see pertinent articles

in Bever and Kunz 2001). Harking south and east

to the American interior, rather than west across

Bering Strait, the assemblages appear irrelevant to the present discussion.

3. Sites of similar age and affinity recorded more recently in the Unalaska Bay area of nearby

Unalaska Island (also of the Fox group) are thus

4 4

far known only from elevations of 20 m or more

above modern sea level, higher than ocean-edge

sites of later date in the region (see Knecht and

Davis 2001).

4. A single determination of about 3400 years ago from Shemya, cited previously as a possible

indication of occupation by that time in the Near

Island (Dumond and Bland 1 995, Table 2), has been

learned to be from material subject to a marine

reservoir effect (see note 5, below) and must be

considered younger than the measured age.

5. The coastal site of Naivan, located near

the southern tip of the Chukchi Peninsula, has been

concluded to represent people who devoted some time to fishing and has been dated to 8000

years or more ago (Gusev 2002)—as have some

other sites reported by Dikov (1993) from east- ern Chukotka—but displays no evidence of a markedly maritime adaptation.

6. Over the earth as a whole, the surface waters of the ocean preserve older carbon so that

organisms inhabiting them yield "'C ages about

400 years greater than terrestrial materials of the same true calendar age, but in certain regions a much greater excess of apparent age is imparted

because of upwelling of still more ancient carbon

from greater sea depths. This necessitates an additional correction; although a specific additional

factor for the Bering Strait region has not yet been

announced, data reported from other North Pacific locales entail a further correction of from 1 00-

300 years, for a total of 500-700 years that must

be deducted from '''C ages to bring them into line with those from terrestrial samples. See Dumond

and Griffin (2002); Stuiver and Braziunas (1 993).

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48 100 YEARS/ THE "ESKIMO WEDGE"
flailing at ^ering^trait?

~]~ine Jesup j\jorth facific [^-Xpedition and the ^tudtj of (^.uiture (^^ontact

PETER P. SCHWEITZER

In 1 908, Franz Boas—the organizer of the Jesup North

Pacific Expedition ONPE)—presented an overview of the main results of the expedition, six years after its conclusion (Boas 1908; see Boas 2001:17-24). Despite

its unimpressive length of 1 6 pages, this report—delivered as the Opening Address at the 1 6th International Congress of Americanists in Vienna—was Boas' final and most extended presentation of what he considered to be the scholarly fruits of a monumental en- deavor that lasted for five years (1 897-1 902), costed

at least $100,000, and involved almost 20 researchers. According to Boas, the expedition's goal was to

resolve the question of cultural relations between the Old and New World (Boas 1 908:4). Bering Strait, the

area where the two regions under consideration actually meet and through which most of the supposed

movements of people, objects, and ideas must have

passed, should thus be considered of prime relevance

to the research questions and targets of the JNPE. However, the place name "Bering Strait" was mentioned

exactly three times throughout Boas' final JNPE presentation. One of those references was purely locational;

the second one referred to Boas' conviction that Es- kimo societies were late arrivals at Bering Strait (the

so-called "Eskimo Wedge theory"; see Dumond, this

volume); and the third was in conjunction with the

distribution of reindeer herding in Northern Eurasia (and

its absence in the Americas). This last reference is intriguing, since it uses the argument of "lively interaction between Asia and America in the Bering Strait

area" (Boas 1 908:1 7) to argue for the late transition to

reindeer herding in northeastern Siberia. Alas, the excited reader does not learn anything more about this

"lively interaction" in Boas' final address. During the years 1 993-96, Evgenii Colovko and

myself have conducted a multi-site oral history study,

entitled "Traveling Between Continents" which was

funded by the U.S. National Park Service, Alaska Region. Our primary goal was to document the legacy of

inter-continental Native travels between Alaska and

Chukotka (Chukchi Peninsula) during the first half of the 20th century (more specifically, until 1948, when all

official travel across Bering Strait was halted by Cold

War politics). Since our project was situated on the

Asiatic and American sides of Bering Strait, we dealt

intensively with many Chukchi, Inupiaq, and Naukan

Yupik communities and individuals. Although we were

unable to conduct fieldwork on St. Lawrence Island and in the southeastern section of the Chukchi Peninsula, various references to Siberian Yupik societies from

these areas are contained in our data. Situated at multiple cultural and linguistic boundaries, "Traveling Be- tween Continents" provided us with ubiquitous instances of culture contact. We learned of social visits,

feuds, long-distance economic endeavors, marriage ties, exchanges of personal names and songs, between

social units of different cultural and linguistic affiliation.

Since we have provided more detailed discussions of our results elsewhere (Schweitzer 1997; Schweitzer

and Colovko 1995a, 1995b, 1997a, 2001), I will
present here the project's brief summary only, as it

pertains to the character of culture contact in the Bering

Strait area. This will lead us to the issue of why those

very contacts among the North Pacific Native groups

have surprisingly eluded the interest of many of the JNPE researchers a century ago.

"Traveling Between Continents" in the

Bering Strait Area

Most of the culture contact processes we encountered can be interpreted as exchange transactions. In

the first place, the economic realm provides a number

of excellent examples: reindeer herders from the interior Chukchi Peninsula exchanged their products for sea- mammal products with coastal communities on the

Asiatic and American sides of Bering Strait, whereas

transactions between maritime communities on different sides of the strait focused on goods not locally

available, some of which were acquired through longdistance trade. Beyond the obvious utilitarian aspect

of exchanging goods, there were also instances of

transactions that defy a simple supply-and-demand

model (for example, wolverine furs were reportedly

traded in both directions across Bering Strait). Thus, a major element of "traveling" was the creation and

maintenance of social ties. Marriage was a logical vehicle to this end, but so were adoption, formalized

partnership, informal friendship, the migration of individuals, and personal naming practices. The social links

that were established through these means were a necessary precondition for any kind of visit that was

not based purely on negative reciprocity (such as raids and other warfare activities). Since the equivalent of having no recognized ties in a particular community

was being considered a stranger and, thus, an enemy,

kinship and other links had to be established across community, language, and ethnic boundaries.

The structure of inter-community contacts was in no way arbitrary. Geographic and social proximity de- termined the frequency of social links between individual communities. Whereas most of these exchange

5

relations were balanced, there were also instances

of dominance by one side. This was most clearly

expressed in the relations between the reindeer herders and coastal communities, whereby the herders

generally considered themselves to be superior. A

good example of such unequal relationships was

the spread of the Chukchi language among Yupik

(and, to a much lesser degree, Ihupiaq) speakers,

while there were hardly any instances of Chukchi

being able to speak Yupik or Ihupiaq.'

After 1920, nation state politics of both Russia

and the United States gradually began to exert a domineering influence over these links by encouraging some

(those inside the country) and discouraging other ("international") connections. Euro-American group and individual interests were, nothing new to the area under

consideration. Ever since the first Russian boats had

sailed through Bering Strait in the mid-1 7th century,

the demand for foreign goods had contributed to the

structure of economic relations. Until the mid-1 9th

century, the Asian side of Bering Strait was much closer

to the supply of Russian goods, which provided its

inhabitants with more favorable exchange conditions. Subsequently these conditions were reversed, first by

Yankee commercial whalers after 1850 and later by

traders operating from Seattle. In the early 20th century, the Alaskan Seward Peninsula (i.e., the town of Nome) became the supply center of imported goods,

while the Chukotka residents were primarily contributing raw materials or goods of Native production, such

as old ivory, reindeer and fox skins, reindeer fur parkas,

and skin-boots. As we have argued elsewhere (Schweitzer and

Colovko2001), historic warfare in the Bering Strait area was a syncretistic product of traditional social organization (more or less autonomous social units with shifting alliances) and outside pressures (in a nutshell, the

encroaching "World-System"). These outside pressures

led to competition over access to Euro-American goods

and indirectly contributed to the rise of Chukchi reindeer herding, which in itself triggered tremendous

100 YEARS/ BERING STRAIT CULTURE CONTACT
changes within the regional network of social relations. However, warfare was as much an expression of the

social fabric that linked different communities, as were

marriage, economic transactions, or social visits (see

Burch 1 998). Similarly, the conduct of warfare activities did not exclude those other activities. Since all

those forms of culture contact could appear beyond

(as well as within) ethnic and linguistic boundaries, "culture change"—that is, the exchange and spread of "culture elements"—was an almost necessary result of "traveling between continents." One of the most obvious effects of culture contact

is in the realm of language. Instances of bi- and multilingualism were quite common throughout the Bering

Strait area. As mentioned above, some forms of bilin- gualism were an expression of one-sided relations; however, in many other cases (e.g., between the Alaskan Inupiat and Siberian Naukan Yupiit Eskimo) there were approximately equal levels of bilingualism, which

reflected more balanced social relationships. In addition, all the languages of the area display a fair number

of borrowings in vocabulary and grammar. The existence of previous "trade jargons" is likely, albeit poorly

documented (cf. De Reuse 1994). Specific languagerelated exchanges took place in the realms of the bestowal of personal names and the performance of

songs. Inupiaq and Yupik personal names in the Bering

Strait area are "recycled," that is, they are bestowed to

a newborn after the death of its previous bearer; in

addition, each person can have multiple names, some

of which stem from other communities. One specifically interesting aspect of this regional system of naming is the high frequency of Chukchi personal names

that is found among the Naukan Yupiit Eskimo (and, to

a lesser degree, among the Bering Strait Inupiat and St. Lawrence Island Yupik people). The preponderance of

Chukchi personal names in the Naukan name pool is

not the result of Chukchi social dominance, but of the

structural properties of Chukchi and Eskinx) naming

systems, which are distinct but compatible (Schweitzer

and Golovko 1997a). Songs and dances in the Bering

Strait area are "owned" by the individuals and communities who created them. They are, nevertheless,

widely exchanged throughout the region, and songs

are generally performed in their original language. In

contrast to personal names of "foreign origin," the

source of received songs and dances is generally well remembered and usually acknowledged (see also

Kingston 2000).

While language-related exchanges and borrowings

are easier to detect, those in the realms of social organization, religion, and material culture are often less

visible. Nevertheless, there are several well-documented

cases in these spheres too. They range from the adoption of reindeer herders' dwellings by the coastal communities of the Chukchi Peninsula and St. Lawrence

Island' to the disintegrating effect of Inupiat bilateral

kinship organization on the clan system of Naukan

Yupiit. Other examples include the adoption of syncretistic religious practices (e.g., a "revitalization movement" in Naukan in the 1 920s) and the abandonment

of others (e.g., the absence of "messenger feasts" on

Little Diomede Island). The above-mentioned forms of

culture contact allude to several distinct processes of

incorporating "foreign elements." We have argued

elsewhere for a preliminary model describing idealtypes of cultural exchanges in the Bering Strait area

(Schweitzer and Golovko 1 997b). This model proposes

to take particular note of whether a certain cultural

practice is recognized as borrowed or not. Here it is

sufficient to state that even in the early 1990s, after

almost 50 years of suspended direct contacts, the effects of culture contact were ubiquitous in the Bering

Strait region.

Returning to Boas and the Jesup Expedition, it seems

difficult to grasp why a huge joint effort interested in

cultural relations between Asia and America had so

little to say about the Bering Strait region, a multi-ethnic arena of diverse forms of culture contact and its

effects. Most of the forms and effects of culture contact across Bering Strait were at least as visible at the

turn of the nineteenth century as they are today (and

p. p. SCHWEITZER
some of them would then have been much easier to document). The remainder of this paper will shed some

light on why the very crossroads between the Old and

New World proved to be of marginal interest to the

organizer of the JNPE. First, though, it is necessary to

break down this general question into at least two

components. The first is whether Boas, who never visited the Bering Strait region, slighted the area in his summary reports or whether this deficiency was an

unfortunate by-product of the organization and logistics of theJNPE fieldwork in the area during 1 900-1

Secondly, what was the relationship between the

collected (and published) field data and the interpretations that Boas and other members of the Jesup Expedition drew from them?

For analytical purposes, I will discuss the JNPE field- work monographs separately from the interpretations

based on them. However, since there has never been

(and never will be) a neat demarcation line between

data and interpretation, this should not be misunderstood as a naive form of positivism. First, I will briefly

review the published monographs that resulted from

(and, in one case, preceded) the JNPE. As a second

step, I will survey the interpretational tools Boas and

his collaborators used to arrive at their conclusions.

Finally, I will tackle the title question whether Boas and

the JNPE, in general, failed at the task of confronting

culture contact in the Bering Strait region.

The Published Field Data

The first thing to be mentioned is that the JNPE teams

did not conduct any fieldwork on the Alaskan side of

Bering Strait nor hardly anywhere else in Alaska (see

Krauss, this volume). Boas justified this circumstance

by referring to other available publications for the region, such as those by Nelson (1 899), Murdoch (1 892),

and others (Boas 1 908:9).^ For the Alaskan side of Bering

Strait, he certainly had first and foremost Nelson's "The

Eskimo About Bering Strait" in mind, which was published in 1 899, during the early phase of the JNPE." Thus,

I will begin this section with a brief review of the book

5 2

that was seemingly considered an adequate substitute for extensive new fieldwork by Boas and his JNPE

crew.Edward William Nelson (1855-1934) was a naturalist who took on a four-year assignment with the U.S. Army Signal Service in St. Michael, Alaska, in 1877.

Although his main task was to provide meteorological observations, he agreed to collect ethnological information and specimens for the Smithsonian Institution in exchange for logistical and publication support. Between 1877 and 1881, Nelson was able to

travel extensively in the Yukon-Kuskokwim River Delta,

the southern part of the Seward Peninsula, and into the

Indian country along the Yukon River. In addition, in

1 881 he took a trip on the Revenue Cutter Corwin to

St. Lawrence Island, the Chukchi Peninsula, Wrangel Island, and Northwest Alaska as far as Point Barrow

(Fitzhugh and Kaplan 1 982:32). Upon his return to Washington, D.C., in the fall of 1881, he began to prepare

the publication of his journals and notes; but ill health

delayed the process considerably. Finally, in 1 899, his monumental monograph, 'The Eskimo About Bering

Strait" appeared in the Eighteenth Annual Report of

the Smithsonian Bureau of American Ethnology for the

years 1896-97.

It is not the purpose of this chapter to provide a

full analysis of Nelson's anthropological results (see

Lantis 1954; Fitzhugh 1983). Instead, I will focus on

the issue of culture contact, which Nelson had ample

opportunities to experience first-hand. Using just broad

linguistic labels of today, he dealt with various Central

Alaskan Yup'ik, Siberian Yupik, Naukan Yupik, and Inupiaq groups and had additional short encounters with

Reindeer and Coastal Chukchi in Siberia, as well as with

Athapaskan groups in interior Alaska. Using the nar- row concept of "traditional societies" (Burch 1 980), he

had data from more than 20 such groups. His location

at St. Michael was ideal for observing real-time culture

contact among them; however, that was not what

Nelson was interested in. Except for the Athapaskan

and the Chukchi, all other Native societies of the

] 00 YEARS/ BERING STRAIT CULTURE CONTACT
region he covered were reduced in his publication to one label, namely the "western Eskimos." While Nelson was aware of some of the linguistic and social boundaries in the region he surveyed (Nelson 1 899:24-6), he

interpreted them as merely dialect and tribal variations

of one ethnic group. Thus, the first chapter of his monograph starts out with the following statement:

The lives of these people adjacent to the Tinne [Athapaskan - P. S.], as well as those of

the Siberian coast who are in constant

contact with the Chukchi, have been some- what modified by their surroundings, al- though in their language and customs they

are still unmistakably Eskimo (Nelson

1899:23).

It is a pity that 'Nelson did not expand on this mysteri- ous phrase, "have been somewhat modified by their

surroundings." These are exactly the forms and results

of culture contact we are so interested in. There are,

however, a few short sub-chapters, where he provided

us with some information about the functional reasons of some forms of culture contact. His three-anda-half-page account of "Trade and Trading Voyages"

(Nelson 1899:228-32) offers a good review of the extent of trade networks throughout the region at the

time. Similarly, his short account of "Wars" (Nelson

1899:327-30) is a useful summary of traditional alliances and hostilities in the Bering Strait area. However,

neither in those chapters nor in the rest of his book did

he try to account for the local cultural differences and

their relation to culture contact. Most of the time, his

generalizing statements about "western Eskimo" culture mirrors mainly the Central Alaskan Yup'ik area with

which he was most familiar.

In the final analysis I have to agree with Margaret

Lantis' assessment that "about 250 pages of the

[Nelson's] text are essentially an annotated museum

catalogue" and that "his presentation of the museum

collection of about 1 0,000 specimens still is unequaled

among Alaska Eskimo ones" (Lantis 1 954:1 3). The results of Nelson's sojourn and monograph are strongest in the field of material culture, as in the case of his

fellow Smithsonian affiliate, John Murdoch (1 892). Thus,

William Fitzhugh's comment that "Nelson's collections.

. . can be used for scholarly study of interaction and

change across the ethnic, linguistic, and cultural boundary in eastern Norton Sound" (Fitzhugh 1 983:34), nevertheless, cannot be fully executed outside the realm

of material culture. The two scholars who conducted fieldwork in northeastern Siberia for the JNPE were Waldemar Jochelson

(Vladimir lokhel'son, in Russian) and Waldemar Bogoras

(Vladimir Bogoraz). While Jochelson worked mainly

among the Koryak people in northern Kamchatka and

among the Even, Yukagir, and Sakha people of the contemporary Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) and the Magadan Province, Bogoras conducted his field surveys mainly in Chukotka, including several locations at

Bering Strait. Waldemar Bogoras (1865-1936) was a

Russian revolutionary whose first acquaintance with

Siberia and its Native people was involuntary: he was

exiled to the mouth of the Kolyma River during the

years 1890-8. Like several of his fellow narodniki exiles, he began collecting ethnographic and folklore material from the Chukchi and other peoples, with whom

he was in contact (see more in Vakhtin 2001 :78-82).

The linguistic competence and ethnographic experi- ence acquired during those years made him an excellent choice for the JNPE Siberian team. In addition,

Bogoras had already participated in a large ethnographic expedition to Yakutia, sponsored by the rich

gold miner and philanthropist Innokentii Sibiriakov in

the years 1895-97.

The fieldtrip for JNPE was conducted by Bogoras

and his wife, Sofia Bogoras, over 1 2 months during the

years 1 900-1 . Unfortunately, Bogoras had to cover an

unreasonably broad area. As Igor Krupnik has recently

noted , "he [Bogoras - P.S.] was mainly on the move. .

. . he surveyed an area from the Bering Strait to Kamchatka Peninsula, over a distance equal to a round

trip from London to Sicily" (Krupnik 1 996:40). Thus,

when Bogoras finally reached the shores of the Bering

Strait during the last months of his Siberian sojourn, he

p. p. SCHWEITZER
was unable to visit all the coastal villages as planned.

Especially unfortunate was the fact that he did not make it to the areas closest to the Alaskan mainland,

particularly, the villages of Naukan, Uelen, and their surroundings, as he originally proposed to Boas (Vakhtin

2001 :83). However, it is worth mentioning that Bogoras

conducted that trip ("traveling half-way between continents") in the "Native way".

The major result of Bogoras' JNPE participation was

his three-part monograph TheChukcheeiBogoras 1904-

9). Despite its mono-ethnic title, the massive work also

provides significant information about the Siberian Yupik

ROUTE-MAP, Jt&UP WORTH PAOIPIC EXPtOITION The red lines show the princijxvl rouies irnverx*?! Iiy iwirtie* in «he field (row 1S97 li> i(/>2 inclusive. In Nurlh America the juumey« of the diUcrtnt parties have w)t hwn inriitaltd strsiaratel)', the coumry having been coveretl in m> many diri-ctions : in Asia the ilnt-and-da.'ih line shows the course followed hy the Bogoras party ; the broken Sine, ihit of the Jochetson party ; the iolicl liiic. that of the Laufer jiarly.

6/ A segment of the original map of tine Jesup Expedition activities, 1 897- / 902, showing the routes of

Bogoras' andJochelson's parties in the Bering Sea area (Adapted from Boas / 903:72)

was able to reach St. Lawrence Island from the southeastern coast of the Chukchi Peninsula. He traveled by

Native skin-boat from Cape Chaplin to Cambell, on St. Lawrence Island in May 1 901 and he spent a few days on the island, before coming back by the same boat. That made Bogoras the only early ethnographer who

(whom Bogoras called Asiatic Eskimo) and, to a lesser

degree, the Koryak, Yukagir, Even, and Russian Creole.

In accordance with other major "base-line ethnographies" of the turn of the century, Bogoras managed to

touch upon almost everything anthropologists were supposed to be interested in: from fishing implements

54 100 YEARS/ BERING STRAIT CULTURE CONTACT
to funeral ceremonies, from shamanism to dog-breeding, and from children's games to Native customary

law. Unlike his Alaskan predecessors Nelson and Murdoch, he thus succeeded in providing a more holistic

portrait of the society he studied and not an account

biased primarily towards its material culture. His longterm experience in the area and his fluent knowledge

of the Chukchi language surely contributed to the truly

impressive scope and quality of his work. In retrospect, one of the few major shortcomings of his monograph was also related to his prolonged stay in western

Chukchi territory, among the reindeer herders of the Kolyma River area. Throughout his book, there is a marked preponderance of information about the Reindeer Chukchi, while the Maritime Chukchi (and Siberian

Yupik) are generally treated with much less attention. As Krupnik has mentioned, Bogoras continued throughout his career to look at Siberian Native life through a

Reindeer Chukchi lens (Krupnik 1 996:43). In addition,

Krupnik has aptly criticized Bogoras for representing

Maritime Chukchi (and Siberian Yupik) social organization as much less structured than it proved to be by

later research (Krupnik 1 996).

However, recognizing that shortcomings are quite

inevitable in a work of the scope of The Chukchee, instead, I want to focus on the most notable achievements of the book. To me, those are the already mentioned multi-ethnic focus and the extensive use of historic documents, both of which lend a truly diachronic

quality to Bogoras' volume. It should be remembered

that the predominant format of ethnographic monographs at the time—including Boas' vision of the JNPE

publication series—was to treat a single ethnic group

as an isolated phenomenon that could be described

without much mention of other groups. The Chukchee;

to the contrary, was characterized by an unusual

amount of historical information. For example, Bogoras'

50-page chapter, "Contact of the Chukchee with the

Russians," has few equals in early 20th century ethnographies. Bogoras did not limit his diachronic ap- proach to accounts of "colonial history," but applied it

to a variety of topics, such as the "origin of reindeer

breeding" or issues of shamanism.

In addition, Bogoras constantly challenged the nar- row confines of single-ethnic monographs. He not only

referenced inter-group and inter-ethnic relations in the

abstract; but he also contributed hundreds of concrete

illustrations of such relationships. For example, in discussing "Mixed Marriages" (Bogoras 1904-9:591-5),

he did not merely state that Chukchi men sometimes

married Tungus (Even) women. Instead, he provided

intricate details about how the problem of distinct marriage presentations (bride-service vs. bride-price) was

solved. Similarly, his sections about "Trade" (Bogoras

1 904-9:53-69) and "Warfare ' (1 904-9:645-59) abound

in specific details of interethnic conduct. In sum. The

Chukchee is not only a "world-class monograph" but one that provides ample concrete data about culture

contact in areas adjacent to Bering Strait. Bogoras published several other volumes resulting

from his participation in theJNPE. However, these were

mainly collections of folklore (Bogoras 1910a, 1913,

1917, 1 9 1 8) or linguistic sourcebooks (Bogoras 1 949).

In addition, he wrote a huge assembly of articles; since most of them address specific topical problems and

use his JNPE materials mainly as illustrations, they will

be discussed in the following section.

Interpretations by Boas and Bogoras

At the turn of the twentieth century, the battle be- tween evolutionists and diffusionists was the defining

moment in anthropological debates (see Lee and

Graburn, this volume). Boas was among the most vocal and influential critics of evolutionism, which had

dominated the generation of scholars preceding him.^

His article, "The Limitations of the Comparative Method

of Anthropology" (1 896; abbreviated hereafter as "The

Limitations"), remains a textbook example of the "historical method" which dismisses approaches that treat

all similar phenomena as the results of the "uniform

working of the human mind." Boas was, however, from

the beginning a "moderate diffusionist." Already in "The

p. p. SCHWEITZER
Limitations" he demanded that the historical method

is applied to a "well-defined, small geographical territory" and that "continuity of distribution as one of the

essential conditions for proving historical connection"

be observed (Boas 1 982 [1 940]:277). This caveat was

directed at more radical diffusionists, many of whom

were strongly influenced by the German

anthropogeographer Friedrich Ratzel (as was, in fact,

Boas himself). At the same time, Boas did not exclude

the possibility of "independent invention," nor did he

reject the "comparative method" entirely. Instead, he was calling for careful historical investigations before

building any sweeping models that rested on evolution or diffusion.

This was very much Boas' mindset during the organization and conduct of the JNPE. The plan for the expedition can be seen as an attempt to apply the historical method, by selecting a well-defined geographical territory and looking for continuities and discontinuities of culture element distribution. As Boas stated

after the completion of the expedition, "if we approach

the problem of culture parallels from a purely psychological and purely evolutionistic point of view, an investigation or a problem, as the one before the Jesupexpedition, would seem unsolvable" (Boas 1908:5). In

other words, the JNPE would have never been designed

nor undertaken by an ardent evolutionist. According to Harris (1968:278-80), around 1910, Boas began to change his general views about the

possibilities of finding general laws regarding cultural development. He became more skeptical about the

predictability of cultural processes and maintained that

there is no necessary correlation between the devel- opmental stages of different aspects of culture. This

theoretical development of Boas is important for our

purposes. As mentioned above, his final report regarding the results of theJNPE was presented in 1 908. However, at that time a significant portion of individual monographs stemming from the expedition was not

yet published. It took until 1 926 for the final portion of

the expedition field data Gochelson's final delivery of

5 6

his Yukagir monograph) to appear in one of the last

issues undertheJesup Expedition series (whereas Jochelson's JNPE Yakut materials were only published in 1 933

and outside of the expedition series). At that point in

his career, Boas had entirely abandoned every aspect

of the comparative method, devoted himself to "historical particularism," and became more interested

in individual rather than in group processes (Harris

1968:280-1).

It is also noteworthy that the final volume of the JNPE series (vol. XII, to be entitled "Summary and Final

Results"; Boas 1 905:94) was never published. In a sense,

the full interpretation of Bogoras' (and Nelson's) results was never accomplished by Boas. It could be argued

that Boas' JNPE program reflected primarily his early

theoretical preoccupations (as outlined in The Limitations"). By the time all the results were finally assembled.

Boas' interests had significantly changed and, thus, a

detailed summary and interpretation of data collected under a "past paradigm" was no longer desirable. The question remains as to which aspects of the

original program might have become obsolete for Boas.

Since we have no direct evidence from him on the

subject, I cannot make more than informed guesses.

By reading through Boas' early reports about the JNPE,

I was quite struck by the sheer spatial and temporal

scope of the problems he intended to address. Far from staying within the "well-defined geographical territory" of the North Pacific region. Boas addressed questions of culture history ranging from the southern tip of

South America to Europe and from the Paleolithic to

the recent past. If this is the "historical method," it surely

is history on a macro-scale. Boas was dealing with

questions such as the when and where of the origin of Eskimo culture; he compared the peoples of the Arctic and Northwestern North America to those of the southern part of North America; he hypothesized about

Mesoamerican influences in North America; he tried to

assess the relative ages of different culture areas; he

classified the languages of northeastern Siberia in relation to North American languages, etc. (Boas 1 908).

100 YEARS/ BERING STRAIT CULTURE CONTACT
These questions seemed more appropriate in the writing of an ardent diffusionist rather than of a moderate

advocate of the "historical method."

It might well be that the initial program of the JNPE was in reality much more ambitious than Boas' cautionary theoretical prescriptions. Somehow, the strategic location of the JNPE must have tempted Boas to

address the "big questions" of culture history, such as

the peopling of the Americas. While his JNPE master

plan can be said to fit with his theoretical writings of

the time, it also made room for much more far-reaching issues. One thing that even Boas' theoretical opponents admit is that he held very high methodological

standards (see Harris 1 968). It is easy to imagine that

Boas realized that, however tempting the "big questions" might be, the JNPE data did not provide more

than food for speculation. More in accordance with

his (especially, later) views, he eventually abandoned

the grand synthesis project. Instead, he went to practice in the field of "historical particularism." However,

either because of time constraints or lack of regional

interest, he did not work with all the data compiled by

the JNPE. In fact, he primarily worked with materials on

Northwest coast societies, where he tried to reconstruct detailed historical sequences. The Bering Strait

material never received a similar treatment by Boas.

In contrast to Boas, Bogoras was for most of his

career an outspoken (although not always conscious)

evolutionist. Traces of this approach can easily be found

in most of his writings, including "The Chukchee." There,

before presenting materials on Chukchi religion, he provides us with his views on the five "developmental

stages of primitive religious concepts" (Bogoras 1 904-

09:277-90). The model suggested by Bogoras displays an eclectic mix of influences ranging from Charles Darwin to Herbert Spencer to Edward B. Tylor. Although

those pages contain interesting ethnographic information, its presentation suffers from the straightjacket

approach of constructing a unilineal sequence of religious concepts: from animism (a label he rejected) to

supernatural beings. In addition, Bogoras provided a

short comparative treatment of religious ideas among

the Koryak and Itelmen, as compared to the Chukchi

(Bogoras 1 904-9:290-1 ). While the similarities between

Koryak and Chukchi concepts seem to strengthen

Bogoras' evolutionistic argument, his final paragraph

of that section indicates an implicit argument for diffusion. He pointed out that Chukchi and Eskimo folklore showed strong resemblances, while Koryak and Itelmen

stories were closer to those of the American North- west coast (Bogoras 1904-9:291).

Other instances of evolutionistic leanings in The

Chukchee can be found in Bogoras' treatment of social

organization. For example, regarding the Chukchi "family

group"—a group of kindred families—he suggests that

it "may perhaps be called an embryo of a clan" (Bogoras

1904-9:541). However, despite the usage of such

terms as "group-marriage," The Chukchee, for the most

part, stays free of putting Chukchi social organization

into an evolutionary framework. Such a framework was

to be found in Bogoras' last publications, when Marxist evolutionist line demanded that his views fit into

the ruling dogmas such as "pre-clan" and "clan society" (see Bogoras n.d.: 292-6). His views about religion, on the other hand, were consistently phrased in developmental terms (see Bogoras 1906, 1910b).

It has already been indicated that Bogoras was

not opposed to explaining the distribution of culture

elements through diffusion and migration. This is especially evident from a number of his articles published

after the completion of the JNPE. For example, his

Russian article "Ancient Migrations of Peoples in Northern Eurasia and America," (Bogoras 1927) reads like a compendium of speculative population movements

throughout the northern parts of Eurasia and North

America. While Boas and Bogoras seem to meet in this

respect, there was a temporal hiatus between their

macro-historical contributions. When Bogoras issued

his major statements on the subject during the 1 920s

(e.g., Bogoras 1 924, 1 927), Boas had already long abandoned the search for the "big picture" of human cultural history.

p. p. SCHWEITZER
After reviewing Boas' and Bogoras' general approaches, we still need to look at several specific as- sumptions that informed their work. One of them is

the already-mentioned "Eskimo Wedge theory," which

can be called a direct result of the JNPE (Dumond, this

volume; Freed et al. 1 988:32). According to Boas' view

(which was shared by Bogoras), Eskimo cultures originated in Canada and were late arrivals to Alaska, where

they "interrupted, at an early period, the communication between the Siberian and Indian tribes" (Boas

igOSigS-g)."^ unfortunately, this view of Bering Strait

culture chronology disqualified the various Eskimo societies of the region from being considered an intrinsic

part of the regional cultural network. Another specific

assumption that informed Boas' (but not Bogoras')

approach has at least to be mentioned, being that for

Boas "culture contact" was limited to contact among

Native societies. He had no interest in the dramatic

cultural processes that were taking place before the

eyes of thejesup Expedition members in the field. This

aspect of Boas' views —which is so difficult to grasp

has rightly been questioned by several other papers in

this volume (see Krauss, this volume; Lee and Craburn,

this volume). Here it must suffice to state that Boas' concept of the relationship between science and politics was ambiguous. While he is rightly remembered as

a courageous enemy of racism, Boas always considered his "political" views as being entirely "scientific."

Thus, there was no room for a moralistic position, which

would have been an almost inescapable precondition

or consequence of analyzing contemporary Native/

non-Native interactions.

Conclusions

Let me now attempt at a preliminary synthesis of the arguments developed above. There is no reason to suggest that Boas' lonely fieldworker on the Russian

side of Bering Strait—^Waldemar Bogoras—failed the

task of documenting culture contacts in the region.

On the contrary, his major account of theJNPE-trip, The

Chukchee, contains many excellent descriptions of such

5 8

processes. After almost ) 00 years, this work continues to be a "treasure chest" of information for scholars

interested in the subject.

Unfortunately, things were different for the Alas- kan section of the region. Nelson's material culture- focused monograph could in no way match Bogoras'

lively account. With the possible exception of tracing

culture contact through objects of material culture, we are left today with few usable clues. It has to be

stated, however, that Nelson's "job description" neither at the time of his Alaskan fieldwork (1 877-8 1 ) nor

during his writing for the Smithsonian (in the 1880s

and 1 890s) included what we would want to see most

in his monograph these days. Thus, to a certain degree, the "blame" should rather be put on Boas who

assumed that Nelson's' work in progress could/would

become a valid substitute forJNPE fieldwork in Alaska. He seemed to have sensed that after the completion

of the Jesup Expedition, when he stated that "unfortunately our knowledge of the Alaskan Eskimo is not thorough enough to permit of a definitive statement

in regard to their culture" (Boas 1 905:98). However, we at least have to consider the institutional and political pressure Boas was facing while lobbying for "his"

expedition (Freed et al. 1988). It might well be that keeping good rapport with the Smithsonian Institution, which had financed Murdoch's and Nelson's report, led him to abandon plans for independent field- work in Alaska.' Although Bogoras and Boas are often portrayed

as having belonged to mutually exclusive camps of

anthropological theory (evolutionism and historical particularism, respectively), most of their synthesizing writings on the subject adopt a strangely similar perspective. Both show a particular interest in "grand culture

history," which leaves no room for the study of concrete culture history. In Bogoras' case, his interest in

the details of how neighboring groups interact seems

to have been satisfied by the completion of his JNPE

monographs. Further micro-historical analysis was

seemingly not a major concern to him. For Boas, macro100 YEARS/ BERING STRAIT CULTURE CONTACT
history held its fascination until around 1 908; after that,

he devoted much of his energies to local and detailed

accounts of historical processes. Unfortunately, the

Bering Strait region was never able to attract considerable attention from this outstanding scholar. The "Es- kimo Wedge" theory created and defended by Boas,

Bogoras, and others, certainly did not contribute to

the study of culture contact phenomena in the area

under consideration. Since the Eskimo societies around

Bering Strait were considered to have "messed up the

puzzle" of culture history, instead of being interpreted

as an intricate part of it, the heuristic value of the region became negligible. Viewed from their "macroscale" perspective of history, Bering Strait appeared

too "narrow" as to allow a sweeping statement to be

applied to the North Pacific Rim.

Finally, Bogoras' detailed descriptions of Native/

non-Native interactions in the Bering Strait region did

not attract Boas' analytical curiosity, since the latter thought them outside of the anthropologists' goals.

Thus, another chance at understanding the mechanisms

of culture contact and change was passed over. The question phrased in the title of this paper

Failing at Bering Strait?—has yet to be addressed.

While it is evidently quite easy to point out certain shortcomings some 1 00 years after the completion

of the JNPE, I concede that it would be inappropriate to speak of "failure" regarding the expedition's

accomplishments in the Bering Strait region. After

all, the research questions and interests of Boas,

Bogoras, and the others who contributed to the

mega-size endeavor of the JNPE were shaped by

the dominant theories and paradigms of their time.

Thus, we cannot condemn them for the fact that they did not pose or answer then many of our key

questions of today. In the final analysis, there is nothing more telling than the fact that we are still debating their field data and theoretical positions and

will probably continue to do so for at least another

1 00 years. Few of us can hope for a similar interest by succeeding generations of anthropologists, who

will perceive the shortcomings of our approaches

all too plainly.

Acknowledgments

This article is a follow-up to a joint paper by Evgenii V. Colovko and myself presented at the conference "Constructing Cultures Then and Now: A Centenary Confer- ence Celebrating Franz Boas and the Jesup North Pacific Expedition, 1 897-1 997," November 1 997, in New

York City. I hereby want to acknowledge the input

Evgenii Colovko has provided on my anthropological

perspectives, especially within the context of our joint

research project "Traveling Between Continents." I also want to thank Stacie Mcintosh and Igor Krupnik for

editorial assistance and advice.

Notes

1 . However, in the few villages with a mixed

Chukchi and Yupik population, such as Kiwak and

Uelen, Chukchi fluent in Yupik were quite common

(see Krupnik and Chlenov 1 979).

2. To be more specific, coastal residents

adopted certain architectural principles of the

yaranga, the traditional skin-covered dwelling of

the Reindeer Chukchi. As its tundra precursor, the

coastal yaranga was an above-ground structure which featured an inner chamber (polog). In contrast to the reindeer herders' dwelling, it was more

solid and not designed for frequent moves. This

architectural shift only became possible once the

coastal residents received a steady supply of re- indeer skins (to cover the polog and other parts of

the yaranga) from the tundra (Igor Krupnik, per- sonal communication, November 1998).

3. According to a map of proposed expedition operations published in 1 897, fieldwork was

also planned in Western Alaska and the Aleutians

(see Fitzhugh and Krupnik 2001 :xvi; Krupnik and

Vakhtin, this volume).

4. In addition, he might have had John

Murdoch's "Ethnological Results of the Point Bar- row Expedition" (1 892) in mind, which was already

published by the time JNPE was in the planning

stage. However, Murdoch's monograph is not only

situated outside of our geographic range of interP. p. SCHWEITZER
ests, but has hardly anything to offer on issues of

culture contact.

5. Since I am here primarily interested in Boas' treatment of culture change in the Bering Strait area, I cannot provide an in-depth review of Boas' general contributions to anthropology. For recent contributions to this vast body of literature see Baker (1998), Cole (1999), Darnell (1998, 2001),

as well as several contributions in Stocking (1 996)

and Krupnik and Fitzhugh (2001).

6. Frederica de Laguna's statement (1 994:1 2) that Boas' views on the problem were already for- mulated in his famous early monograph "The Central Eskimo" (1888) can be extended. It could be

argued that his general views on the homogeneity of Eskimo culture, formed as they were by his Central Inuit field experience, made him uncritical of Nelson's field data.

7. Boas had a long-standing but complex re- lationship with the Smithsonian National Museum.

In 1887, Boas had a protracted dispute with the

museum's Otis Mason about how to properly dis- play museum artifacts (Cole 1995 [1985]:1 12-8).

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Press. Fitzhugh, William W.

1 983 Introduction. In Edward W. Nelson, The Eskimo

about Bering Strait. Pp. 5-106. Washington, DC:

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1 982 Inua: Spirit World of the Bering Sea Eskimo. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press. Fitzhugh, William W., and Igor Krupnik

2001 Introduction. In Gateways. Exploring the Legacy

ofthe Jesup North Pacific Expedition. Igor Krupnik and

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Williamson

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1 902). American Anthropologist 90(]y.7-24.

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Theories ofCulture. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell. Kingston, Deanna M.

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the Years 1887-1888. Washington, DC: Government

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1899 The Eskimo about Bering Strait. 1 8th Annual Re- port ofthe Bureau ofAmerican Ethnology for the Years 1896- 1 897, pt. 1 . Washington, DC: Government Print- ing Office. Schweitzer, Peter P. 1997 Traveling Between Continents: Native Contacts Across the Bering Strait, 1898-1948. Arctic Research of the United States 1 1 : 68-72.

Schweitzer, Peter P., and Evgenii Golovko

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(Traveling Between Continents, Phases One and Two).

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Alaska Regional Office.

1 995 b Traveling Between Continents: The Social Or- ganization of Interethnic Contacts Across Bering Strait. The Anthropology ofEast Europe Review 1 3(2):5(3-5. 1997a Local Identities and Traveling Names: Inter- ethnic Aspects of Personal Naming in the Bering Strait Area. Arctic Anthropology 34(1 ): 1 67-80.

1 997b Culture Contact in the Bering Strait Area: Open

Questions ofJesup I and Contemporary Approaches.

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proliva (Memory of the War: Constructing Outside

Conflict in the Ethnic Cultures of the Bering Strait Region). In Trudy fakul'teta etnologii Evropeiskogo

universiteta v Sankt-Peterburge. Pp. 26—37. St. Pe- tersburg: Evropeiskii Universitet. 2003 Levels of Inequality in the North Pacific Rim: Cultural Logics and Regional Interaction.. In: Hunter-Gatherers of the North Pacific Rim. J. Habu,J.M. Savelle, S. Koyama and H. Hongo, eds. Pp. 83-101. Senri Eth- nological Series, 63. Osaka, Japan: National Museum

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University of Wisconsin Press.

p. p. SCHWEITZER

I

7/ Jochelson's first expedition camp at the village ofKushka on the Sea of Okhotsk Coast, summer 1900. Dina

Jochelson-Brodsky is sitting in the middle; a tall man standing to her left is Norman Buxton (?) (AMNH 4 1 88)

63
8/ The transport ofthe JNPE collections near Yakutsk, East Siberia, spring 1902. Photographer, WaldemarJochelson

(AMNH 1755)

64
9/ Waldemar Bogoras, with the expedition collection freight ready for shipping out of Novo-Mariinsk, summer

1901 . Note the label on one of the crates: "Jessup (sic!) Expedition. Jochelson. Vladivostock via Nagasaki." Other

crates carry label "Anadyr" (in Cyrillic) and a Russian double-head eagle imperial seal (AMNH 22332)
/ 0/Jochelson's reindeer team with the JNPE collections, East Siberia, 1 90 1 (?) (AMNH4206)

66
/ //Jesup Expedition Siberian collections displayed at the AMNH. Photographer, R.E. Dahlgren (AMNH 3 1 003)

6 7
1 2/ Example of old Eskimo twined basketry (pack sack) issran (Central Yup'ik). Collected by

James W. VanStone on Nunivok Island, 1952 (UAM 554-5446)

68
14/Closeup ofgrass-coiling technique

(Reprinted from: Otis Mason 1902, Fig.] 31).

/ 5/ Closeup oftwined-grass technique

(Reprinted from: Otis Mason 1902, Fig.] 52)

] 6/ Miner Bruce basi<et

from Kotzebue Sound. Photographer, Aniba] Rodriguez

(AMNH cat. #60-2324)
/ 7/ Early coiled beach-grass basket. Collected by Lt. CM. Stoney on Putnam or Kobuk River,

northern Alaska, 1887 (NMNH cat. #1 27891

)

70
19/ Eskimo in skin boats (umiaks^ ready to trade with the passing ship. Port Clarence, Alaska, 1899. Harriman

Expedition (NMM P-l 1078)

7 1
RUSSIAN .TRADE

..GOODS

\

Sakha/Yakut

160

/ - Reindeer skins ^ Maritime products: sea mammal

oil, seal and walrus skins, ivory ; ^ Land peltries:sable,fox (Siberia);

fox, beaver, lynx, marten (Alaska) /

Manufactures, etc.: clothing,

pipes, bowls, beadwork, dogs,

berries, wood, jade, chert O Major trade centers

180

Yukagir

Evenk \

Nizhnekolymsk

East Siberian Sea I

Wrangel Is.

In**'

Yukagir

,

Okhotsk^

'Evenk

/

Even //

ll

/J.

Chukchi

Markovo

Anadyri

/

50 / Ncgidal TSakhalin

AlbazinV?. r"'"^^''^''' V ^"^"f'"

lirn, V'tof,

f It'elmenJ

jizhic

Chukchi

Qulfof ^ Anadyr '^i^

Koryak

Nizhne Kamchatsk AMERICAN

WHALERS

Bolsheretskf Petropavlovsk

Ci. Aleut

Kuril Is.

PACIFIC OCEAN

20/ North Pacific-Sibehan-Alaskan Trade Systems, ca. / 775-1900. Adapted from Fitzhugh and Crowell 1 988:236-37, with

revisions.

72
140

Commercial trade goods: Russian traders (tobacco, break tea, beads, iron implements,

firearms, clothing); Chinese and

Japanese traders ( tea, beads, porcelai

firearms, l<nives, clothing); Hudson Bay

Company (blankets, tobacco, firearms,

knives, and axes); American whalers

(alcohol , firearms, ammunition,

woodem boats, tobacco, clothing).

Limit ofpolar ke

Trade goods moved from east to west, and north to south, creating a crossroads oflinked cultures across the Bering Sea area.

7 3

20/ North PadPc-Sibehari-Alaskan Trade Systems, cc. 1775-1 900. Adapted from Fitzhugh and Crowell 1 98S:236}1 • Tr.de goods moved from east to west, and north to south, creating a crossroads oflinked cultures across the Bering Sea area.

72
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

2// Sfl/V/f /.OM/rence Island coiled beach-grass tray. Collected by Dr. Riley D. Moore, 1912

(NMNH cat. #280637)

22/ Chukchi basket. Collected by

Waldemar Bogoras, Jesup North

Pacific Expedition, 1 900-0 1 . Photographer, Am'bal Rodriguez (AMNH

cat. #70-7952)

7 4
75
24/ Koryak coiled grass basket. Collected by Waldemar and Dina Jochelson, Jesup North

Pacific Expedition, 1900-01. Photographer, Antbal Rodriguez (AMNH cat. # 70-3932, 70-3352)

25/ Koryak coiled willow root basket. Collected by Waldemar and Dina Jochelson, Jesup North Pacific Expedition, 1 900-0 1 . Photographer, Am'bal Rodriguez (AMNH cat. # 70-3 1 95)

76
26/ Chinese tea basket, bamboo with porcelain tea cups. Collected by Berthold Laufer, Jesup North Pacific Expedition, 1898-99. Photographer, Anfbal Rodriguez (AMNH cat. # 70-2638)

27/Ainu basket (ter\k\). Collected by Bashford Dean, in Hokkaido

Shikiu, 1901 (AMNH cat. #70-

4091 A&B)

7 7
28/ Koryak basket makers at work. WaldemarJochelson (Dina Jochelson-Brodsky?), photographer, 1 900-0 1 (AMNH

1576)

78
[diffusion and (^.oionial /\ntl-iropo!ogL):

"J^heones of CZ-hange in the (^ontext of Jesup 1

MOLLY LEE NELSON H. H. GRABURN

The centennial of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition is

a fitting occasion on which to reexamine the construct

of diffusion, which has lain dormant since the grand

theories of the 19th century fell from anthropological

grace. Without question, one of Franz Boas' main interests in verifying the Asian origins of North American

indigenous cultures was to chart the distribution of

cultural elements across Siberia and into Alaska (Boas

1 903:73). Nevertheless, Jesup Expedition publications,

and those by Boas himself, map the spread of such

elements among the Native cultures of Siberia, but are

uniformly unenlightening on links across Bering Strait. The overarching argument of this paper is that diffusion theory never reached its full potential in Jesup

Expedition publications because the Boasian model

used by its investigators failed to incorporate the agency of World System Theory (Wallerstein 1 974).

Their perspective ignored hybrid cultural forms emerging from the cross fertilization of the North Pacific in- digenous peoples with the world system into which

they were linked by the fur trade, the Yankee whaling

industry, and the other forms of commerce that escalated across the North at the turn of the 20th century.

Whereas Boas and his contemporaries discussed in some detail Native-Native contacts, they bracketed

out the trans-Beringian connection, a route largely controlled by Western traders and whalers, because at

that time, Native-Western interactions did not fall within

the scope of anthropology (see also Schweitzer, this

volume). We use a case study of the transmission of

two hybrid forms of coiled basketry across Siberia and Alaska through the agency of the world sys- tem to illustrate our point.

The World System and the Spread of Coiled

Basketry across Siberia and Bering Strait

The hypothetical spread of coiled basketry across Siberia from two different sources, the Chinese border

and the Kamchatka Peninsula, underscores the pivotal

role of the world system in the diffusion of cultural

traits in the areas studied by the Jesup Expedition. It

also makes clear the contribution that material culture

studies can make to our understanding of culture history. In an era when most branches of anthropology

have abandoned the search for relationships between

the cultural forms of one group and another, material

culture studies and archaeology have retained this approach, not out of any belief that it might lead to the

discovery of "Ur-forms," but because the cultural di- mensions of material objects can only be understood

by charting their variants through time and space. Our

research into the spread of coiled basketry across Siberia and into Alaska, for example, illustrates how the

failure to take non-Native agency into consideration

created an artificially static picture of culture change

in the North when the reality was both complex and

infinitely protean.

Aboriginally, Alaskan Eskimo people from Bristol Bay to Barrow made basketry and matting in the

twined technique (Fig. 12). Between 1878 and 1881,

79
however, Edward W. Nelson collected two types of

coiled basketry in the region of Bering Strait (Fig. 1 3)

for which there was no archaeological precedent (Lee

1995:58; Nelson 1899:202-5). Coiling is completely

different from twining. Twining involves twisting two

flexible weft strands around a set of rigid warp elements. Coiling, by contrast, consists of overwrapping

a foundation of one or more fibers with a weft strand

and at the same time securing one revolution of the

coil to the next (Figs. 14, 1 5).

Nelson's findings of the newly appearing coiled

basketry around Bering Strait were soon joined by those

of others, such as Miner Bruce on the northern edge of

the Seward Peninsula (Fig. 16) and Murdoch at Point Barrow (Murdoch 1892:326-7; VanStone 1980:50-

1 ). The first type of coiled basketry to appear in Alaska was made of beach grass {Elymus mollis), and spiraled

from the center of the base in a technique known as

bundle coiling (Fig. 1 7). The other, made of willowroot, is constructed in the single-rod, non-interlocking

coiling technique (Fig. 18; see Mason 1904/1972:

247c). The only ethnic group near the Eskimo people

to use any form of coiling was the Athabaskan Indians, who made single-rod willow-root baskets in the same technique as those in the Nelson collection; however, none is known to predate them (Lee 1995:59).

Given the constant flow of traffic, both Native and

non-Native, across Bering Strait during the whaling and

trading era of the late-nineteenth century (Fig. 1 9), the

next logical place to look for the sources of the two

types of Eskimo coiled ware is in Siberia.

Trade Routes between Siberia and Alaska

Establishing a connection between Alaskan Eskimo and

Siberian coiled basketry depends on demonstrating

technological similarities between them and a possible means of their transmission. In a global sense,

Alaska was the final meeting point of the world-encircling capitalist trading system linking Europe and Asia. By 1 750, Russian fur traders and commercial hunters

had moved across Siberia as far south as Kamchatka,

as far north as Chukotka (the Chukchi Peninsula), and

as far east as Alaska (Fisher 1 943). At the same time,

the North American arm of the fur trade, in the form of

the Hudson Bay Company, was approaching Alaska

from the East, reaching British Columbia by 1 843 and

Fort Yukon in the interior Alaskan Arctic by 1 847 (Fig.

20).More immediately, Alaska was directly connected

to Siberia by Native and western commerce by the

late nineteenth century. As Dorothy J. Ray has put it,

the waters of Bering Strait functioned as "an intercontinental highway, its coastal fringes occupied by

peoples who had more or less the same way of life"

(Ray 1 975:1 0). In the ice-free summertime, both people

and commodities moved back and forth by this route

in large skin boats known as umiaks. European trade goods had reached the coast of Alaska via Siberia

well before the arrival of the first white explorers (Ray

1975:197). Thus the presence of Europeans and the

proliferation of imported goods they brought along

served to stimulate—but not initiate—a pre-existing

practice of tapping into a world system of trade.

Certain groups in the Bering Strait region were central to trans-Beringian trade, notably the Chukchi on

the Asian side and in Alaska, the Eskimo people of the

coastal settlements along Norton and Kotzebue

sounds and the strategically located St. Lawrence, King,

Big and Little Diomede, and Sledge islands (Bogojavlensky 1969; VanStone 1980:10). By 1900, furthermore, Siberian Yupik Eskimo and Chukchi, were crossing the strait every summer in skin boats to participate

in the trade fairs that had become annual events on

Kotzebue Sound, Port Clarence, and at other locations

(Burch 1988:234-40; 1998:151-62). Here, as many

as 2000 Native people congregated to trade.

Though there was exchange of indigenous products such as reindeer and sealskins, the trade also

included imported Western goods. At this time, Bering

Strait was the locus of both indirect and direct

Native-Western trade. After 1848, Yankee whalers

also acted as middlemen and took on Eskimo crew

80 100 YEARS/ THEORIES OF CULTURE CHANCE
members on the Alaskan side before they crossed to

Siberia (Bogoras 1 904-9:64; Jochelson 1908:808).

Sailors from the whaling ships also participated in the

Native trade fairs, and later, when the baleen market

faltered, many whalers became traders, exchanging

western goods for furs on both sides of Bering Strait

(Fig. 23; see Bockstoce 1986:180-204). It seems safe

to conclude, then, that Natives on both sides of Bering

Strait participated in a turn-of-the-century version of a

world system and that this system provided a wellestablished route by which artifacts, including baskets,

could have traveled from Siberia to Alaska. (Ray 1 975:

97-9; VanStone 1980:9-11).

Coiled Basketry

Both bundle-coiled grass and single-rod coiled willowroot baskets were made by the Siberian Yupik, Chukchi,

and Koryak people of this region. These baskets share

similarities in shape, decorative designs and other technical features with their Alaskan counterparts.

Bundle-coil grass baskets were commonly made

by the Siberian Yupik people of St. Lawrence Island (Moore to Ales Hrdliaeka, 21 December 1912, NAANMNH 55962; Moore 1923:361), by the reindeer and

maritime Chukchi (Bogoras 1 904-9:225,228), and the Koryak Qochelson 1908:636). According to today's

St. Lawrence Yupik elders, baskets there were undecorated. The few known examples are made with an even- ness of stitch characteristic of trade baskets sold around Bering Strait at the turn of the twentieth century (Fig. 2 1 ). Three grass baskets securely documented

to the Chukchi are known, all reminiscent of Alaskan

Eskimo coiled ware. One, collected by Bogoras, serves

as a base for a leather drawstring bag, as do early

grass and willow-root baskets on the Alaskan side

(Bogoras 1 904-9:224-8). The basket is decorated with

simple geometric designs also reminiscent of Alaska

(Fig. 22). Two later Chukchi grass baskets share ovoid

and rounded shapes similar to Alaskan Eskimo examples. Koryak grass baskets are considerably more

accomplished. Jochelson (1908:631) reports only

M. LEE AND N. H.H. CRABURN

indigenous uses for them; but the repetitive designs

and mass-produced quality on fifteen examples in the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) collection suggests that they were almost certainly made to

sell to outsiders, a practice that was already common

at that time (Fig. 24).

Sources ofSiberian andAlasl<an Coiled Basketry

The distribution of the two types of coiled basketry

among the Siberian Yupik, the Chukchi, and the Koryak

people suggests that these techniques were probably

not much older on the eastern side of Bering Strait

than on its western shore. Furthermore, the archaeological record of northeastern Siberia parallels that of

Alaska: twined ware appears but coiling is absent

(Sergei Arutiunov, personal communication to M.L.,

1 994). What explanations can be found for the sud- den appearance of coiling? Certainly, the broadest answer is that the various northeastern Siberian groups were all interlinked through trade. The Chukchi are known to have traded with the Koryak, Yukagir, and

Even (Antropova and Kuznetsova 1964:803). Chukchi

women apparently had only recently picked up bas- ketmaking from Russianized Natives at trade fairs

(Bogoras 1904-9:228). Most northeastern Siberian

groups also bartered directly or indirectly with Westerners and others from outside the region (Stepanova

et al. 1 964:792-3). Assuming that knowledge of these

two coiled basketry techniques could have been introduced from elsewhere, the historical record suggests that they may have arrived in Siberia from two

different localities to the South. Moreover, the impetus

for their appearance is intimately linked to the spread

of non-Native goods through trade and commerce.

Willow-Root Basketry and the Culture of Tea

The two known Koryak willow-root baskets with

stepped lids and stick starts show strong affinities with

lidded willow baskets collected elsewhere in Siberia

(Fig. 25). Bogoras collected a basket from Russianized

Natives living along the Anadyr River valley, north and

8 1
east of the maritime Koryak that is strikingly similar to

the Koryak willow baskets. Woven in the same single

rod, non-interlocking coiling, the lozenge-shaped,

stepped-lid was collected with tea-cups and tea paraphernalia inside. Possibly, the Koryak willow-root baskets were also used for this purpose. The Koryak were known to value porcelain teacups, which were "preserved as treasures in special boxes " Cochelson 1 908:

580). Moreover, using similarly shaped and woven

baskets for the storage of fragile tea ware seems to have been widespread in Siberia. Among the Khanty

people in Western Siberia, for example, single-rod wil- low baskets were similarly used for storing tea ware

(Popov 1955:106, Plate 20). There is a possible outside source for this practice.

During the 19th century the Chinese exported porcelain tea sets in coiled baskets (Fig. 26). That Siberian

peoples would have seen the Chinese type, or one

deriving from the Chinese type, is certainly possible.

Bundle-coiled Crass Basketry

The coiled grass basketry that appeared in Alaska and

northeastern Siberia at the same time as willow-root

baskets seems to have a related source. Its closest

affinity is with the few known examples of Ainu coiled

basketry (Craburn and Lee 1 999; Saito 1 995). The striking similarities between the twined basketry of the

Ainu, the northeastern Siberians, and the Alaskan Es- kimo have long been noted (Mason 1904:402;

Lawrence Dawson, personal communication to ML and

NC, 1986); but a careful analysis of relationships be- tween Ainu and northeastern Siberian coiled grass ware

is the subject of future research. The few examples of Ainu coiled ware that are known closely resemble Koryak baskets in technique,

shape, and decoration (Fig. 27). The historical literature

attests to frequent contacts between Kurile Ainu and

Kamchatka peoples. It documents trade links between

Koryak and Kurile Ainu (but not between the Kurile and Hokkaido Ainu), but disagrees on whether coiled

basketry might have traveled by this route. In the fu8 2

ture we plan to focus on this complex problem.

Discussion: Boasian Models of Change

What, then, does the example of the sporadic spread

of coiled basketry across the North Pacific area, from

Siberia to Alaska, suggest about Boas's theories of

diffusion? Let us step back for a moment to consider

theories of culture change as expounded by Franz Boas,

the leading anthropological organizer and theoretician

of the Jesup Expedition.

Early in his career. Boas was very open to the "prin- •

ciple of the theory of evolution. . . [which] opens the

vast field of natural sciences to the historical method"

(Boas 1889, in Stocking 1982:67). Thus, he claimed,

the understanding of a people not only required knowledge of their history, but of the history of their ancestors, so that there is a "continuity of inventions and

ideas from the level of primitive people up to our own

time." Furthermore, he asserted at the time, because

the histories of any one area are undoubtedly in- complete, any approach to local history would al- ways have to rely on the comparative method, that

is, to draw its conclusions with the aid of data from

other areas assumed to be at comparable evolutionary levels. As further ethnological data became available, it grew increasingly difficult to uphold the integrity of

these evolutionary levels and their strict placement in

a universal evolutionary hierarchy. For instance, Boas' own data on the family system of the Inuit people of

Baffin Island (Boas 1888), confirmed the anomalous

finding that their kinship-terminology system placed

them at the same "level" as Euro-Americans. Thus, in

his famous article, "The Limitations of the Comparative

Method of Anthropology" (Boas 1896), he rejected as

unscientific the possibility of both completing the evolutionary history of mankind and the search for ulti- mate origins of social customs and technologies. In its

place, he privileged historical particularism, stressing

detailed knowledge of local ethnological histories, to

be gathered from the fast-disappearing Native elders

100 YEARS/ THEORIES OF CULTURE CHANCE
in the rapidly changing milieu of Indian and other tribes under the imperial sway.

While carrying out his own detailed ethnographic

fieldwork on the Northwest Coast, and being aware

of the equally detailed work of others in the region

(Emmons 1 903, 1 991 ) and further north (e.g. Murdoch

1892; Nelson 1899), Boas foresaw the possibility of

putting together these local histories—these individual

pieces of the ethnological jigsaw puzzle—into larger

regional histories. In the North Pacific area. Boas planned

the Jesup Expedition as such a large-scale research

project by choosing those pieces of this geographical

puzzle that required fitting in place. In the first volume

of the JNPE publications (1898) that is, after only one

season of expedition fieldwork, he placed the effort

within a larger universal frame by stating, "We must, so

far as we can, reconstruct the actual history of mankind, before we can hope to discover the laws underlying that history." (Boas 1898:1). In other words, instead of using the laws of the comparative method to

fill in the gaps in reconstructing local histories, it should

be the other way round, with the construction of comparative laws being the end point of all human historical research. As to specific methods for construction of particularistic and regional histories. Boas was unfortunately

rather unclear both in defining and assigning the relative importance of migration versus diffusion, and about

relating actual field data to either proposition. In this

first jesup Expedition volume, he generalized "In short,

historical changes of far-reaching importance took place

long before the tribes became known to history. They

imply mixture of blood, as well as exchange of cultural achievement" (Boas 1 898:6).

In 1903, in his overview article in the American

Museum Journal about the results of the jesup Expedition, after the fieldwork had been conducted. Boas

essentialy plagiarized himself. Apart from adding descriptions of the later field seasons, the article is otherwise word for word identical with his 1898 introductory piece, with the exception that "Franz Boas" has

become "Prof. Franz Boas" or "Professor Boas." (1 903:78,

82). His preliminary conclusions, which highlight the

importance not of diffusion but of invasive migration

and gradual differentiation (akin to linguistic drift?) due

to slow spreading migration, are:

The unity of the race was much greater in former times than it is now; that the invasion

[migration] of eastern tribes in America, such

as the Eskimo, Athapaskan and Salish, and of

the western and southern tribes in Asia, such

as Yakut and Tungus, have disturbed the former conditions [i.e. of the contiguity of

the Chukchi, Koryak, Yukagir, and the Indians

of the American northwest coast]. Nevertheless, enough remains to lead us to think that the tribes of this whole area must be considered as a single race or at least that their culture is a single culture [changed by

'gradual differentiation'?]. Thus the jesup

Expedition seems to have established the

close relationship between the peoples of

Asia and America (Boas 1 903:1 1 5).

The following year, in a major address on "The History of Anthropology" (1 904), Boas was more explicit.

He differentiated between "the historical method,

which endeavors to reconstruct the actual history of

mankind; and the other, the generalizing method, which

attempts to establish laws" (ibid:514). He related how

these two had come into conflict, how they are fundamentally opposed, and how "all scientists were equally

guilty of premature theories of evolution based on observed homologies and supposed similarities"

(ibid:516). He then considered the "psychic causes" of men's propensity to evolve through a fixed evolutionary sequence of stages, as well as "the influence of

geographical environment . . . [where] the main stress

is laid on the causes which bring about modifications

of the fundamental and identical traits" (ibid:51 7). He

contrasted "independent origins [i.e., evolution of the same stages and associations in different places—ML,

NC] . . . and transmission from one part of the world to

another" while warning readers about Ratzel's claim

that "all sameness of cultural traits must be accounted

for by transmission." He concluded that "it requires

actual investigation into the individual history of such

M. LEE AND N. H.H. CRABURN 83
customs to discover the causes of their present distribution" (ibid:519) and that "the grand system of the

evolution of culture, that is valid for all humanity, is

losing much of its plausibility" (ibid:522).

In later publications touching on the results of the

Jesup Expedition, Boas concluded "many of the cultural elements that are widely spread in the Old World

have found their way to America" (Boas 1 925:22-3). In

another paper, he was even more vague: "what is com- mon to the two Americas [in comparison with 'fundamental traits of Old World culture'—ML, NG]," he wrote,

"may be due as well to diffusion as to antiquity. Furthermore, most generalized traits of culture may have

developed independently in most areas" (Boas

1 933:363). Few of Boas' observations on Old and New

World connections as we have seen, are closely rea- soned enough to see him testing theory against data. Of interest in light of the subject of this paper, Boas

declined to consider the distribution of any form of

basketry out of the misconception that it was unknown

to the Eskimo people: "Less certain," he says, "are the

conclusions to be drawn from the distribution of weaving, which is present in all parts of the Old World, but seems to be absent among the Eskimo" (Boas 1 925:24). Boas and his contemporaries did not focus on the

actual mechanisms of diffusion. This came up a generation later in anthropological theory, particularly in

the acculturation literature (Redfield et al. 1 934; Schweitzer, this volume). In the North Pacific area, various mechanisms of "pre-capitalist" exchange had been recorded,

including "silent trade," armed exchange, begging, and

boasting (Burch 1 988:234-8). By the beginning of the

nineteenth century, trade had become more routinized, with regular trade fairs, units of currency, credit, and so on, all of which were known to the Jesup Expedition researchers. It is probably true that tea drinking,

tea sets, coiled baskets for tea sets, and the technique

of coiling itself followed these well-worn routes.

At the turn of the twentieth century, it was acceptable in American academic circles to seek explanations, whether diffusionary or evolutionary, only

among cultures having "pure" Native culture elements.

The assumption was that such cultures were on the edge of extinction; thus it was they who demanded

scientific attention. As a result, Boas for the most part

studiously ignored evidence of Native-Western trade and of hybrid forms and said little about the hybrid

(Creolized) peoples who produced and transmitted

them; the one exception was his early interest in the music of urban Indian songs in Vancouver, performed

in Chinook jargon (see Jacknis, this volume). In fact,

turn-of-the-century American collectors of material

culture, for instance, the American Museum of Natural

History and the Smithsonian Institution, boasted that

they had rejected genres that bore any evidence of

contact with the outside world (Craburn 1996:12-3).

We must draw a line, however, between Boas the

theorist and organizer, and his seasoned though relatively untrained and politically idealistic Russian exile

field workers, Bogoras and Jochelson. These Russians were critical of the Tzar's administrative policies in the

area and were well aware of the negative impact of

colonialism. Their detailed ethnographies mentioned

hybrid cultural forms without placing them in an evolutionary or diffusionary framework; however they did

not give too much detail on the multi-cultural communities—Native, white, or mixed—that grew up in the wake of colonization and trade. Bogoras made many

references to the Creole/mixed population in the Anadyr

River valley, and he described its role in intercultural

transmission. In the case of coiled basketry, for example, Bogoras referred to the Chukchi willow root

weaving: "One or two of the Chukchee . . . make better baskets of willow-roots, but the style is wholly

copied after the work of Russianized natives" (Bogoras

1 904-9:228). Jochelson avoided Creole people and

mixed cultural traits in his Koryak work (Fig. 28); but in

his volume on the Yukagir (1 926) he focused on Siberian Native groups whose culture was deeply disrupted

by Russian contact, Christianization, language loss, material culture change, and population decline through

disease. Boas organized the Jesup Expedition publica84 100 YEARS/ THEORIES OF CULTURE CHANCE
tions so that these "historically contingent" matters were included in the regional reports; but he paid little

or no attention to them in his explanatory models of

trans-Beringian flows, even though such contacts were

evident to all.

It was only decades later that American anthropologists began to study Western-influenced Native

material cultures (cf. Craburn 1 976). Therefore, it is not

surprising to discover that more recent paradigms, such

as transnationalism, have considerable relevance to the

study of hybrid cultural forms such as the coiled basketry of the Circumpolar North. According to Lavie and

Swedenburg (1996:9), for example: "Hybrid products

are thus results of a long history of confrontations be- tween unequal cultures and forces. . . . The hybridizations we encounter therefore are not just the product

of entirely 'new,' epochal postmodern conditions [but

also resemble the old conditions]." This observation

could apply equally to the hybrid cultural forms such

as the coiled basketry of the North Pacific Rim during

thejesup Expedition era. Indeed, we believe that the

so-called post-colonial model proposed by Lavie and

Swedenburg (1 996), Appadurai (1 990, 1 991 ), and Inda

(1996) is productive for the analysis of colonial contexts under discussion here. Appadurai (1 990), for instance, argues that migrating populations impact state and local politics, carrying with them new mechanical and informational technologies, bringing along with them transnational in- vestments and new political ideologies; all of these

could characterize Siberia of the mid-nineteenth century. In contrast, the evolutionary and diffusionary para- digms informing Jesup Expedition research were not

only inadequate for the colonial context but can be

better seen as hypothetical models conceived for imagined but unobservable past. To return to the title of our paper, we would argue

that diffusionism was not a satisfactory model for an- thropology of the colonial period, and that the

transnationalist model developed for the anthropology of the post-colonial period furnishes a more adM. LEE AND N. H.H. CRABURN

equate lens through which to consider the hybridity

that defined it.

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to extend their gratitude to the

organizers of the Jesup Centennial Conference for their

invitation to participate and for the stimulation the occasions and the ensemble of participants presented.

They would particularly like to acknowledge the editorial guidance of Igor Krupnik.

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M. LEE AND N. H.H. CRABURN

*~["he Jesup Expedition and jts /\naiogue5:

/\ (^.omparisoi

STANLEY A. FREED, RUTH S. FREED,

AND LAILA WILLIAMSON

Several great expeditions of the 1 9th century have an

aura of melodrama about them. They bring to mind

hero-explorers operating in rugged country with little

logistical support from a distant homeland, overcoming obstacles by ingenuity, courage, and persistence.

The men who organized and led their own expeditions were resolute entrepreneurs with a strong interest, often tantamount to an obsession, in some scientific problem. The leaders of expeditions under governmental aegis were frequently military officers. They

were experienced commanders, adept at leading small companies of men in difficult, sometimes dangerous

circumstances. Leaders of both types of expeditions

often carried out some of the expedition's scholarly

work; more commonly they acted as the principal scientists of the personally organized expeditions.

Some expeditions of the 19th century have be- come legendary scientific endeavors, the Jesup North

Pacific Expedition (JNPE) among them. What accounts

for the enduring fascination of the Jesup Expedition? It was a great adventure story, which is perhaps the chief

reason; but it had other less obvious features. They are

best seen when the Jesup Expedition is compared to

other famous expeditions of the 1 9th century. We have

chosen three well-known expeditions for comparative

purposes, the Lewis and Clark Expedition (1 803-6), the

U. S. Exploring Expedition (1 838-42), and the Cambridge

Anthropological Expedition to Torres Straits (1 898-9).

The first two were American, the third one British.

The Jesup North Pacific Expedition

(1897-1902)

Franz Boas (1 858-1 942), a young assistant curator in

the Department of Anthropology of the American Mu- seum of Natural History (AMNH), conceived and organized the North Pacific Expedition in 1 896-7, to study

the relationship between Native peoples of Northeast

Asia and North America. Boas was keenly aware that

the wealth of the American Museum's trustees and

friends could be used to support research and collecting, and he lost no time in Joining with Frederic Ward

Putnam (1839-1915), the head of the Department of

Anthropology, to seek the support of Morris K. Jesup,

the AMNH President, for a research project of extraordinary scope and ambition. Putnam and Boas presented

Jesup with a six-year project for research on both sides

of the Bering Strait.

Putnam's participation was vital, because Boas was

a new employee of the Museum, who had yet to prove

himself to Jesup. Despite Putnam's role as catalyst and some press reports that Putnam was in charge', the

expedition was cleady Boas' idea (Vakhtin 2001:74).

Jesup liked big projects and important problems. Putnam

and Boas played on this aspect of Jesup's personality,

arguing that their project would settle the intriguing

question of the origin of the first people to enter the New World from Northern Asia. After an unsuccessful

effort to raise money from his fellow philanthropists,

Jesup vowed to fund the project personally.

8 9
The estimated field expenses of the expedition have

been variously reported as from $10,000 to $40,000

per year. The New York Times {March 12, 1897: 12) gave

a figure of $60,000 or $10,000 per year. Kennedy

(1 968:1 42), citing correspondence between Jesup and

Boas, said, "[Jesup] agreed to underwrite the expenses

of the expedition for six years, at an estimated cost of

$40,000 a year." Boas unsuccessfully suggested a fouryear extension of the expedition at a cost of $ 1 00,000,

which indicates an annual cost of $25,000 (Kennedy

1 968: 1 44). There were also later expenses of publication (Cole 2001:39-41). The final cost of the expedition will probably never be known with any precision.

The Jesup Expedition, announced in March 1897,

generated considerable interest in the popular press. The origin of the American Indians is "the biggest of

the unsolved anthropological and ethnical problems"

and "alive with human and historic interest," stated The

New York Times in an editorial of March 1 4, 1 897. Science, the bellwether American scientific journal, published a four-page unsigned article [presumably written by Boas—eds.] about the expedition a few months

after the departure of the first field party (Anonymous

1 897). The following summary of theJNPE activities is based upon our earlier papers (Freed et al. 1988a,

1988b, 1997), as well as upon other review publications that appeared in recent years (Cole 1 999, 2001

Vakhtin 2001).

The expedition's research on the Northwest Coast

of North America was carried out by young professionals, supplemented by a few local amateurs under

Boas' direction and close supervision. Harlan I. Smith

(1872-1940), who served at the American Museum

until 191 1 and eventually became Chief Archaeologist of the National Museum of Canada, excavated

sites in British Columbia and Washington State. While Boas was not impressed with him intellectually, he

nonetheless considered him to be a reliable person

who could be successful with direction. Indeed he was; Smith contributed five volumes to the Jesup North Pacific Expedition series, and made important collections.

John R. Swanton (1873-1958), who joined the Bureau of American Ethnology Just after receiving his

doctorate in 1 900, was seconded to the Jesup Expedition for about a year to study the Haida people of

the Queen Charlotte Islands. The Bureau paid his salary

($50 per month) and received all the lexical and grammatical material that he collected, whereas the Jesup

Expedition paid his traveling and field expenses. All

ethnological material, including texts, thus became the

property of the American Museum (Boas to W.J. McCee,

1 Oct. 1900, AMNH-DA; Jonaitis 1988:197-201).

Livingston Farrand (1 867-1 939), then professor of psychology at Columbia University, was a member of

Boas' first field party, which left New York in late May

1897 for Spences Bridge, British Columbia. Boas,

Farrand, and Smith, the third member of the team, met

James Teit, a local resident, who became their field

guide and the fourth member of a small party (Wickwire,

this volume). The group then left for Bella Coola. Farrand dropped out when the team reached the Chilcotin;

there he remained for a disappointing month collecting sparse ethnographic information and trying to measure heads. The next summer, 1 898, he worked

with indifferent success among the Quileute and

Quinault Indians of Washington State. He published

only three slim papers in the JNPE series but collected some outstanding artworks Oonaitis 1988:191).

George Hunt (1854-1933) and James Teit (1864-

1 922), local residents and amateur ethnographers who

straddled Euro-Canadian and Indian cultures, were two

of the most important and productive members of

Boas' team. Hunt was raised in Fort Rupert, British Co- lumbia as a Kwakwaka'wakw (KwakiutI), spoke their

language fluently, was literate in English, and was a

steady and reliable worker. The association of Hunt

and Boas began in 1 886, during Boas' first trip to the Kwakwaka'wakw. Boas taught Hunt to write the

Kwakwaka'wakw language while Hunt was assisting

him with his work for the World's Columbian Exposition in 1893. Hunt was truly a remarkable man. Boas

recognized his potential, helped him to develop it, and

90 100 YEARS/ COMPARISON OF EXPEDITIONS
acknowledged his accomplishments by making him

collaborator and coauthor of numerous publications.

"|T|he Boas-Hunt relationship was one of the most productive and enduring ever to exist between an anthropologist and a member of another culture. [It] was

based upon mutual interest, respect, and affection"

(Codere 1966:xxviii; see also Berman 2001).

James A. Teit, a Scotsman who lived among the NIaka'pamux (Thompson) Indians, authored two substantial monographs on the Thompson and another on the Lillooet Indians for the JNPE series; he also collected some exceptionally fine Salish artworks (Wickwire, this volume). After the Expedition, Teit worked

on behalf of Indian rights. "The British Columbian natives had immense respect and admiration for, and

trust in, this man, whom they asked to accompany

them to meetings with government officials. . . .Teit

served as translator, sometimes working simultaneously

in four or five different languages" Gonaitis 1 988: 1 90). The Siberian operations of the Jesup Expedition

began a year later than the North American research and covered an area many times as large under conditions much more difficult than on the American side.

Fieldwork on the Siberian side was an ordeal mainly

because of the hostile environment.-^ Climate, terrain,

illness, insects, and the vast distances that had to be

covered by horse, reindeer sled, dog sled, boat, and

raft, or on foot made research a dangerous adventure.

It called forth a toughness that is rarely required in the

present age of modern transport and communication.

Moreover, the Russian government made trouble. The

Canadian and American governments took no interest

in the activities of Boas and his team, and would help

if asked. The Russian government took a definite and

hostile interest in the three principal JNPE investigators

in Siberia, Berthold Laufer (1874-1934), Waldemar

Bogoras (1 865-1 936), and WaldemarJochelson (1 855-

1937). The former happened to be a foreigner and a

Jew; the latter two were former Russian political exiles, who spent several years in Siberia for their anti-government activities (Freed et al. 1997:12).

S. A, FREED, R. S. FREED, AND L. WILLIAMSON

Three teams carried out the Asian fieldwork. Laufer's team surveyed along the Amur River and on Sakhalin

Island in the southern section of the Siberian Pacific

region, whereas Bogoras' and Jochelson's parties covered northeastern Siberia. The Amur River team of Laufer and amateur archaeologist Gerard Fowke was first into

the field. Laufer arrived on Sakhalin Island on July 10,

1 898, where he remained until March 21,1 899, studying the Cilyak (Nivkh), Evenk (Tungus), and Ainu. He

crossed to the mainland on March 25, and settled in Khabarovsk on the Amur River to study the Nanay

(Gold). When navigation opened in late May, he de- scended the river, visiting Nanay and Gilyak villages on the way. Although he had a taste for fieldwork and

for the most part stoically endured its hardships, his endurance was sorely taxed by some frightening illnesses and accidents, among them a two-and-a-half month siege of influenza and pneumonia, and a plunge

through weak ice into frigid water that would have

been fatal had not his guide saved him.

Laufer's published account in the Jesup North Pacific Expedition series was disappointing, especially

when compared to the classic ethnographies produced

by Bogoras and Jochelson. His only JNPE volume was a

slim, well-illustrated monograph on the art of the Amur

River peoples (Laufer 1 902). He was especially fascinated by the art of the Nanay and their neighbors, and

he collected many of their superb artworks for the American Museum (Kendall 1 988:1 04). After the Jesup

Expedition, Laufer Joined the Field Museum of Natural

History in 1 908, where he spent the remainder of his

scholarly career. For many years he was easily the outstanding American Sinologist.

Gerard Fowke (1855-1933), Laufer's fleeting and

often grudging team partner (Cole 2001 :36-7), was a

largely self-taught itinerant adventurer who was drawn

to archaeology by his love for outdoor life and taste

for exotic customs. He worked at various occupations

for about 1 5 years, schoolteacher among them. When

he was 30, he abandoned teaching for research in ar- chaeology and geology. For his Siberian research of

9 1
1 898, he recruited two local companions and set out

in a large open boat to explore the Amur River from

the village of Verkhne-Tambovsk to the town of Nikolayevsk, about 330 miles downstream at the mouth of

the river. From there he traveled out into Tartar Strait,

along the coast to the Sea of Okhotsk, and back to

Nikolayevsk. They found nothing of any interest; Fowke

himself acknowledged that his work was a "dismal

fizzle." Boas considered him to have been a mistake

and permitted him only one season in Siberia. Undaunted, Fowke continued his archaeological research

in the United States well into his seventies. On the recommendation of Professor Vasily V. Radloff, the Secretary of the Russian Academy of Sciences,

Boas entrusted fieidwork in northern Siberia to Walde- mar Jochelson and Waldemar Bogoras. Both were already veterans of several years of Siberian field research when they joined the Jesup Expedition team. Friends

and colleagues, they were Russian intellectuals and

revolutionaries who in their youth were exiled to Siberia where they became ethnographers. The theme of

loss through exile and recovery through science gives

the lives of Jochelson and Bogoras a special piquancy.

A young American, Norman C. Buxton, was charged

with zoological collecting of behalf of the AMNH; he was added to the group when Jochelson and Bogoras

passed through New York on their way to Siberia (Hoffmann, this volume). Jochelson also engaged Alex- ander Axelrod, a Russian emigre student from Zurich,

as a general assistant, particularly for carrying on geographical work (Boas 1903:101).

The team of Waldemar Bogoras and his wife Sofia

(later to be Joined by Axelrod) arrived at Mariinsky Post

at the mouth of the Anadyr River in July 1 900. They

spent three months with the local Chukchi. At the end

of October 1 900, Bogoras went on a long journey to

northern Kamchatka for an arranged meeting with Jochelson's team. Traveling mostly by dog sled, he was on

the move for the rest of his twelve and a half months

in Northeast Asia. He generally remained no more than

a few weeks in any location. Terrain and illness made

9 2

the trip an ordeal. While her husband traveled, Sofia Bogoras stayed in the small local town of Markovo on

the Anadyr River and at Mariinsky Post, making collections for the American Museum.

Bogoras published five contributions for the JNPE

series, most prominently on the Chukchi. He and Sofia Bogoras collected ethnographic data, linguistic notes and 150 texts, 4,500 ethnographic artifacts, skeletal

material, plaster casts of faces, archaeological speci- mens, 95 phonographic records, and somatological

measurements of some 860 individuals. No modern

anthropological couple has collected such a diversity

of data. After the Expedition, Bogoras had a distin- guished career in Russia, engaging in scientific and literary work. In 1 932, he established the Museum of the

History of Religion of the Russian Academy of Sci- ences and he was its first director until his death in

1936.

While the Bogorases were occupied with the

Chukchi and the Siberian Yupik (Eskimo) in the North,

Jochelson, his wife Dina Jochelson-Brodsky, and their

associates, Axelrod and Buxton, made another JNPE

Siberian team that studied the Koryak and Tungus (Even)

along the Sea of Okhotsk, and later, the Yukagir and

Sakha (Yakut) of the interior Northeast Siberia. On August 1 6, 1 900, they arrived in Kushka, a small village

at the mouth of the Cizhiga River. Thejochelsons then

made a difficult journey to the villages of the Maritime

Koryak in Penzhina Bay, where they spent the first half

of the winter of 1 900 living most of the time in native underground dwellings. Conditions were almost intolerable. Lice were the greatest torment. "As long as we

remained in these dwellings we could not escape these

insects, which we dreaded more than any of the privations of our journey" (Boas 1 903:1 04). The Jochelsons made comprehensive studies of the

Koryak, Even, Yukagir, and Sakha people. They collected about 4,400 ethnographic specimens, 41 face

casts, measurements of 900 individuals, 1 ,200 photographs, phonographic cylinders, skulls and archaeological specimens, and a small zoological collection.

100 YEARS/ COMPARISON OF EXPEDITIONS
Jochelson published three ethnographic monographs

for the American IVluseum; his wife Dina, who later

earned a degree in medicine, handled all the anthropometric work and most of the photography. She published several papers and a Ph.D. thesis on Native

women of Northeast Siberia.

After the JNPE, Jochelson led the Aleut-Kamchatka

Expedition of the Imperial Russian Geographical Society in 1909-1 1. Dina Jochelson-Brodsky, again, joined

him as a field partner. From 1912 to 1922, he was

division curator of the Museum of Anthropology and

Ethnography of the Russian Academy of Sciences in

St. Petersburg/Petrograd; from 1922 until his death in New York fifteen years later, Jochelson was associated

with the American Museum and the Carnegie Institution of Washington.

The Jesup Expedition confirmed the close relationship of the Native populations of northwestern North

America and northeastern Asia and strongly supported

the view that the ancestors of the American Indians came from Asia. Boas, Jochelson, and Bogoras tried to go beyond these currently accepted points but their

analyses have not gained favor. From the data collected by the Jesup Expedition, Boas discerned a close

cultural affiliation between eastern Siberia and the region of Southern Alaska and British Columbia, a cultural "break" between the east Siberian tribes and the

Eskimo, and a "fundamental break" between the northeast Siberian tribes and the Tungus and Yakut to the

west. He wrote, the "Chukchee, Koryak, Kamchadal

(Itelmen), and the Yukaghir must be classed with the American race rather than with the Asiatic race." In

brief, the JNPE postulated an assumed reverse migration ofAmerican Indians to Siberia; Jochelson later gave

the name "Americanoids" to the people descended

from these hypothetical reverse migrants (Ousley 2000).

The Americanoid theory never gained serious attention and is considered today a historical curiosity.

Today, a century after the Jesup Expedition, its published ethnographies and museum collections retain

their importance; but the contributions of the Expedition to solving the problem of the origin of the ancient

Native Americans have been far superseded by later

research. Just before Boas and his party left for the Northwest Coast in 1 897, The New York Times wrote

that the origin of the American Indians is "the biggest

of the unsolved anthropological and ethnical problems"

and "alive with human and historic interest." That com- ment is as true today as it was 1 00 years ago. In those

days, the issue was purely scientific, and anthropologists were the only players. There were few theories to

be tested and the question lacked the political nu- ances that it has since acquired. Technology was simple

and before the Jesup Expedition data sets were sparse. Today, high technology (like radiocarbon dating and

DNA studies) provides the key arguments, whereas

ancient and surprising skeletal finds, and newly dis- covered archaeological sites indicate that the question of the origins of the First Americans is much more

complex than imagined a century ago. The next "Jesup

Expedition" will probably explore the problem primarily in modern laboratories rather than in the Siberian

wilderness.

The Lewis and Clark Expedition (1 803-6)

At the beginning of the nineteenth century, President Thomas Jefferson initiated the Lewis and Clark

Expedition. Though perhaps the most famous of the

great American expeditions, it owes its birth and

later fame more to political and historical circumstances than to any enduring scientific legacy. At

this point in history, negotiations between France and Spain over the Louisiana Territory were heading

in a direction potentially dangerous to the interests

of the United States. Fortunately for the Americans,

Napoleon was in need of money and he eventually

sold the Louisiana Territory to the United States on May 2, 1803. Anticipating the inevitable American

occupation of the territory, President Jefferson had

initiated preparations for an exploring mission to

the region before its purchase. The priority of the

expedition enhanced its fame. It was the first overland

S, A. FREED, R. S. FREED, AND L. WILLIAMSON
expedition to the Pacific coast and back (Ambrose

1996:71-3, 101-2).

The Lewis and Clark Expedition has an extraordinary hold on the American imagination. Time magazine devoted its cover and a major, 43-page multiauthored article to the Expedition to mark American

Independence Day, 2002, and to anticipate the celebration of the Expedition's bicentennial, beginning in

January 2003, when the 1 1 states touched by the explorers plan to commemorate and to re-create the 3-

year journey. Trying to explain the American fascination for the Expedition after 200 years. Time noted its

practical side, "When they launched their wooden boats

up the Missouri [River] and into the wilderness, Lewis

and Clark were charting the future of America." There

had to be a mystical element as well, and Time made a

stab, "[At that time] the young nation already had a

constitution, but it lacked an epic. It had a govern- ment but no real identity. Lewis and Clark helped invent one." (Kirn, 2002:38-9)

Captain Meriwether Lewis (1774-1809) and Lieutenant William Clark (1770-1838) led the expedition.

Lewis, a confident, strong, and self-reliant member of

the Virginia gentry, ran his family's large plantation at

the age of eighteen. He and Thomas Jefferson were

neighbors. When Jefferson became president he

chose Lewis as his secretary and groomed him for

leadership of a dangerous exploratory mission to the

Pacific. Lewis invited Clark, another Virginian, to share

command. Lewis and Clark had served together in the same company and had become friends and mutual

admirers. At 33 years of age, Clark was the oldest man

on the expedition.

Lewis and Clark selected their men with great care

during the summer of 1 803. Many men applied, probably for the adventure, but they also were well paid

after the expedition. Each man received a land grant

and double pay (Ambrose 1996:414-5). The explorers, initially about 40 mostly young unmarried men,

were organized as a military unit. Many of the men

were from the army and all but 10 were enlisted as

privates. All were outdoorsmen and good hunters; specialties critical for a long and enduring journey—from

carpentry to gun-smithing to iron-working to boat handling, and translating—were well represented.

President Jefferson instructed Lewis and Clark to

explore the Missouri River to its headwaters and from

there, the rivers leading to the Pacific to find the most

direct and practicable water communication across

the continent for purposes of commerce. Prospects

for agriculture and settlement were almost as important a motive as commerce, and Jefferson wanted information about plant and animal life, soil, mineral resources, and climate (Ambrose 1996:94-5). Knowledge of Indian tribes was important. As befits an expedition of exploration, they were expected to make

detailed maps.

The party traveled the Missouri River in three boats.

Lewis and party left Pittsburgh in late summer 1 803

and, after wintering near St. Louis, the three boats set out for the upper Missouri in the spring of 1804,

reaching the villages of the friendly Mandan Indians

in today's North Dakota where they spent the winter of 1 804 through early 1 805. The next spring, the

party continued up the Missouri, crossed the continental divide on horseback, and descended the Columbia

River in canoes. They reached its mouth and the Pacific

shore in late fall 1805, and passed the winter there. The party arrived back in St. Louis in September 1 806,

to great excitement.

The journals of Lewis and Clark and shorter diaries by other members of the expedition are interesting

narratives of exploration, spiced with accounts of

menacing encounters and perilous mishaps: Indian

hostilities, accidents, difficult terrain and climate, illness, and dangerous animals. Yet only one encounter

with Indians was fatal: Lewis and his men killed two

Blackfeet Indians. A member of the expedition died of

illness, several were dismissed, and one man was courtmartialed and given 1 00 lashes (Moulton 1 986, 2:7-8,

60). The journals contain much important information

that was new at the time. "Clark's great map of the

94 100 YEARS/ COMPARISON OF EXPEDITIONS
west . . . would in itself have justified the expedition"

(Moulton 1986, 2:5). However, complete publication

of the journals was long delayed, and Lewis and

Clark lost some credit for their discoveries (Ambrose

1996:470).

After the Expedition, Lewis and Clark went on to

successful careers, not in science, as the members of

the Jesup Expedition had done, for they were not scientists, but in politics. Jefferson named Lewis governor

of the Louisiana Territory in 1 807. It was a difficult role, and his life was complicated by personal financial problems. He also suffered from mental and physical problems—possibly hypochondria and depression, or even from manic-depressive illness (Ambrose 1 996:466-7).

In less than two years, he committed suicide. Clark

later served as superintendent of Indian affairs in Louisiana Territory and as governor of Missouri Territory.

The Lewis and Clark and Jesup Expeditions were so

different ventures as to be almost separate species.

The purpose of Lewis and Clark was as much political

and commercial as scientific. It brought knowledge

about a vast new territory and helped open the West

to settlement. Politics and the expedition supported one another. By contrast, the Jesup Expedition had no

political goal. A purely scientific venture, the JNPE dealt

with the most intriguing scholarly issues of the day,

such as the problem of American Indian origins and

the relations of Native tribes living on both sides of the

Bering Strait. Lewis and Clark's mission featured no scientific problem or hypothesis, although the idea of an

easy water passage across the continent was still in

the air. Lewis and Clark laid that myth to rest. The two expeditions were also organized very differently. The Lewis and Clark group stayed together. It had a command structure of a military unit with officers and enlisted men. There were further distinctions based on crafts. The Jesup Expedition had almost none

of this structure. Expedition personnel were widely dispersed in tiny units. Sometimes even couples were

separated; the Bogorases worked separately for most

of their time in the field. Technical specialization depended on incidental training and interests. Mrs.

Jochelson, a medical student, took care of physical

anthropology and photography, particularly of the women; Mrs. Bogoras did most of the couple's ethnographic collecting. Basically, the Jesup Expedition featured investigators working independently and re- sembled more closely the later style of independent

fieldworker than the classic government-sponsored

research expedition represented by Lewis and Clark.

The U. S. Exploring Expedition (1 838-42)

The U. S. Exploring Expedition dwarfs the other three

expeditions in size, scope, drama, and later institutional

effects. Yet it had drifted into relative obscurity for al- most a century until William Stanton's comprehensive

account (1975) and, especially, until the Smithsonian

Institution portrayed it ten years later in a major exhibit and book entitled Magnificent Voyagers {\/'\o\a and

Margolis 1 985). Coming at a time when the American

scientific community was tiny and its resources were

minuscule, the "Ex. Ex.," as it is often called, was manna

from heaven. There was a rush to win places on the

expedition, for scientific reputations were there to be

made (Baatz 1986:1020; Stanton 1975:45). As a large-scale project of science and exploration

sponsored by the U. S. Government, the Ex. Ex. set a

precedent that continues to the present day and is

best compared to today's outer space program. It was

the first such project of the U. S. Navy, and served as a model for some fourteen subsequent American naval

exploring expeditions before the Civil War. It included

a corps of civilian scientists, which was a novelty for

the United States. The nine selected expedition's

"scientifics" were winnowed from a projected corps

of twenty-five. Several of them became giants in their

fields. Their scientific qualifications were equal to those

of the members of the Jesup Expedition and far ex- ceeded the modest scientific training of Lewis and Clark.

"James Dwight Dana, the most gifted of the group . .

became one of America's most distinguished scientific leaders" (Viola 1985:10).

S. A. FREED, R. S. FREED, AND L. WILLIAMSON
The civilian scientists worked chiefly in geology,

botany, zoology, and philology. Most of the physical

sciences—geography, hydrography, astronomy, study

of terrestrial magnetism, meteorology, and cartography—were assigned exclusively to naval officers. The

charter of the Ex. Ex. emphasized the promotion of commerce and navigation, and so the work of the

"scientific gentlemen" was seen as less essential to the

success of the expedition than the task of exploration

and mapping. The scientific character of the expedition was not lessened by the secondary role played

by its civilian scientists; in retrospect, their research and collecting turned out to be as scientifically important as the work of the naval officers.

Lieutenant Charles Wilkes commanded the expedition. Born in New York City, he attended various boarding schools, and his well-to-do father had him tutored

privately. He was drawn to the sea at the age of 1 5.

After several voyages as a sailor, he received an ap- pointment at the age of 1 9 as midshipman in the U. S. Navy (Leonhart 1985:189-91). Later he studied surveying, advanced mathematics, triangulation, geomagnetism, and hydrography. After several officers had

been given command of the expedition and then were

relieved of duty, Wilkes was offered the post and his appointment approved when he was 40. There were

forty other naval lieutenants at the time, and thirtyeight had more sea service (Stanton 1 975:6 1 ). However, Wilkes "respected science" and had scientific

qualifications.

Wilkes was an autocrat, much more so than Lewis. He represented the "old navy" where flogging was freely

used to maintain discipline. Described as contentious,

opinionated, brooding, aloof, arrogant, conceited, rude,

a strict disciplinarian, and always fearful of cabals and

mutiny, he cultivated the image of a martinet, because

it invoked authority and obedience (Stanton 1975:1 39). Although Wilkes was not loved, he certainly was respected. James Dwight Dana valued Wilkes highly: "I much doubt if, with any other commander ... we

should have fared better or lived together more harmoniously, and I am confident that the Navy does not

contain a more daring or driving officer" (Viola 1 985:23).

Six ships set sail from Hampton Roads, Virginia, in August 1 838. During the fouryears of intensive survey

of the Pacific Ocean region, the fleet crossed the Pacific three times extending explorations from Tierra del Fuego to Polynesia to Antarctica to New Zealand, Fiji, and to the North Pacific Coast of North America. Two

of the smaller ships were lost in rough seas, one with

its 1 5-man crew. The Expedition returned to the United

States by way of the Cape of Good Hope. The sailors were young "iron men" in the era of wooden ships;

hard work was required and heroics were expected.

The Ex. Ex. was the last great circumnavigation of the

globe under sail (Kassel 1 985:257).

The scientific results of the Ex. Ex. were published

in 19 volumes of reports and atlases (originally, 28

were planned). There were also large collections of

plants, animals, ethnographic specimens, gems, fossils, and corals. The collections eventually came to the

fledgling Smithsonian Institution and helped determine

its development toward a museum institution that be- came the National Museum of the United States, and

away from the national research institute that was a

real alternative in the 1840s and 1850s Gackson

1 985:450; Viola 1 985:9). The publications were probably the expedition's most remarkable achievement.

The reports were the grandest scientific production to come out of the U. S. until that time and they had an acknowledged international impact. Much of the sur- vey was still incorporated in nautical charts a century

later Cackson 1985:455). That the work of the Ex. Ex. was mostly published was due to the tireless efforts

of Wilkes, who bullied the scientists into completing

their reports and battled the Government to ensure

publication. Without publication and "Without Wilkes'

incredible energy and Byzantine mind, the Expedition's

achievements might have been no more lasting than

the wake of its ships upon the waters of the world"

(Stanton 1975:363).

The Ex. Ex. resembled Lewis and Clark's mission in

96 100 YEARS/ COMPARISON OF EXPEDITIONS
its funding and military organization, and the Jesup Expedition in its emphasis on science. All three expeditions operated in difficult and dangerous regions, and

the participants were tough men and women. All three had extraordinary leaders, bold, determined men, with enormous energy. However, the exploration of uncharted regions was by far the main purpose of the two military-style expeditions, with additional strong

political and commercial motives. The JNPE, lacking

both, was an entirely scientific venture.

The Cambridge Anthropological Expedition to Torres Straits, 1898-9

The Torres Straits Expedition, organized by Alfred C. Haddon (1855-1940), was, like the Jesup Expedition,

a pure scientific enterprise. Haddon and his team left a

lasting mark on British anthropology just as Boas fixed

his stamp on American anthropology (Kuklick 1998:

1 58-9; Rouse 1 998:50, 73-6). However, Torres Straits

lacked the grimness of theJNPE's grueling fieldwork.

Melanesia was no bed of roses—there was one

uncomfortable and dangerous voyage of about a week

on a crowded small ketch—but it was nothing compared to East Siberia. Writing to Boas from Khabarovsk on the Amur River, Laufer observed, "Nothing is free

here except death, which you can have in this country at special bargain rates." By contrast, W. H. R.

Rivers decided to join the Torres Straits Expedition

because he was feeling run down and "much in need

of a holiday," and Charles Myers spoke of his Borneo

sojourn as "a delightful way to spend a holiday"

(Stocking 1995: 109, 111). Torres Straits was seri- ous business, but it also had the unmistakable air of

college boys on a lark. Haddon came from a family initially in comfortable

circumstances: his father owned a printing firm and

wanted his son to enter the business (Quiggin 1 942:4);

but the son's interests, encouraged by his mother, were

in science. Clearly not cut out for the business world,

he was sent to Cambridge to study physiology and

zoology. In 1 880, he obtained the chair in zoology at

S. A. FREED, R. S. FREED, AND L. WILLIAMSON

the Royal College of Science in Dublin. Stocking (1 995:

99) describes him as gentle and emphatic by nature. He had wide interests, inexhaustible energy, and was

deeply religious, impetuous, and devoted to natural

science, especially zoology (Quiggin 1942: 10,64).

Haddon and Boas were alike in some ways. They

both had backgrounds in the natural sciences, Haddon

in zoology and Boas in physics. They both had experi- ence in their areas of interest before organizing their

expeditions. Both saw their earlier fieldwork partially in terms of professional advancement. Boas hoped that

his multi-year field research in British Columbia on behalf of the British Association for the Advancement of Science (BAAS) would help establish him as an

Americanist, thus opening the door to permanent employment and a successful career in the United States. Haddon wanted to escape the dead end of a provincial professorship. He was "perishing for want of research" and opined that "the Department here is played

out" (Quiggin 1 942:77). In 1 888 Haddon went to Torres

Straits to study coral reefs and saw opportunities for ethnographic work in the region. Back in England, he

turned to anthropology and obtained a post as Lecturer in Physical Anthropology at Cambridge in 1 895.

In 1 897 he decided to return to Torres Straits to gather more information for an ethnography that Cambridge

University Press had agreed to publish.

Haddon selected six investigators, his ideal number, by specialization. His concept of anthropology

included psychology, for "a successful investigator must

have a true insight into the minds of the investigated

and understand their reactions and ways of thought"

(Quiggin 1942:95). He began with two experimental

psychologists, Charles S. Myers and William McDougall,

both students of W. H. R. Rivers. When Rivers asked to be included, three of the six investigators on the

expedition's team were experimental psychologists

who studied such faculties as vision, hearing, smell,

touch, and reaction time (Rivers 1901:1-2). Although

Haddon felt that the psychological side was rather overweighed, he was pleased to have Rivers. More9 7
over, Myers was an accomplished musician, thus filling one of Haddon's limitations. The other limitation that Haddon felt keenly was linguistics, and he was fortunate to recruit Sidney H. Ray, the only available English

specialist with an excellent knowledge of Melanesian

languages. Anthony Wilkins, an undergraduate, joined

the group as anthropological trainee and photographer. Charles G. Seligman, a medical pathologist with

leanings toward anthropology, was the final addition. Haddon completely neglected archaeology and paid

relatively little attention to physical anthropology.

The anthropological work of the Jesup Expedition

compared to the Torres Straits expedition—featured

less individual specialization by discipline. Boas selected

his two key Siberian investigators Gochelson and

Bogoras) because of their previous work with the tribes

he wanted studied. On the other hand, he recognized

archaeology as a special field, and he put two archaeologists on his expedition team (Smith and Fowke), in

addition to a mammal specialist (Buxton) who collected about 500 mammal specimens. The rest of the personnel, especially on the Siberian side, were expected

to take care of everything: ethnography, linguistics,

and physical anthropology and a little archaeological

and zoological collecting as well. It all worked out

very well, mainly because of the competence of the

fieldworkers.

Unlike Boas, Haddon pieced together his funding

from several sources: Cambridge University, the gov- ernments of Britain and Queensland, and several scientific societies. Nonetheless, he did not have enough

money, and the six anthropologists had to pay their own way. Unexpectedly, Charles Hose, a district official, on learning of the expedition, persuaded the Rajah of Sarawak to invite the group to Sarawak all ex- penses paid, which resulted in several additional months

of fieldwork on Borneo (Stocking 1995:109).

The group arrived at Thursday Island on April 22,

1 898. From there, the seven anthropologists split into two groups and sailed east. Rivers, Myers, and

McDougall spent four months on Mer (Murray) Island,

"carrying out the first extended series of psychological and physiological tests ever performed on native

populations." (Stocking 1995:109). The other men

toured the southeastern coast of New Guinea. Later,

part of the group went to Sarawak, and the others

toured along the western shore and among the islands of the Gulf of Papua. The last members of the

expedition left for England in April 1 899.

The veterans of the Torres Straits Expedition, like

those of the Jesup Expedition, had distinguished and

influential later careers. Haddon did more than any other man to establish anthropology at Cambridge. He had

a strong sense of fieldwork and placed it at the heart

of what it means to be an ethnographer. He published

enormously until the year of his death. Seligman and

Rivers, veterans of the Torres Expedition and two of

the great anthropologists of the day, are credited with

providing the ethnographic core of the "Cambridge

School" of anthropology (Stocking 1 995:1 15. 117;

Kuklick 1998:158-9). Myers and McDougall became

influential in psychology.

Conclusion

Why are these four expeditions famous? First, the timing was favorable. They all were the earliest of their

kind, and their scientific work was important at the

time. Some of it is still quite valuable today, especially

the collections, the ethnographies of the Jesup and the

Torres Straits expeditions, and River's development of

the "genealogical method," an indispensable tool in

ethnography.^ Second, publication of the scientific results of all the expeditions was massed in a set of

volumes rather than dispersed in scattered individual

publications, which considerably increased the scientific impact of the work. Boas was certainly aware of

this effect. His agreement with his researchers stated

that all publications would appear in the museum's

series, with certain exceptions but only with museum

approval. Coordinated publication is not easily

achieved. The leaders of the expeditions had to cajole

authors to submit manuscripts and to supervise the

98 100 YEARS/ COMPARISON OF EXPEDITIONS
process of publication long after the fieldwork was

done. On the contrary, neither Lewis nor Clark took the

pains to publish the journals of their expedition. Other

editors prepared them for publication, the first appearing in 1814.

Thirdly, the investigators—Boas,Jochelson, Bogoras,

Laufer, Haddon, Rivers, Seligman, and Dana—were among the greatest scientists of the day. Boas' ideas

influenced anthropology in the United States for decades; Haddon built anthropology at Cambridge. There were effects on museums as well as on universities. At

the American Museum, the Jesup Expedition was to some extent the model for the next major effort, the

study of the Plains Indians, although Clark Wissler did much more theoretically with the Plains project than

Boas did with the Jesup Expedition material (Freed and

Freed 1983:808-9). The Ex. Ex. was important in the

history of the Smithsonian; Baatz (1986:1020) also

credits it with catalyzing "the creation of a national

scientific association, which appeared a few years later

with the genesis of the AAAS [American Association

for the Advancement of Science] in 1848." Quiggin

(1 942: 1 42-3) credits Haddon during his brief curatorship at the Cambridge Museum of Archaeology and

Ethnology with arranging related objects to tell a story

and thus to make the collections essential factors in

ethnographical and geographical work.

A century after two strictly scientific expeditions,

Jesup North Pacific and Torres Straits, the people of the

regions that were studied recognize the importance

of the work done by visiting ethnographers. Although

with some reservations, they are thankful that a record

of their lives was made before their cultures had irrevocably changed. Kwakwaka'wakw who came to New

York for the opening of the Chiefly Feasts, the Enduring

Kwal<iiitl Potlatch exhibit at the American Museum in

1991, commented, "Thank God for Hunt and Boas. Without them we would have no culture." The current

chief of Thursday Island, Ephraim Bani, on a trip to European museums in 1 997, said that when Haddon

visited Thursday Island he had found its culture disintegrating and was "on a rescue mission." Chief Bani now found "his culture preserved" in the Cambridge

Museum, where Haddon had brought his Torres Strait

collections (Merrison and Calvert 1 997). In an editorial comment about Drawing Shadows to Stone, a photographic exhibition based on the work of the Jesup Expedition on the Northwest Coast and in Siberia, The

New York Times wrote, "[l]t is impossible to look at

these photographs . . . without sensing that their subjects were collaborating with the anthropologists

among them to devise a new, and still evolving, form

of survival" {The New Yorl< Times, 29 Jan. 1998:A22).

Such collaboration is the key to ethnography that has

lasting value. The chief reason for the fame of the expeditions

for the general public is that all four ventures were

spellbinding adventure stories. The Ex. Ex., the Jesup

Expedition in Siberia, and Lewis and Clark, especially in

the Bitterroot Mountains, were dangerous, and full of

hairbreadth escapes. Torres Straits was less hazardous, but in those days just being in Melanesia was

adventure enough for Europeans. The Ex. Ex. took pride

of place with its generous measure of treachery, floggings, hostage taking, shipwreck, and pitched battles. Some 100 lives were lost. All of this would be enough

to ensure the enduring fascination of the expeditions.

But there is something else. The expeditions fore- shadow major historical trends. Lewis and Clark and

the Ex. Ex. are full of optimism and self-confidence, the

product of a new strong country fulfilling its "manifest

destiny" from ocean to ocean and beyond its borders.

Torres Straits was different, as Haddon came face to

face with the results of western colonialism. He was

not at all sure that its real and alleged benefits were

worth the damage it caused to Native peoples.

The Jesup Expedition has a curious foreboding quality. Bogoras and Jochelson were former underground

political conspirators who had spent time in prison

and lived for years in exile, both abroad and in Siberia. The Russian government maintained a secret surveillance over their field activities during the JNPE mission.

S. A. FREED, R. S. FREED, AND L. WILLIAMSON 99
Laufer had considerable trouble obtaining Russian permission even to get to Siberia, because he was Jewish—as were the two other key Siberian investigators

(Freed et al. 1 988a: 1 2-3). Their lives seemed to herald

the murderous political, ethnic, and ideological conflicts that convulsed Europe during the twentieth century. Participants in all four expeditions faced uncomfortable, sometimes dangerous, conditions in the field;

but only the JNPE groups working in Siberia had to contend with governmental suspicion if not hostility.

In view of this circumstance, Boas wrote tojesup, "the

full success of their investigation deserves the highest

praise."

Acknowledgmerits

Our thanks are due to Laurel Kendall for inviting us to

contribute an essay to this volume. We thank Alicia Carmona for research assistance.

Notes

1 . The New York Times reported, "The expedition

will be backed by Mr. Jesup from his private resources.

Prof. F. W. Putnam. ..will conduct the expedition and

with him will be the anthropologist Dr. Boas" (1 2 March

1 897: 1 2). In fact, Putnam never went into the field with

the expedition, and Boas directed and supervised the whole enterprise.

2. As Bogoras wrote to Lev Shternberg, a fellow

political exile, "Kolymsk [in Siberia] is a different planet, even less connected with Earth than the Moon, completely alien to Earth, a block of ice cast out into space and suspended there above the emptiness, where ev- ery accidental spark of life freezes down and suffo- cates" (20 June 1894, quoted in Vakhtin 2001:79).

3. Another methodological innovation that came

from the Torres Straits Expedition was a system of

recording string figures. Haddon had a longstanding

interest in string figures, and, in 1898, he and Rivers invented a method for recording them (Quiggin

1942:128-129; Rivers and Haddon 1902). Although

later simplified terminologies have been developed,

the precise anatomical nomenclature of Rivers and

Haddon is still preferred 1 00 years later (Averkieva and

Sherman, 1 992:xxii, xxviii, 5).

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] 897-] 902. Laurel Kendall, Barbara Mathe, and Tho- mas R. Miller, eds. Pp. 9-1 7. New York: American

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Press. Kassel, Bernard M.

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1 902 A Method of Recording String Figures and Tricks.

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1 975 The Great United States Exploring Expedition of

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Contributions to Circumpolar Anthropology 1 . Washington, DC: Arctic Studies Center. Viola, Herman J. 1985 The Story of the U. S. Exploring Expedition. In Magnificent Voyagers: The U. S. Exploring Expedition,

1838-1842. Herman J. Viola and Carolyn Margolis,

eds. Pp. 1 0-23. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institu- tion Press. Viola, Herman J., and Carolyn Margolis, eds.

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S. A. FREED, R. S. FREED, AND L. WILLIAMSON
29/ Dina Jochelson-Brodsky steps out of the expedition's winter headquarters at the village ofKamenskoye, 1901

Photographer, Waldemar Jochelson (AMNH 4 1 71-6729)
ANTHROPOLOGIES AND HISTORIES:

JESUP TEAM MEMBERS THEN AND NOW

f^ranz £)oa5 and the fvlusic

of the j\jorthwest (^oast jndians

IRA JACKNIS

Franz Boas' research strategy for the Jesup Expedition was broad, relying on a wide range of documentation.

In addition to casts and measurements of body parts,

ethnographic and archaeological artifacts, observers'

field notes, linguistic texts in Native languages, and

photographs, Boas and his team collected music in

the form of notation and sound recordings. A pioneer

in so many areas of anthropology. Boas was also a

leader in the field of ethnomusicology, generally, and

the study of Northwest Coast Indian music, specifically. This essay summarizes and contextualizes Boas'

musicological contribution by reviewing his research and writing on the topic during the two decades

surrounding the Jesup Expedition, 1 886-1 906. It also

offers a more detailed examination of his most ex- tended Jesup research: his recording of Thompson

Indian songs in 1 897.' As part of his broad education in mid-nineteenth

century Germany, Franz Boas (] 858-1 942) studied

European art and music, and learned to play the

piano (Liss 1996:160). According to his biographer,

"Music . . . formed an important part of his life. He had

begun to learn the piano early, and his enjoyment of

Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, and Bach increased as he

grew older" (Cole 1999:32). As Cole makes clear, though, this musical education came informally; that

is, Boas acquired it as an avocation. Partly because of

the specialization demanded by the German educational system, he never studied music in his secondary

or university classes. His older sister Toni was a great

influence, an accomplished pianist with whom he

played four-hand piano arrangements (Liss 1 996: 1 62). As a student in Bonn, he sang in a choir and formed a

trio with two of his friends. Throughout his life Boas made an effort to live with a piano, frequently attended

classical concerts, and hung pictures of Mozart and

Beethoven in honored places in his home (Cole 1999:

46-7,139). Classical music was often a presence for him on his field trips far from home: He "yearned for Beethoven" during his first fieldwork, among the

Baffinland Eskimo in 1 883-84 (Liss 1 995: 1 22), and on

his British Columbia field trips played the piano and

organ at the request of local residents (Rohner

1969:67ff, 141-2). While he clearly derived pleasure

from this music, the aim of his piano-playing was not

so much to be a practiced performer but more to understand the music and the performances of others: "I want to learn only in order to understand and, of course,

to listen. I want to learn the playing of music only in so

far as it allows me to appreciate" (F. Boas to Toni Boas, 6 October 1 876, in Cole 1 999:32; cf. Liss 1 996: 1 62).

This remark makes clear his scholarly or analytic ap- proach to music, and it was these substantial musical

abilities that formed the foundation for his subsequent

anthropological research on the subject.

From his first field trip to his last, Boas documented

Native music. Although his fieldwork among the Baffinland Eskimo (Inuit) of 1 883^ was conducted primarily

to determine Native perceptions of the environment,

he transcribed folk tales and songs, published in a

1 05
series of later articles (Boas 1887a, 1889a, 1894a,

1 897b) and in his monograph. The Central Eskimo (Boas

1888c). His first exposure to Northwest Coast Indian music came in January 1885, when he worked with a

troupe of Bella Coola visiting Berlin. Struck by their

"unique music," he transcribed four of their songs, which

he sent to Carl Stumpf (Cole 1 982: 11 9, 11 7). Stumpf,

a German psychologist who was one of the founders

of comparative musicology, had studied the songs of

the Bella Coola party a few months earlier, when

they visited Halle (Stumpf 1886). In the fall of 1886,

Boas made his first visit to the Northwest Coast. Here

he studied Chinook songs in Victoria and Vancouver,

and KwakiutI song and dance in the villages of northern Vancouver Island. Music thus lay at the very inception of Boas' North- west Coast research, and he continued to study the

subject in the years leading up to the Jesup Expedition. During the Chicago World's Fair in 1 893, he again

documented Native music in a displaced setting—this

time using the phonograph to record songs of the

visiting group of KwakiutI (Jacknis 1 99 1 a: Fig. 30). On

his next field trip, he was able to greatly extend his

study of the tribe's music in its ceremonial setting, this

time over several weeks in the fall of 1 894 at Fort

Rupert (Fig. 31). The first season of the Jesup Expedition marked an important advancement in Boas' musicological research; for the first time he was able to use

the phonograph in the field. In June 1 897 he recorded

Thompson Indian music with the assistance of James

Teit in Spences Bridge, B.C. These sessions also proved

to be his most extensive musicological research for

the expedition. He was in the field only once more

during the Jesup Expedition years; on that second trip

of 1900 he focused on KwakiutI material culture and

language, rather than on anything specifically musical.

Although Boas traveled periodically to the North- west Coast after 1 900, he did little musicological field- work until his last trip, in 1 930-1 , when he again worked

with the KwakiutI of Fort Rupert and Alert Bay. This, at

the age of 72, was actually his most intensive study of

Native music. He recorded 1 56 cylinders and exposed

about an hour's worth of 1 6-mm film of dance, crafts, and gesture. On this trip he attempted to gather material that would allow him to delineate tribal, genre, and

individual styles, and also to clarify the rhythmic relations of texts and dance movements. Even then he did

not stop, recording KwakiutI Daniel Cranmer on acetate-coated aluminum disks when Cranmer visited

Boas in New York in 1 94 1, the year before Boas' death.

Boas' Research and Writing on Music

Franz Boas made important contributions to a number

of diverse areas of ethnomusicological research, among

them recording and transcription; formal analysis (scales,

melody, and rhythm); song genres; song texts and the

relations of words and music; performance practice;

the social and cultural context of music; organology

(the study of musical instruments); areal relations and

history; and acculturation; in addition to his support

for the institutional structures of scholarship.

Perhaps his most important contributions to the

field of ethnomusicology were on the nature of transcription in notation and sound recording (Ellingson

1992:118-25). Boas published over a hundred of his own transcriptions (Fig. 32). At the beginning, he transcribed the music by having the singer repeat the notes

until he had written it down in a Western notation

style. However, his work with Stumpf and the Bella

Coola had made him well aware of the limitations of Western notation for tribal music. In one article, for example, he adopted Stumpfs diacritic of a zero mark

placed above a note, to indicate that "the tone is sung

a little lower" (Boas 1888a:50; Ellingson 1992:120).

Boas was among the earliest ethnologists to make

mechanical sound recordings. The first American anthropologist to use Edison's wax cylinder phonograph

in the field was Jesse W. Fewkes, who recorded

Passamaquoddy Indian music in Maine in 1890.^ He

followed this test with recordings of the Zuni in 1890

and the Hopi in 1891. Funded by Boston philanthropist Mary Hemenway, this collection was acquired by

1 06 PARTICIPANTS/ BOAS AND MUSIC
Harvard's Peabody Museum in 1894. During the Chi- cago World's Fair in 1893, Boas worked with musicologist John C. Fillmore to record KwakiutI songs on

1 1 6 wax cylinders. Also at the Chicago Fair, Benjamin

Ives Oilman recorded Javanese, Samoan, Turkish, as well

as KwakiutI music (again with Hemenway sponsorship;

this collection was also acquired by Harvard). The most

important institution for the recording of American Indian music during its first decade was the Smithsonian's

Bureau of American Ethnology (BAE). Alice C. Fletcher,

a Bureau research associate, had been studying Native

American music since the early 1 880s, and during the

1 890s she recorded the Omaha and many other Plains

groups. Other Bureau recordists were Washington Matthews, among the Navajo, and James A. Mooney among

the Caddo, Comanche, Arapaho, Kiowa, and Paiute. Though starting slightly laterthan the Smithsonian,

the American Museum of Natural History under Boas was a leader, especially in quantity and regional range, and it was the first American anthropology museum

to collect sound recordings. The history of early Ameri- can Indian recording remains to be written, but it appears that the American Museum was much more

systematic than the BAE in sponsoring recording.

Perhaps because of Boas' own interest in the subject,

the cylinders were carefully cataloged as soon as they

entered the museum. At the Smithsonian, on the other

hand, their creation and preservation were left to the

interest of individual researchers. Moreover, the American Museum's collection predated the largest Euro- pean sound archive, the Berlin Phonogramm-Archiv,

which began informally in 1 900 and officially in 1 905

(Reinhard 1971; Simon 2000, cf. Gillis 1984:324). In

addition to the 228 cylinders made by the Jesup Expedition, other early American Museum recordings were made among the Blackfoot and other Plains groups by

George Bird Grinnell in 1 897 and among the Tarahumara

and Huichol of northern Mexico by Carl Lumholtz the

following year. The American Museum collection, in

turn, became the model for others at the University of

California and Indiana University.^

Although we have no explicit statements from Boas on the ethnographic utility of the phonograph, he must

have advocated it for his Jesup Expedition colleagues,

as several of the parties used the machine. The first

accessioned collection of phonograph recordings in

the American Museum is comprised of 1 39 cylinders

from the Koryak, Yukagir, Yakut (Sakha), Tungus (Even),

Chukchi, Eskimo (Siberian Yupik), and local Russians

made by Waldemar Jochelson and Waldemar Bogoras

in Siberia in 1 901 -2 (Freed, Freed, and Williamson 1 988:

1 01 ). In addition to Boas' forty-five Thompson Salish

cylinders of 1897, Livingston Farrand recorded thirtyfour cylinders among the Quinault and another ten of

the Quileute of Washington State in 1 898. On Sakhalin

Island in 1 898-9, Berthold Laufer recorded Gilyak (Nivkh)

and Tungus (Uilta) songs (Boas 1 903:97). ^ On the related Harrington Expedition in 1899, Roland Dixon re- corded twenty-one cylinders among the Maidu of

northeastern California.''

This substantial recording activity is perhaps the

greatest ethnomusicological legacy of the Jesup

Expedition (Keeling 2001:285-90). The phonograph,

although a relatively recent ethnographic medium, was

just one part of a multi-media set of tools employed

by the Jesup Expedition. Like the extensive photography, primarily of physical types, this activity resulted

in the production of a corpus of enduring objects

of otherwise ephemeral culture, which could remain

the basis for future scholarly research (Jacknis 1 984,

1 996). Years later, writing to museum founder George

Heye in 1 927, Boas explained, "I am trying to develop

gradually a collection of records of Indian speech and

song which, I believe, will be just as important as collections of specimens of their handy craft which are accumulating in museums" (Boas to Heye, 30 November 1927, APS-BP).

Although music was treated in several of the Jesup

Expedition publications, it held a relatively minor position. Boas shared some insights into the Thompson

(NIaka'pamux) recording sessions in letters to his wife

and parents (Rohner 1 969:202-4), but his published

I. JACKNIS 1 07
remarks on music in theJNPE publications are quite

brief. He contributed a chapter on art to Teit's monograph, The Thompson Indians (Je\t 1 900), including several pages on types of songs and a description of

musical instruments (Boas 1900:383-85). Boas' report on Bella Coola mythology included notations for four

songs, three with texts (Boas 1898:71, 82, 93, 94),

with other song texts and translations in passing. The

first volume of the Kwakiutl Texts contains a section on "Songs" (Boas and Hunt 1905:475-91), with interlinear translations of 32 song texts, including texts for 20 Hamatsa songs and others, plus a description of a

winter ceremonial. One reason for this relatively meager output on Boas' part was his conception of his

research and publication as an entity. For example, the

winter ceremonial description was a more complete

version of his earlier account in a report that had been

published by the Smithsonian Institution (Boas 1 897a).

Generally, though, he did not repeat in hisJNPE publications the extensive information on music that was

contained in that monograph.

While neither Bogoras nor Jochelson supplied any

musicological analysis, their JNPE monographs contain

good descriptions of music and musical instruments,

especially as part of shamanism (Keeling 2001). Both

include vivid anecdotes about Native reactions to their

recording (Bogoras 1 904-7:436; Jochelson 1 908:426-

7). Bogoras, for example, offered a very sophisticated

description of how the Chukchi shaman obscures the

source of the music by modifying the sound of his

voice with a drum, and another long account of his

use of the phonograph to explore the nature of "separate voices" or ritual ventriloquism (Bogoras 1 904-

7:434, 436). The most extensive publication on music

to come out of the Jesup Expedition was John R. Swanton's work. Swanton, a student of Boas then employed by the Smithsonian Bureau of American Ethnology, collected among the Haida in 1900-1 for the American Museum. His JNPE monograph contains a

general description of Haida songs and a brief sum- mary of song types (Swanton 1905:212), which he

1 08

complemented in a longer study of texts and translations for 106 Haida songs collected on the expedition

(Swanton 1912). However, he noted only song texts and enclosed a brief description; there were no transcriptions or recordings (cf. Enrico and Stuart 1996).

While Farrand, Jochelson, Bogoras, and Laufer recorded

music, and Swanton obtained many song texts, only Boas published transcriptions, as he seems to have

been the only musically literate person in the team. Most anthropologists of the time worked with professional musicologists to first transcribe and then analyze their recordings of Native music (Brady 1984:3). Boas was virtually alone (along with Alice Fletcher) as

a fieldworker who was able to make recordings in the

natural context of musical performance, accompanied

with verbal records in the Native language, and then

musicologically analyze this material. His training al- lowed him to investigate technical issues of scales,

melody, and rhythm. For example, he was perhaps the

first to note complex rhythmical structures in North- west Coast songs (Ellingson 1 992:1 1 8; cf. Boas 1 888a:

51-2). More generally, he also contributed to the first major debate in American ethnomusicology. John C.

Fillmore, the collaborator of both Boas and Alice

Fletcher, adhered to a widespread notion of the period, that there was a universal harmonic sense, which was realized only imperfectly by tribal music (Filmore

1 893, 1 895). Reviewing Fletcher's Study of Omaha Indian Music (1893), Boas initially accepted Fillmore's

theory "that the underlying sense of harmony is the same as ours" (Boas 1894b: 171). It is puzzling why

Boas supported this position, now regarded as false and ethnocentric. Boas' later research showed how

each culture needed to be understood on its own

terms. Boas, like Fillmore, may have been influenced

by Hermann Helmholtz's theory of a natural musical

scale based on Western harmony (Myers 1 994:xx), or

he may have felt that it actually accorded a degree of

cultural respect to Native musical systems. We do know

that Boas' early work was marked by evolutionary

positions that he later rejected, and that his thought

PARTICIPANTS/ BOAS AND MUSIC
was always caught in intellectual oppositions (Stocking 1974:1-20). In any event, towards the end of his

career, Boas did reject Fillmore's theory of latent har- mony (Boas 1927:342).

Much of Boas' exploratory writing on Northwest

Coast music was an attempt to classify songs into

genres. In his early essay on KwakiutI songs, he noted

children's songs, love songs, prayers, and war songs

(Boas 1 896). His most definitive research on this topic,

left unpublished at his death, was his 1 930-1 field trip,

during which he was able to clarify the distinctions between summer songs, winter songs, gambling songs,

love songs, mourning songs, and baby songs (Franz

Boas to George Herzog, 18 April 1933, APS-BP).

As a pioneer linguist. Boas naturally focused on the

setting and language of song texts. With most of his

musical transcriptions, he supplied the words in the

Native language and a translation. In his essay on Chi- nook songs, he noted that "the Tsimshian sing many

Haida songs, although they do not understand the meaning of the words" (Boas 1888b:224). From the appended glossary of the Chinook words, he thought

it interesting "that not more than seventy-four words

occur in the collection of thirty-nine songs" (Boas 1 888b:

225). In several publications, most notably the KwakiutI

winter ceremonial study, he offered a semantic and

cultural explanation of the song texts, identif/ing, for

example, the various mythological characters to which

the songs refer.

Franz Boas is known forthe contextual ethnographic

approach he brought to the study of culture, advocating intensive fieldwork and Native texts over armchair

speculation. Naturally, he contributed to the study of

the social and performative context of music. For example, he learned from his first KwakiutI field trip that:

The songs which are sung during these

dances are in part very old, but a considerable number are new, and native poets and

composers are continually adding to their stock of songs. As chorus singing is practised [sic] at all festivals by these Indians,

and as the rhythms of the songs are very

complicated, a good deal of practice is

necessary before an artistic effect can be

reached. ... Every village has its singingmaster, who instructs young and old, and

holds regular rehearsals before each festival. (Boas 1888a:51)

Again, his most elaborate study of this type was

his monograph on KwakiutI winter ceremonials, where

he specifically describes the seating of the musicians;

the roles and duties of the song leader (who acts as composer and music director), his assistant, and the

chorus; and the handling of the instruments (Boas

1897a:432, 437); in addition to more general comments on the masked dances to which the music is a

vital accompaniment.

Because of his role as artifact collector and mu- seum curator, there was one otherwise minor field of musicology to which Boas made an important contribution—organology, or the study of musical instruments. He himself collected a full range of Northwest

Coast rattles, whistles, and drums on his many field

trips (Cole 1 985; Jacknis 2002:23-6). During the Jesup

Expedition, however, he collected relatively little, sharing the responsibility for the Bella Coola and KwakiutI

collections with George Hunt (Jacknis 1991b). An insight into Boas' interest in musical instruments is evident in his instruction to the Jesup collectors. For example, from John Swanton, collecting among the Haida,

he requested:

[R]attles also if fully explained. Please inquire

particularly in regard to the significance of

the raven rattle with hawk face on its lower

side and lying figure on its back. What is the

legend of the origin? How are they used and

how are they held in dances? What is the

difference between these rattles and the round rattles, most of which represent birds or heads? Are they used in different ceremonials? What is the use of the rattle set with puffin-beaks? What is the signficance of

the clapper, most of which represent the

killer-whale? Specimens of all of these, if fully

explained, are desirable. A series of whistels

[sic] with explanations would also be good

to have. Do you consider the flageolet as an

imitation of European patterns or as their own invention? (Boas to John Swanton, 5 June, 1900, acc. 1901-31, AMNH)

I. JACKNIS I 09
Boas described these instruments principally in his study of the KwakiutI winter ceremonial (Boas

1897a:431^, 437, 438^0, 445). In addressing the iconography of Hamatsa rattles, for example, he noted

the skull motif as a reference to the man-eating theme

of the winter ceremonial and the former practice of

killing slaves (Boas 1 897a:439; cf. Fig. 33). Whistles, he

wrote, are considered the voices of spirits (Boas

1 897a:447). Perhaps because Northwest Coast instru- ments are comparatively simple in form, it was these

sorts of contextual topics that Boas addressed, as opposed to the more usual musicological concerns of

instrument form, construction, and tuning.

One area of research—a major Boasian orientation

that underlay the entire Jesup Expedition—was diffusion and history. Boas, however, did little direct writing on this aspect of Native music. Perhaps he felt that

it was first necessary to compile an adequate sample

and description. This omission is particularly striking in

that such issues of areal relations were the ostensible

rationale for the expedition's work. In his summary essays, he did cite mythological and artifactual patterns,

but nothing from music, most likely because the musical collections were relatively small and because they were not transcribed. Nevertheless, as he often did

with his many research topics. Boas suggested this

subject to his later students, George Herzog (1930)

and Helen H. Roberts (1936). Franz Boas did, however, make an important contribution to the study of more recent history. It is commonly claimed that he was uninterested in studies of acculturation; but one of his most fascinating

musicological essays, "Chinook Songs" (Boas 1 888b), was devoted to the music of the urban Indians of

Victoria, Vancouver, and New Westminster, B.C. Largely

migrant workers, they labored in the saw mills, canneries, and hop fields. Boas published thirty-eight song

texts and translations, as well as two melodies in

musical transcription. The texts—composed in a complex linguistic Creole that combined English, Chinook,

and other Native Northwest Coast languages—mostly

expressed feelings of loneliness and lost love. For instance, "When the steamboat leaves/ Say good-bye,

Jimmy!/ Billy will feel very sad" (Boas 1 888b:224), with

the words "steamboat" and "good-bye, Jimmy" in English. In his analysis. Boas noted the contexts of perfor- mance and transmission.

Throughout his mature career, Boas dedicated himself to creating the institutional structures of scholarship; and ethnomusicology was no exception. Largely

as a result of the use of the phonograph, the 1890s was the critical decade for the institutionalization of

the field (Lee 1 993:2 1

, cf. Densmore 1 927). Boas knew

and corresponded with the leading students of American Indian music, among them Alice C. Fletcher, James

A. Mooney, Washington Matthews, George Bird Grinnell,

John C. Fillmore, and Benjamin I. Gilman. In the Journal

of American Folk-Lore, he favorably reviewed Alice

Fletcher's pioneering A Study of Omaha Indian Music

(Boas 1 894b). In December 1 898, he invited Fletcher,

Matthews, and Carl Lumholtz to join him in demonstrating some of their recordings of Indian songs at

the annual meeting of the American Folklore Society

(AFS) (e.g.. Boas to G. B. Grinnell, 23 December 1898,

AMNH-DA; cf. Newell 1899:53-4). This led to the for- mation of an AFS committee on American folk music,

which Boas cHaired. As part of this effort. Boas came in

contact with leading musicians and composers of his

day. He asked his Columbia colleague Edward

MacDowell to serve on the committee. Although

MacDowell declined. Boas did use another local composer, Frederick R. Burton, to transcribe some of the

recorded songs. These composers, along with Arthur

Farwell, Charles Wakefield Cadman, and R. Carlos Troyer, were loosely referred to as "the American Indianists"

(Pisani 1 998). There is no record of Boas' personal opinion on their creative work, but the Native music that

he and his colleagues were recording was a vital stimulus to contemporary composers who were attempting to create a genuinely American music.

As a German immigrant, Boas naturally maintained scholarly ties with his homeland. He actively

1 1 PARTICIPANTS/ BOAS AND MUSIC
shared his research on Northwest Coast Indian music

with two of the founders of the so-called "Berlin school

of comparative musicology": Carl Stumpf and his student Erich von Hornbostel (Christensen 1 991 ). Just as

Boas had sent his early Bella Coola transcriptions to

Stumpf, in 1905 he lent forty-three of the Thompson

cylinders to his old colleague, then at the University of

Berlin, evidently at his request (cf. Boas to Stumpf, 1 3 November 1 905, AMNH-DA). Von Hornbostel, with his

colleague Otto Abraham, used them as the basis for

an important early essay in ethnomusicology (Abraham

and von Hornbostel 1975 [1906]). Some of these cylinders were reproduced by the Berlin PhonogrammArchiv and subsequently included in the Archives' Demonstration Collection (Reinhard 1 971 ; Reinhard and List

1 963). First produced in the early 1 920s, copies of the

1 20-cylinder set were distributed to archives throughout the world—"the first anthology of traditional music ever issued" (Seeger and Spear 1 987:89). Boas

continued to teach and encourage growth in the field,

training scholars such as George Herzog (who had

previously studied under von Hornbostel) and Helen

H. Roberts. Through these German connections, Boas

infused the study of American Indian music with an

international perspective.

Boas' research on music had implications beyond

its own sphere of study. As music was the art to which

he was most personally attracted, it seems to have

become the model for his aesthetic theory, and helps

to explain the origins of his rather idiosyncratic theory

of primitive art (Boas 1927). Boas suggested that all

decorative patterns were derived from a craftsperson's

motor patterns Gacknis 1992:1 58). Using the word "virtuoso"—a term common in musical criticism—Boas

claimed that designs, indeed all formal patterns, were

created out of the rhythmical actions necessary to pro- duce the work. In support of this. Boas examined rhythmic patterns in visual, verbal, and musical art forms. Although his theory has it roots in German aesthetics,

it must have appealed to someone who was familiar

with the nature of artistic (i.e., musical) performance.

I. JACKNIS

As in all his work. Boas' research on music was

devoted to the critique of then-popular notions of

cultural evolution and to the promotion of cultural

equality. In his first essay on Native music, he argued

that "the mind of the native enjoys as well the beauties of nature as we do; that he expresses his grief in mournful songs, and appreciates humorous conceptions" (Boas 1887a:383). At the same time, however.

Boas' anthropology was committed to appreciating

cultures on their own terms. In his now-classic debate

with Smithsonian ethnologist Otis T. Mason over the

principles of museum classification, he prominently employed a musical example: "From a collection of string

instruments, flutes, or drums of 'savage' tribes and the modern orchestra, we cannot derive any conclusion

but that similar means have been applied by all peoples

to make music. The character of their music, the only

object worth studying, which determines the form of

the instruments, cannot be understood from the single

instrument, but requires a complete collection of the

single tribe" (Boas 1 887b:62). Note his emphasis, that

the character of their music was the only object worth

studying. He elaborated this contextual approach in

the next response in the debate:

The rattle, for instance, is not merely the

outcome of the idea of making noise, and of

the technical methods applied to reach this end: it is, besides this, the outcome of

religious conceptions, as any noise may be

applied to invoke or drive away spirits; or it may be the outcome of the pleasure children

have in noise of any kind; and its form may

be characteristic of the art of the people.

Thus the same implement belongs to very

different departments of a psychological museum. (Boas 1887b:65; see Fig. 33)

Nowhere could one find a better and more succinct example of Boas' approach to the study of culture. ' It was perhaps not an accident that Boas chose

to use musical examples to make a general cultural

critique. Such a perspective would come to influence

the study of Northwest Coast and other Native musics, as much as it affected anthropology in general.

For Franz Boas, music was not a limited or specialized

1 1 1
phenomenon, but actually lay at the core of human

culture and thus of anthropology.

Recording Thompson Indian Music, 1897

In June 1897, in Spences Bridge, B.C., Boas recorded

Thompson Indian music with the assistance of James

A. Teit (Rohner 1 969:202^; cf. Wickwire 1 988, 2001

,

this volume). Without doubt, these Thompson sessions were the most important musicological contributions

of the entire Jesup Expedition project: first because

they involved Boas, the expedition leader; second,

because they were the most extensive musical research

(as opposed to sheer recording) of the six-year expedition fieldwork; third, because they were Boas' first sound recording in the field; and finally because of their subsequent analysis in a pioneering essay in ethnomusicology (Abraham and von Hornbostel 1 975 [1 906]).

In this section we consider how sound recording, like

all ethnographic transcription, can be regarded as the outcome of a social interaction resulting in cultural representations. Like Native-made artifacts, these objects

must be understood within their generating context. The visiting JNPE team—consisting of Boas, Farrand,

and Smith—spent about ten days in Spences Bridge

(Fig. 34), arriving on the evening ofJune 3, and leaving

the morning ofJune 1 4. In addition to sound recording,

the party took photographs, plaster casts, and measurements of people, and gathered a small collection

of artifacts (see Thom 2001 :1 41-2; Wickwire, this volume). They began recording songs on June 6, documenting ten songs in the first session, with another

thirty-five cylinders recorded over the next two days

(Wickwire 1 993:544). The sessions took place in Teit's

house; given the insensitivity of early phonographs,

the recording would have been improved by an in- door setting.^ Earlier cylinder machines were rather large,

bulky, and heavy; but by the mid-1 890s several companies had introduced home models that were much

smaller and lighter (Fig. 35). "About the size and weight

of a portable sewing machine today" (Brady 1 984:4),

such an apparatus could be packed on horseback, as

did Boas and the JNPE team. Although some were or

could be driven by an electric motor fitted with a battery, many of the home models were treadle or spring

driven and thus were perfect for field recording. And

like the modern tape recorder, the same machine could

be used for recording and play-back.

Like photography, sound recording is a focused

social interaction, minimally involving the ethnographer

and the Native performers. In this case, however, a

critical player was James Teit (1 854-1 922). Just as Boas

collaborated with George Hunt among the Bella Coola

and KwakiutI, here, too, he relied on a local field assistant (see Wickwire, this volume). For the Jesup Expedition, Boas selected Teit to be the prime researcher for

the Plateau tribes of British Columbia. After participating in the 1897 recording session, he went on to do

important musicological research under the auspices

of the Anthropological Division of the Geological Sur- vey of Canada. With a phonograph acquired in 1912,

Teit recorded 250 songs, now preserved in the Canadian Museum of Civilization (Wickwire 1 988, 2001 :336).

Teit undoubtedly was responsible for selecting the

six singers to be recorded. In fact, several of them

were his relatives by marriage: Lucy Antko (his wife.

Fig. 36), Xwalinek (her sister), and Nsilkapeskit (her sister's

son; Wickwire 2001 :n. 7, 449). Just as Hunt tended to go first to his relatives Oacknis 1 991 b:2 1 1 ), Teit must

have found it easier to involve people he knew well.

This rapport was critical, as Boas encountered some

initial resistance to his recording: "Some of the people were bashful, especially the women, who did not want

to sing until all the men had left the house" (Rohner

1 969: 204). In fact, four of the six singers were female

(Wickwire 1993:544). As Wickwire points out, Teit's ethnography was especially sensitive to women's issues, probably because of his marriage to Antko.

Boas indicated that gender was an issue in the performance, but the singers may have also been reluctant to be recorded by a strange contraption. The phonograph was relatively new for everybody, and especially so for Native people. The machines used during

1 1 2 PARTICIPANTS/ BOAS AND MUSIC
the Jesup Expedition were undoubtedly the first that

these people had ever experienced, which explained

the strong feelings of surprise frequently expressed (cf.

Brady 1999:1 10). Thompson people also had problems with being photographed (Hill-Tout 1978:64). "

But their initial shyness gave way to pleasure, aided

perhaps by the machine's reproductive abilities, as Boas

noted that "The singing was a great deal of fun for the

villagers" (Rohner 1 969:204).

This inter-social encounter produced objects that

transcribed or represented aspects of Native cultural

"reality" Oacknis 1 996). With his methodological sophistication. Boas spent much of the 1 890s attempting to

ascertain the strengths and weakness of cylinder recording as an ethnographic medium. On the one hand,

a cylinder recording was an indexical representation

of actual acoustical phenomena. Within its limitations,

it could more accurately record the sonic data apart

from the filter of an observer's abilities and knowledge.

And it was easier to capture a song by this means

than from the repeated singing necessary to produce

musical notation. Despite their obvious benefits. Boas was acutely aware of the limitations of the cylinder

machines. Early phonographs could not accurately

record rhythm, faint notes, or the sounds of choral or

instrumental ensembles that were common on the Northwest Coast. Even more critical, many musical per- formances, among the Thompson as well as the

KwakiutI, lasted several hours, while wax cylinders

could record only for short periods (an average of three minutes for a four-inch cylinder, and nine minutes for a

six-inch one).'-^ During his 1893 Chicago World's Fair

session. Boas overcame this limitation by recording a

single song across two cylinders; but in Spences Bridge,

motivated perhaps by a shortage of cylinders, he was

forced to use the machine more as a sampler. The

effect of such technological limits was to create the song as a bounded musical object and unit of

ethnomusicological study (cf. Shelemay 1991:280).

With his interest in context. Boas clearly realized

that there was more to a song performance than the

physical sound. While recording the singing of the Th- ompson, he noted the vivid acting and gestures that accompanied the performance:

"The singers became ecstatic and acted out

all their old stories and ceremonies while

they sang. One of them sang a prayer. While

singing he danced and reached out to the sun with both arms while looking upward.

Then he brought them down slowly, looking

to the ground. Before that he had crossed his hands in front of his chest with the palms

outward, moving them to the left and to the

right as if he wanted to embrace the celestial body" (Rohner 1969:203).

To his parents, he added,

"An old woman sang the song into the phonograph which serves to 'cleanse' women who had borne twins. She took

bundles of fir branches and hit her shoulders

and breast with them while she danced. The

song imitates the growl of the grizzly bear

because they believe that the children derive

from the grizzly bear" (Rohner 1 969:204).

Despite noting this detailed description. Boas did not go on to complain about the phonograph's failure to

record such gestures, evidently resigning himself to its

limitations. On the other hand, perhaps his sensitivity

to such failure of transcription led him in 1930-1, at

the age of seventy-two, to use a movie camera to document KwakiutI music and dance.

Returning to New York, Boas had these cylinders

cataloged, but he himself was never able to seriously

study them. In his musical research, as in all his work.

Boas generally devoted more effort to description than

analysis. By himself or with colleagues he managed to

transcribe most of his recordings, but his musical analyses tended to be partial and expressed in short essays and passages of monographs rather than in longer,

specialized works. Although not all his transcriptions were published. Boas undoubtedly felt compelled to

publish as many as possible because they were the

principal form, at the time, of reproducing the music. In

these early years of sound recording, the available tech- nology could produce multiple copies only with great

difficulty. When a system of mastering was developed

I. JACKNIS 1 1 3
a few years later, there was no commercial market for

these cylinders, and thus there was no incentive to reproduce them in quantities. Boas did make copies of

his wax cylinders, but they were inevitably distorted from the original, and there was a limit as to how many

copies could be made before the original signal was

obliterated. Thus transcription was as much a form of

reproduction (and presen>/ation) as it was analysis.

As in his linguistic and ethnographic research, Boas was keenly interested in the methodological implications of these alternate forms of transcription. In one

of his earliest ethnological essays, "On Alternating

Sounds" (Boas 1 889b), he had called attention to the

role of observer bias in the transcription of exotic languages. In fact, it is hard to tell which was more fundamental for Boas—his approach to musical or linguistic

transcription. Moreover, his early training in psychophysics and acoustics, which he applied primarily to

linguistics (cf. IVIackert 1 994), also laid a foundation for

his musicological research. After using the phonograph

for the first time at the Chicago Fair, he made a careful

study of the usefulness of the machine. Working in

parallel. Boas transcribed melodies by ear, while Fillmore made his transcriptions from the cylinder recordings.

Boas then subjected these to re-analysis during his next

field trip in the fall of 1894. His publication of the results (Boas 1 896, 1 897a) was the first comparative

investigation of the transcriptions of the same songs

by different transcribers. Although he complained to

his wife that Fillmore's music was "not very accurate" (Rohner 1969:178-9), when he published them he

claimed that "on the whole" their respective "renderings of the music agree closely" (Boas 1 896: 1 ). In any

case, for Boas it was necessary to continually confirm

his ethnographic transcriptions, so that one could be

sure that they represented Native culture and not observer bias.

Boas was not alone in preferring transcription to

the actual recording. According to Richard Keeling,

"Early collectors seem to have regarded the

machine more as a sampling device or as an

aid for producing written transcriptions than

as a means of recording actual performance

practice. While this approach to field recording partially reflects theoretical presumptions

that seem archaic nowadays, the methodology was due in great part to technological

limitations of the equipment itself (Keeling

1991:xiii, cf. Brady 1984:9).

Thus scholars such as Boas and Fillmore played their

cylinders over and over again to ensure the accuracy

of their transcriptions, in the process drastically degrading the surfaces of the grooves and their ability to

preserve the music.

Like Native artifacts, these cylinders were associated with documentation that reflected their creation. Wickwire has noted the differences in Boas' and Teit's

field notes from this session.

"Boas made notes of only the cylinder

number, the tribal affiliation (Thompson

Indians'), the type of song ('Dancing song,

love song, religious song,' etc.), the place of

recording ('Spence's Bridge'), and the re- corder ('F. Boas'). By way of contrast, Teit made note of the Native names of the

singers ('Kaxpftsa', 'Antko', etc.), the Native names of song-types ("s'tlae'eski"-dance song, etc.), and incidental material such as the flexibility of the words used in the songs"

(Wickwire 1988:189, cf. 2001).'^

She also notes that Teit's post-1 91 2 recordings were much better documented, including the Native name

of the singer, a reference to photographs, how the

singer learned the song, a Native text and translation, and other information such as the age or importance of the song or its ceremonial context. Any

analyis would depend on the kind and amount of

documentation that accompanied the recorded

music. Commenting on the nature of museum documentation, Tom McFeat observed that "object+ data = specimen, where by 'data' one means notes, measurements, drawings, charts, graphs, photographs,

and models" (McFeat 1967:93; italics original). The

object alone is not sufficient as a cultural representation. This equation is as true for sound recordings

as it is for photographs and artifacts. Unfortunately,

such minimal or partial documentation was common

1 1 4 PARTICIPANTS/ BOAS AND MUSIC
in many archives of early sound recordings (Seeger

and Spear 1987:1 1-2).

Boas drew upon this documentation for his brief

discussion of music in Teit's JNPE monograph (Teit

1 900).'" However, the principal analysis of these songs was done by his German colleagues Abraham and von

Hornbostel (1 906). Although Boas would have preferred

to have the study published by the American Museum,

he felt it was acceptable for it to appear under other

auspices as long as proper credit were given (Boas to

Carl Stumpf, 13 November 1905, AMNH). The resulting essay was actually published in a Festschrift dedicated to Boas. This article was one of the first sophisticated analyses of the musical content of Native

American songs, based on recordings of actual perfor- mances and the transcriptions of forty-three songs. The

essay is divided into two parts: "scales" and "rhythm,

tempo, structure, and performance practice." Although

Abraham and von Hornbostel analyzed notes and intervals using Western musical terminology (e.g., thirds,

tonic, semi-tone), they observed, "But the fact that these

concepts, taken from our notions of harmony, cannot be readily applied to Indian music is obvious from the many cases in which the singing departs from pure

intonation of the consonant intervals" (1 975:303). They

had compared the relative tones to measurements of

absolute pitch, based on a standard tone. Offering a

statistical analysis of the intervals, they confronted

Fillmore's argument about "feeling of latent harmony,"

which Boas had supported. Instead, Abraham and

von Hornbostel concluded, tactfully perhaps, that

"this delicate psychological question is today not

yet ready for discussion" (1 975:306).

Turning to a rhythmic analysis, they admitted to

encountering "great difficulty in the rhythmic structure and metrical arrangements of many of the melodies"

(Abraham and von Hornbostel 1 975:302). As Boas had

found earlier, they noted the complex rhythms and

irregular combinations of beats, and the varying relation of the drumming patterns to the singing (on the

thirty-five songs accompanied by percussion). Finally,

I. JACKNIS

they made a few, brief remarks about the quality of

the vocal production. Their only contextual comments

were that "most of the songs are dance or game songs;

others are designated as lyrical, religious, and 'medicine' songs. But a specific musical characterization of

the types according to use could not be made"

(Abraham and von Hornbostel 1975:309).

Music and Culture/Description and Analysis: The Legacy of the JNPE Recordings

Franz Boas never wrote the concluding volume of the

Jesup Expedition reports, summarizing its findings, and

it is now the common view that the Expedition's greatest legacy was its numerous accumulated collections

(e.g., Krupnik and Vakhtin, this volume). The Thompson

Indian recordings were analyzed, although not by Boas

himself. That study, however, raises important questions about interpretative modes and disciplinary perspectives.

Citing their "lack of precise knowledge of the

culture," Abraham and von Hornbostel admitted that

they were necessarily "limited to strictly musical considerations" (1975:301). The implication was that Boas did not share with them any of the contextual

information that he and especially Teit had recorded.

As Wickwire observes: "Only Boas' information was

used in the analysis nor were any of the singers' names mentioned. Only the English names of the

song-types were given" (Wickwire 1 988: 1 90). She

also cites errors the German researchers made be- cause they were not aware of the cultural context. On one song, what Teit called an exhaling sound,

indicating blessing or good will, they interpreted as an inhaling sound denoting tension or excitement

(Wickwire 2001:444). We have the sound on the

cylinders but what does it mean and, more importantly, what does it represent?

Why did Boas not publish information on the cultural context of Thompson songs, as he had for the Kwakiutl?To some extent, these omissions stem from

the fact that Thompson ethnography was somewhat

1 1 5
marginal to Boas' own research and writing. Over the

course of decades, he managed to publish quite a bit

about KwakiutI music; but it took a while and single

essays were often limited. From a more fundamental

perspective, however, this objectivist perspective characterized all of Boas' ethnography to some extent.

Like Abraham and von Hornbostel, Boas often treated

cultural elements as if they were discrete and isolable. As I have suggested elsewhere (Jacknis 1996), while

Boas moved to a more contextual approach over time,

this shift was never complete. Moreover, specific details of his fieldwork were rarely noted in his ethnography, just as he tended to describe cultures in collective rather than individual terms. In this analysis. Boas and von Hornbostel may have been the more sophisticated musicologists, but Teit had the best understanding of the culture. His work, then, was edited largely

by Boas. Perhaps even more important than making available documents of unique performances, recordings

also allowed comparison. Just as the invention of photography was necessary to the development of art

history, so did sound recording facilitate the creation of (ethno)musicology. A recording makes possible an analysis by scholars—such as Abraham and

von Hornbostel—who were not present at the original

performance. (Although this is the goal of transcriptions, no system of musical notation can completely

capture all important aspects of a performance, a problem made all the more difficult when dealing with non- Western—and frequently non-literate—cultures. Moreover, without recordings even transcriptions were

difficult to obtain). As Brady cautions, however, "without personal knowledge of the cultural context in which

the recordings were made, many early armchair comparative musicologists reached conclusions and de- veloped theories that were skeptically received even by their contemporaries" (Brady 1 984:3). A full analysis

of the Thompson songs thus required both formal and

contextual information. The contrast between the

purely formal analysis of Abraham and Hornbostel

compared to the detailed cultural notes of Teit

presages a persisting tension in ethnomusicology.

As expressed in the 1960s and early 1970s, musicologists such as Mantle Hood (1971) held that it was necessary for scholars to be able to play and

technically analyze Native musics, while anthropologists such as Alan Merriam (1964) stressed the im- portance of investigating their cultural context (cf.

NettI 1991:267).

One hundred years later, what are we to make of

these recordings and of Boas' ethnomusicological

research? Because of his personal interest in music,

and his dual background in science and the humanities, Franz Boas realized the importance of recording

and of studying the music of Native peoples. For a

public museum, devoted to the display of artifacts, to

systematically collect sound recordings was an enlightened policy. Against some opposition on the part

of the museum's administration (jacknis 1 985:1 04-5),

Boas was able to argue that the expedition supported

by President Jesup needed to return home with as many

kinds of records as possible to document these "vanishing cultures." As one of the pioneers of ethnomusicology, Boas encouraged several members of the expedition, who might not otherwise have investigated

this topic, to make valuable records and observations.

The sound archives that Boas initiated formed the basis for much of the major collections in this country.

Over time, these cylinder recordings, like the photographs and all the other collections of the Jesup Expedition, have become historical sources in their own

right, as cultures—and especially practices of musical

performance—change. Contemporary scholars as well

as the descendants of their Native singers can go back

and appreciate these objects with keen appreciation.

And while we may not know as much as we would

like about these recordings, they remain, as Boas in- tended (Stocking 1974:123): "the foundation of all

future researches."

1 1 6 PARTICIPANTS/ BOAS AND MUSIC
Acknowledgments

For research assistance and valuable discussion of these

issues, I am deeply grateful to Wendy C. Wickwire. As

the references make clear, I am particularly indebted

to her for information on the 1 897 Spences Bridge

recording session. Thanks also go to Thomas Ross Miller and Richard Keeling for their help and information. I would like to dedicate this essay to my late friend Douglas Cole, who graciously shared his unpublished

research on Franz Boas.

Notes

1. For reasons of historical consistency, I use the ethnic names that Boas employed in his writing. The contemporary names for these

peoples are as follows: KwakiutI are the

Kwakwaka'wakw, Bella Coola are the Nuxalk,

Thompson are the NIaka'pamux, and Baffinland

Eskimo are the Inuit.

2. Thomas Edison patented his phonographic

recording machine in 1 877, but it did not become

commercially available until 1889 (Keeling

1991 :xii). For pre-1900 collections of American

Indian music, see Cillis 1 984; also Densmore 1 927;

Brady 1984; Seeger and Spear 1987; Lee 1993;

Myers 1994:xiii; and Keeling 2001.

3. In addition to the Smithsonian Bureau of

American Ethnology (3240 cylinders, ca. 1933),

other anthropology museums with music collec- tions were the University of California Museum

(271 3), National Museum of Canada (1 530), Field Museum (1500), and University of Pennsylvania

Museum. The American Museum of Natural His- tory had about 2500 cylinders (Inman 1986:3).

Undoubtedly, the AMNH was a model for the substantial sound collections in California, directed

by Boas' student Alfred Kroeber, beginning in 1901 (Keeling 1991;Jacknis 2003). Indirectly, it was also the basis for the large collection at the

Archives of Traditional Music at Indiana University. Much of the American Museum collection was

copied for Columbia University by another of Boas' students, George Herzog, between 1936 and

1 948, and taken to Indiana in 1 948 when Herzog was appointed to the faculty. In 1961 the AMNH

deposited its collection—including the recordings

from the Jesup Expedition—at the Archives of Traditional Music at Indiana University.

4. Extant documentation attributes the col- lection to both Jochelson and Bogoras, but as we

know that the Bogorases made ninety-five phonographic records, the Jochelsons probably made

the remaining forty-four. Furthermore, we know

that Jochelson worked with the Koryak, Tungus

[Even], Yukagir, and Yakut [Sakha], while Bogoras

spent time with the Chukchi and Siberian Eskimo

[Yupikj. According to the Indiana University sound

archives (Cillis 1984:345), the Siberian cylinder

collection comprises: Koryak (18), Yukagir (10),

Yakut (6); and Chukchi (28), Russians (45), Tungus

(5), Aivan [Yupik] Eskimo (8); for a total of 120

surviving cylinders. On a tribal basis, this would

give thirty-nine to Jochelson and eighty-one to Bogoras, which should be roughly correct.

5. Although Berthold Laufer refers to sound

recording in his correspondence with Boas, these

cylinders have not been located (cf. Keeling

2001:280). The Archives of Traditional Music at Indiana University does have his Chinese music

from the American Museum and his Indian and Ti- betan collection from the Field Museum. As we

know that Laufer worked among the Tungus, those

cylinders listed under Bogoras and Jochelson's name may be his, but Jochelson also worked with

the Yukagirized Tungus.

6. Again, the dating of the Maidu collection

is uncertain. The Archives of Traditional Music, In- diana University, indicates a 1910 date for this (Seeger and Spear 1987:40), which would be unlikely from what we know of Dixon's Maidu field- work; in one 1903 letter Dixon refers to recording

"last year" (Dixon to Boas, 26 March 1903, AMNHDA).

7. From a more technical perspective, such a

critique was directly addressed to the evolution- ary displays in which all the musical instruments

of the world were grouped according to technical attributes (i.e., production of sound from vi- brating strings, membranes, or columns of air in a

tube), popular in institutions such as Oxford's Pitt- Rivers Museum and the Smithsonian. The Berlin school of "comparative musicology" developed

Just such a universal system of classification for musical instruments (Hornbostel and Sachs 1961

[1914]; cf. Kartomi 1990:167-74), one which has

I. JACKNIS 1 1 7
become the basis for most subsequent analysis.

Despite his ties to German scholarship, Boas seems

to have had little interest in such approaches. In- stead, almost all of his musicological research and

writing came in the context of specific cultures

and regions.

8. Although Boas writes of going "down to the village" to collect melodies (Rohner ) 969:202),

Teit's catalogue of the song sessions states that the songs were "recorded on Phonograph by Dr. Boas (at Teit's house), June 1 897" (Archives of Traditional Music, Indiana University, cf. Wickwire

2001 :432, 434, 437). Furthermore, Boas refers to the singing occurring in "the house" (Rohner

1969:204).

9. After the stay in Spences Bridge, there is no further mention of the phonograph. At the end

of July, however, Harlan Smith complained to a

clerk at the American Museum that the phonograph cylinders and photographic plates that the

museum had sent to Victoria in May were missing. Consequently, he had to "do without the phonograph cylinders" (Smith to John Winser, 30July

1897, AMNH, cited in Mathe and Miller 2001:1 10). After leaving Spences Bridge, Smith had gone

to Kamloops, which was Shuswap (Secwepemc)

territory, and Lytton, Thompson territory, where

he focused on archaeology and physical anthropology (Thom 2001:142-3). Perhaps he was not able to make projected recordings because of

these missing cylinders. Wickwire (personal communication 1998) suggests that the Jesup team

left the machine with Teit, who continued to record songs, or Farrand might have used it the

following year in Washington State. In any case, it

is clear that the American Museum had several

phonographs.

10. Several members of the Jesup Expedition noted the impression that sound recording

made among Native people. Both Jochelson

(among the Koryak) and Laufer (among the

Gilyak) reported similar Native beliefs that there

had to be a little man inside the machine with an amazing ability to learn songs Qochelson

1908:426-7; Laufer to Boas, 4 March 1899, in Boas 1903:97). Negative reactions to this mimetic ability were also expressed. Jochelson

wrote: "Older people [of Kamenskoye] stop the

younger ones from singing into the phonograph

saying [that] 'the old one' as they call the phonograph will take their voices and they'll die"

(Jochelson to Boas, 3 December 1900, in Kendall,

Mathe, Miller 1 997:39). Because of such feelings,

performances were sometimes modified: "In Si- beria, some shamans forbade the phonograph

recording of actual ceremonies, instead performing special demonstrations in front of the machine. Besides the possibility that the recordings might be used for evil purposes, they were

concerned that spirits would fly into the recording horn and be trapped irretrievably inside the

phonograph box" (op. cit., pp. 36-7).

1 1 . Somewhat similar to the reactions to the

phonograph were Native responses to cameras, which were much more familiar, especially on the

Northwest Coast (Blackman 1982; Rohner

1969:189; Kendall, Mathe, Miller 1997:33). Unlike that tool, however, the recording could be

played back immediately for the subjects.

12. Probably because of their lack of sonic

sensitivity, Boas found cylinder machines to be of

little use for recording speech: "I have used the

phonograph quite a good deal for certain pur- poses, and particularly for recording Indian music. I find that it is absolutely without any value

for recording Indian languages" (Boas to D. P. Penhallow, 10 February 1899, AMNH-DA)

1 3. The respective field notes are: Franz Boas,

1897, unpublished note, copy from Archives of

Traditional Music, Indiana University; James Teit,

1897, unpublished notes on songs, Salish Ethnographic Notes, APS.

14. There are a few tantalizing clues that

Harlan Smith was to have analyzed the Thompson music. Writing in Spences Bridge in 1 897, Boas

casually noted, "the other night when he [Smith]

took down the songs . . ." (Rohner 1969:205).

See note 9 on the possibility of Smith's use of the

phonograph. On one list of potential Jesup Expedition publications. Smith was listed as the au- thor of "Songs of the Thompson Indians" (cf. F. W.

Putnam to Boas, 12 August [?] 1903, AMNH-DA).

15. Of the texts for the Thompson River

songs. Boas wrote years later, "If I remember

correctly I sent the words to Hornbostel, but I am not sure" (Boas to George Herzog, 18 April

1933, APS-BP).

1 1 8 PARTICIPANTS/ BOAS AND MUSIC
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1 899 The Tenth Annual Meeting of the American

Folk-Lore Society. Journal of American Folk-Lore

12(l):51-4.

Pisani, Michael V.

1 998 "I'm an Indian Too": Creating Native American

Identities in Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-Century

Music. In The Exotic in Western Music, ^omxhan Bellman,

ed. Pp. 2 1 8-57. Boston: Northeastern University Press.

Reinhard, Kurt

1971 [1962] The Berlin Phonogramm-Archiv. In Readings in Ethnomusicology. David P. McAllester,

ed. Pp. 1 7-23. Reprinted from The Folklore and Folk Music Archivist 5(2): 1-4. New York: Johnson Reprint Corp.

Reinhard, Kurt, and George List

1 963 The Demonstration Collection of E. M. von

Hornbostel and the Berlin Phonogramm-Archiv. New

York: Ethnic Folkways Library [Smithsonian Institution]. FE 41 75. LP recording.

Roberts, Helen H. 1936 Musical Areas in Aboriginal North America. Yale University Publications in Anthropology 1 2

Rohner, Ronald P., ed.

1 969 Letters and Diaries of Franz Boas Written on

the Northwest Coast from 1886 to 1931. Chicago:

University of Chicago Press. Seeger, Anthony, and Louise S. Spear

1987 Ethnographic Cylinder Recordings: an In- troduction. In Early Field Recordings: a Catalogue of

Cylinder Collections at the Indiana University Archives

of Traditional Music. Anthony Seeger and Louise S. Spear, eds. Pp. 1-14. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Shelemay, Kay Kaufman

1991 Recording Technology, the Record Industry, and Ethnomusicological Scholarship. In Comparative Musicology and Anthropology of Music: Es- says on the History of Ethnomusicology. Bruno NettI and Philip V. Bohlman, eds. Pp. 277-92. Chicago:

University of Chicago Press. Simon, Artur, ed.

2000 Das Berliner Phonogramm-Archiv 1900-

2000: Sammlung der traditionellen Musik der Welt

[The Berlin Phonogramm-Archiv, 1 900-2000: Col- lections of Traditional Music of the World]. Bilingual

(German/English) edition. Berlin: Verlag fur Wissenschaft und Bildung.

Stocking, George W., Jr., ed.

1974 The Shaping ofAmerican Anthropology, 1 883-

191 1: a Franz Boas Reader. New York: Basic Books.

Swanton, John R. 1905 Contributions to the Ethnology of the Haida. The

Jesup North Pacific Expedition, vol. 5, pt. 1 , pp. 1 -300.

Memoirs ofthe American Museum ofNatural History,

8(1 ). Leiden: E.J. Brill; New York: G. E. Stechert. 1912 Haida Songs. Publications of the American

Ethnological Society 3:1-63. Stumpf, Carl

1 886 LiederderBellakula-lndianer. Vierteljahrschrift fur Musikwissenschaft, 11:405-26. Teit, James A.

1 900 The Thompson Indians of British Columbia.

The Jesup North Pacific Expedition, vol. 1 , pt.4, pp.

I. JACKNIS
1 63-392 . Memoirs ofthe American Museum ofNatural History, 2. New York: C. E. Stechert. Thom, Brian

200 1 Harlan I. Smith's Jesup Fieldwork on the North- west Coast. In Gateways. Exploring the Legacy of

the Jesup North Pacific Expedition, / 897- 1 902. Igor

Krupnik and William W. Fitzhugh, eds. Pp. 139-

1 80. Contributions to Circumpolar Anthropology, 1

Washington DC: Arctic Studies Center.

Wickwire, Wendy C.

1 988 James A. Teit: His Contribution to Canadian

Ethnomusicology. The Canadian Journal ofNative Studies 8(2): 183-204.

1 993 Women in Ethnography: the Research ofJames

A. Teit. Ethnohistory 40{4):Si9-62.

200 1 The Grizzly Bear Cave Them Song: James Teit and Franz Boas Interpret Twin Ritual in Aboriginal

British Columbia, 1 897-1 920. American Indian Quarterly 25(3) A3 ^ -52.

1 22
^etjOnd ^OaS? Keassessmg the Contribution o(- "Inf

and "jxesearch /Assistant": James /\. T^ei't

ormant^

WENDY WICKWIRE

Few of the many early anthropologists who worked in

the Pacific Northwest were more productive than James

A. Teit (1 864-1 922). For the Plateau region, Teit generated a rich ethnographic record of over 2,000 pages

in forty-two published sources, and another 5,000

pages in thirty-four unpublished sources (Sprague

1991:103). He also collected artifacts, took photographs, made sketches, collected plant specimens,

and recorded songs on wax cylinders. Much of this work was undertaken under the direction of Franz Boas and thejesup North Pacific Expedition (JNPE), an arrangement in which Teit is often seen as an

"assistant" and "informant to Boas."' Yet, given the prodigious, independent, and high quality of his output,

it is time to re-evaluate Teit as an anthropologist in

his own right.''

Teit's role in the JNPE was to document the interior regions of British Columbia and, in so doing, fill

a noticeable gap in the ethnographic record. Boas devoted much of his own time and attention to the

central coastal region, partly because this is where

he had good contacts, and also because his few

ethnographic field trips inland had not gone well.

In fact, without Teit's assistance. Boas' JNPE output

would have been substantially smaller. When one

looks closely at Teit's on-the-ground work for the

JNPE, it could be argued that his contribution not

only stands on its own, but in many ways goes

beyond that of Boas.

A Timely Meeting in 1894

James Alexander Teit was the eldest of 12 children

born into a merchant family in the town of Lerwick in

the Shetland Islands (Fig. 37). In 1 884, two years after

finishing secondary school in Lerwick, Teit travelled to Canada to Join his Uncle John Murray at Spences Bridge on the Thompson River in south central British Columbia (Fig. 38)^ Murray owned a popular trading outlet in

the village (Figs. 39, 40). As his uncle's employee, Teit came into regular contact with the local NIaka'pamux

people who lived in the region (Fig. 41).'' He obviously

established immediate rapport with the latter, for within

three years, he had taken up residence with Susannah

Lucy Antko, a member of the Spences Bridge Band

(Fig. 42). When not working in the store, Teit undertook whateverjobs were available, for example, ranching, fruit farming, hunting, and ferry work.^

Teit's life took an unusual turn in September 1 894

when he encountered Franz Boas who was in the region to complete work for his sixth and second-tolast field season for the Committee of the British Association for the Advancement of Science (BAAS) for the

Study of Northwestern Tribes of Canada in British Columbia. En route by train from the Okanagan Valley to

the coast, Boas had decided to spend a night at Spences Bridge. On hearing of a local man, a "Scots- man" who was married to "an Indian woman [who

knew] ... a great deal about the Indians and was

especially kind," Boas immediately tracked him down

1 23
at his small ranch across the river from his hotel (F. Boas to M. Boas, 21 September 1894, Rohner

1969:140). Seeing him so at ease with his wife and

her relatives and quite fluent in their language. Boas employed him on the spot (Figs. 43, 44). As he explained it to his wife in a letter: "The young man is a

treasure [who] knows a great deal about Indian tribes.

I engaged him right away" (F. Boas to M. Boas, 21 September 1894, Rohner 1969:139). With Teit's assistance. Boas instantly gained access to a cultural region that hitherto was not well represented on his ethnographic map.

A Link to the Interior

The demands of the BAAS survey on Boas were great.

Horatio Hale, an American philologist who had retired

to Ontario, was charged with directing Boas' fieldwork

in the Pacific Northwest. Hale's instructions to Boas were to "give an ethnological description of the whole

region [of British Columbia], from north to south, without omitting any stock" (Rohner 1 969:81 ). Hale, who

had worked in Oregon as a member of the Wilkes

Expedition of 1832-42, wanted a comprehensive

survey of everything, from languages and tribal divisions to the physical characteristics of the peoples of

the various regions. Boas was often impatient with

his superior's demands, describing him as an "old man

[who] knows nothing about general ethnology" (Cole

1973:41).

Boas found ethnographic fieldwork in areas beyond

the coast a challenge. He had recorded the stories of a

small group of NIaka'pamux gathered at an Anglican

church at Lytton at the end of his second field season

in the Northwest Coast (his first for the BAAS) in July

1 888. But he was not satisfied with these due to the heavy influence of Christian missionaries. After Lytton,

he headed east to Windemere, just west of the Rocky

Mountains where he encountered what he referred to

as his first "real Indians" on account of their "red skin,

eagle noses, the famous blanket, moccasins, rabbit [?] apron, and deerskin jacket, with hair hanging loose or

braided, more than six feet long" (F. Boas to M. Boas,

1 8 July 1 888, Rohner 1 969: 1 02). Here too he expressed

disappointment. Although he collected a fair number

of stories and vocabularies there, he found it difficult

to find suitable "informants." He also found little com- mon ground with his coastal work. As he explained to

his wife: "I am not so very much interested in these

tribes, because they have very little relation to all my

former work. . . . The language is very unfamiliar to me

and the interpreter does not understand well enough

to make it worthwhile to stay another week" (F. Boas

to M. Boas, 18 July 1888, Rohner 1969:102). Boas tried again the following summer of 1 889 to work with peoples of the interior, but this proved to

be even more disappointing than his earlier efforts. As

he noted in a letter to his wife, "The last two weeks

were not very fruitful. To my great distress a Lillooet

Indian who had promised me the evenings has gone

again and I had wanted to learn something about their

language" (F. Boas to M. Boas, 14 September 1889,

Rohner 1969:1 14). His lack of success with these forays into the interior regions of the province may account for his decision to spend the entire 1890 and

1891 field seasons on the coast.

It was not until his sixth field trip in September

1 894, that Boas ventured again into the interior region. This time he decided to focus on the Okanagan

region, with stops also at Glacier, Enderby, Sicamous

and Kamloops. Again, his results were meager. "My

Okanagan trip was a great failure," he complained to

his wife in a letter dated September 16, 1894:

Friday I went with an Indian to Lake

Okanagan in pouring rain to measure Indians. Unfortunately he took me to the chief first instead of letting me go from house to house. We had to parley a lot, and then the

chief told me to wait, that he was going to

talk it over in the evening. From the way he

acted I could tell that the good chief was

afraid and that I wouldn't get what I wanted.

When all the Indians had scattered in all directions in the evening, I left, arriving in Enderby very late and very angry. I was so cold

that I could not move my fingers. . . . Well, there was nothing I could do about it. . . . Yesterday

1 24 PARTICIPANTS/ JAMES A. TEIT
I got five people in Enderby. I met a missionary there who had come from the Lake. I greeted him politely, he asked me what I was doing, and I explained everything to him

as well as I could. He answered very politely

(he is French), 'That seems very foolish. What

do you want to do such nonsense for?' The

Indians ask his advice, which he freely gives.

And that is the reason for my lack of success

in Enderby. I will be glad when I am back on

the coast again! (F. Boas to M. Boas, 16

September 1894, Rohner 1969:136).

Not surprisingly, when Boas arrived at Spences Bridge

two days later, he was beginning to lose faith in his

abilities as a fieldworker. Teit's willingness to assist him did much to lift his spirits. On the first day of their

meeting, Teit convinced his relatives and friends to submit themselves to Boas' anthropometric measurements; on the second day Teit saddled two horses

and took Boas to visit numerous aboriginal settlements

in the vicinity of Spences Bridge.

Immediately Boas' attitude to his fieldwork

changed. "The disagreeable feeling I had that I don't

get along with the Indians is slowly wearing off now,"

he wrote to his wife, "and I am hopeful that I will have

good results" (F. Boas to M. Boas, 21 September 1 894,

Rohner 1 969: 1 39). By the end of the visit, he noted, "I am slowly getting into the mood of 'fieldwork' again"

(F. Boas to M. Boas, 23 September 1894, Rohner

1969:142).

Before departing for New York in December, Boas made a return trip to Spences Bridge to continue his work with Teit who had arranged a trip to a number of

outlying aboriginal communities: Lytton, Stain [Stein], and North Bend. Boas was pleased, especially with his success at measuring "one hundred and twenty-three

Indians" in just three days (F. Boas to M. Boas, 1 5 December 1894, Rohner 1969:195).

There were many rich ethnographic experiences on this trip, such as one at Stain, at the confluence of

the Thompson and Eraser Rivers where a chief regaled Boas and Teit with speeches in the company of nu- merous onlookers (F. Boas to M. Boas, 1 5 December

1 894, Rohner 1 969: 1 96). Boas was particularly pleased

to find that Teit was already well along on an ethnographic report on the NIaka'pamux that he had pro- posed the previous September (F. Boas to M. Boas, 1 5 December 1894, Rohner 1969:196).

A Year of Continuous Work

During the first year of their collaboration, Teit proved

to be an ideal ethnographic assistant for Boas. He

worked diligently to answer the latter's queries about

the languages and traditions of the interior cultures. By

early spring 1895, he had completed a 216-page report on the NIaka'pamux, noting that this did not in any way exhaust his knowledge of the topic: "There is no subject which [sic] I have taken up in the paper, but what I could have treated more fully if I had wanted

to, especially as this [is] the case with beliefs and cus- toms, many of which I have never made mention [of]

at all in the paper" (Teit to Boas, 22 February 1895,

AMNH-BTC).

One of Boas' early requests of Teit was to find out what existed about the "Stuwixamux," an Athapaskanspeaking group that was once resident in the Nicola

Valley. Teit tracked down three elderly men knowledgeable about this little-known group and wrote an

account, which Boas included in his "Report of the 65th Meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science" (Boas 1 895). By the spring of

1895, Teit had also assembled a large collection of

"articles of ethnological value" (buckskin leggings, a

shirt, moccasins, beaver-teeth dice, gambling sticks, a

stone axe, a tent mat, two root-diggers, a fire drill, and

a stone hammer), which he mailed to Boas in New

York (Teit to Boas, 1 2 March 1 895, AMNH-BTC).

By August 1895, Teit felt sufficiently comfortable

with Boas to begin offering the latter critical feedback.

"I thank you very much for the copy [of the Sixth Report on the Northwest Tribes of Canada] you sent," wrote Teit to Boas, "and have looked over it with much

pleasure and profit. You have made a few slight mistakes in your vocabulary of the Ntlakyapamux. I will send you a list sometime of these when I have more

W. WICKWIRE 1 2 5
time and also the words and compound forms which

you seem to have been unable to obtain" (Teit to Boas,

1 2 August 1 895, AMNH-BTC). Teit also challenged Boas on some of his conclusions regarding interior people:

I consider it very surprising that you should

find four, I might say five, such remarkably

different types of Indian [sic] in the rather small area of BC. If you investigate the

Lillooet next summer you will I am sure find that they are different from the NLakyapamuxoe and the NkamtcinEmux

perhaps resembling the Harrison Lake type, or perhaps somewhat different. You will also

find if you go into that field that the average

Carrier and average Chilcotin are not alike at least in countenance or features and in stature. The only mistakes which I notice in looking over your sheets of measurements

are on sheet 10 (Teit to Boas, 22 October

1895, AMNH-BTC).

Teit's Role in the Jesup North Pacific

Expedition

In June 1 897, Boas returned to British Columbia to finish his work for the BAAS and to initiate the first phase

of his own field project funded by Morris K. Jesup, President of the Board of Trustees of the American Mu- seum of Natural History. The goal of the Jesup North

Pacific Expedition was to conduct a systematic ethnological and archaeological investigation of the relations among the indigenous peoples of the North

Pacific Rim—Northwestern America and Northeastern Asia. Field parties would work in stages over a

five-year period on the American west coast, along

the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk, and in the northern

portion of the Bering Sea. Boas saw this project as an opportunity to pursue a more historical approach.

In his words: "A detailed study of customs in their

relation to the total culture of the tribe practicing

them, in connection with an investigation of their

geographical distribution among neighboring tribes,

affords us almost always a means of determining

with considerable accuracy the historical causes that

led to the formation of the customs in question and

to the psychological processes that were at work

1 26

in their development" (Boas 1896, quoted in Cole

2001:32-3).

Boas sought out primary materials of all sorts, but

especially texts recorded in the Native languages

(retellings of myths, dreams, ideas, etc.), which he

considered to be the best source of accurate and

authentic ethnographic data (Berman 1996:220).

Since few First Nation peoples in the Pacific North- west were fluent in English at this time, however, such

texts were difficult to elicit by non-linguists. Boas' fine

ear for languages enabled him to proceed quickly. But

he could not undertake the task of such large-scale

ethnographic and linguistic recording and mapping

alone. He therefore organized his Jesup Expedition

around teams of ethnographers. For its first field season in the Pacific Northwest, he appointed Harlan I.

Smith, assistant curator of the archaeology collections

at the American Museum of Natural History, to undertake the archaeological component of the project. Boas

also brought along Livingston Farrand, a colleague in psychology from Columbia University, to assist with

the general ethnographic field research. The only problem here was that neither Smith nor Farrand had had

any previous field experience in this region. In fact,

Farrand was a complete novice, having had no previous ethnographic field experience in Aboriginal North

America. He had joined this expedition at his own

expense, in order to gain some field experience under

Boas' tutelage.

To overcome the linguistic and cultural limitations

of his co-workers, Boas appointed Teit. The latter's

fluency in the NIaka'pamux language and two years of

field research under his close supervision qualified him

well to work on the JNPE project. As Boas explained in

his first Jesup Expedition report, Teit had begun his

Jesup research even before the arrival of the expedition team in British Columbia (Boas 1898a). Boas also

designated Spences Bridge to be the initial site for his

Jesup research in North America. He had outlined in

letters how he wanted Teit to prepare for his visit. Teit

had responded accordingly: "I have been preparing

PARTICIPANTS/ JAMES A. TEIT
the Indians here for your taking their pictures. If you

bring a camera I think you will have no trouble getting

a lot of both men and women" (Teit to Boas, 1 March

1897, AMNH-BTC). Teit also prepared his friends and

neighbors for the plaster casting process that Boas

planned to use to document human facial features. He

noted that without such preparation most would be

reluctant to participate (Thom 2001:141).

Boas' goal was to travel by way of the Cariboo

Wagon Road from Spences Bridge to Bella Coola. A

seasoned horse-packer, Teit planned this trip carefully, even advising Boas that he and his colleagues would

need to bring little with them: "Regarding the camping outfit required," wrote Teit in April 1 897, "you will

not need to buy any of it. I will furnish it all. All you

have to bring will be your blankets and any other thing

you may wish in that line. Also anything you think best

as a protection against mosquitoes and flies which

are bad in some parts of the country through which we will pass" (Jeit to Boas, 29 April 1 897, AMNH-BTC;

Fig. 45). Due to Teit's careful planning, the New York- based research team was able to launch into its work

immediately on arriving at Spences Bridge. As Boas

noted after measuring and photographing people and

collecting ethnographic objects: "It was not much effort . . . Teit had prepared everything for us very well. The Indians were ready for us promptly yesterday afternoon, and we could not work quickly enough to

finish with all of them" (F. Boas to M. Boas, 5 June 1 897,

Rohner 1969:202).

The party of four worked incessantly on a variety

of projects, from plaster casting, photography and recording songs: "We can be satisfied with the results of our first two days here. If it only will continue this way!"

(F. Boas to M. Boas, 5 June 1897, Rohner 1969:202).

And it did continue. At the end of the third day. Boas wrote to his wife:

We seem to be finished here with the

castings. I let Farrand and Smith make the

casts ready for shipping. This afternoon

Jimmy Teit and i went down to the village

and collected melodies. The phonograph

works very well, and we got ten good

songs.... I can really be satisfied with my first few days here. We got eleven casts and

many photos, a few measurements and three songs (Franz Boas, 5 June 1897, Rohner

1969:202).

Boas also noted that he had obtained explanations of

the various designs on woven baskets, jewelry, and

masks (F. Boas to M. Boas, 14 June 1897, Rohner

1969:205). In addition to helping Boas and Farrand,

Teit also made time to acquaint Smith with some of

the archaeological sites along the banks of the Th- ompson River. Boas could not have wished for a more

productive beginning to his Jesup Expedition.

On June 14, Boas, Farrand, and Teit headed north

to the central interior, leaving Smith behind to continue his archaeological work at Spences Bridge,

Kamloops, and Lytton. Because Teit had organized everything, including four riding horses, five pack horses,

and three guides, who traveled behind on foot. Boas and Farrand had little to do but to follow Teit. The

travel was slow, however, and Boas expressed frustration in his letters about the monotony of the trip. He was particularly concerned about the time required to pack and unpack the horses. He was also disappointed

to find most of the aboriginal villages along the way

to be completely deserted. He commented repeatedly that people had "scattered" in all directions. This was late spring, a time when women traveled to their

favorite berry-picking and root-digging areas. Men may

have accompanied them to catch fresh fish or meat. "I

will be very glad when we finally reach the coast," he wrote to his wife. "I am fed up with these trips into the

wilderness" (F. Boas to M. Boas, 6 July 1897, Rohner

1969:208). At Puntzi Lake, on the Chilcotin plateau,

the party dropped Farrand to undertake a month-long

field study of language and oral narrative traditions. Meanwhile Boas continued with Teit onto Bella Coola

where he had arranged to work with George Hunt. The son of an English Hudson's Bay Company employee

and a high-ranking Tlingit woman. Hunt had grown up

among, and married into, the Fort Rupert

W. WICKWIRE 1 27
Kwakwaka'wakw. Boas met him in 1886. Later he

comissioned him to mount an artifact exhibit and organize a performing group for the World's Columbian

Exposition in Chicago in 1893 (Cole 1985: 122-40;

Berman 1996).

After seven weeks of slow horse travel, Boas and

his party arrived at Bella Coola on 20 July 1897. Teit and the guides remained there for three days before

beginning the return trip to Spences Bridge. They carried with them the plaster casts and artifacts the group

had collected on the trip north. While Boas worked

with Hunt at Bella Coola and later at Rivers Inlet, and

with Charles Edenshaw at Port Essington, Teit contin- ued the ethnographic work in the more southerly regions that he had been doing prior to Boas' arrival:

collecting myths, working on the language, and revising his NIaka'pamux ethnographic report.

Boas returned to New York in late September 1 897

and wasted no time booking Teit for further ethnographic fieldwork. With the Upper NIaka'pamux research

well underway. Boas was eager for Teit to begin documenting adjacent groups—the Lower Thompson and

the Lillooet. Teit agreed to do this, reporting to Boas by April 1898 that he had completed two weeks of

field research at Spuzzum, which included collecting

thirty-one myths and a range of artifacts: a stone pipe,

two stone hammers, and a copper spek (Teit to Boas,

6 April 1898, AMNH-BTC). By September 1898, Teit had completed another two months of fieldwork

among the Lillooet (Teit to Boas, 28 August 1898,

AMNH-BTC). Although this was his first field research beyond his home community, it went well: "I found

the Lillooets to be a very fine people—the most

tractable and kindest I was ever amongst. I had no

difficulty with them in any way. The Pemberton

people especially were very good" (Teit to Boas, 8

October 1898, AMNH-BTC). "My notes on customs

alone," he wrote to Boas, "fill 1 22 pages and I have

also gathered many stories." He brought home about

1 1 artifacts, the majority of which were baskets, and

a large collection of myths. After spending the fall writing up his Lower Thompson report (Teit to Boas, 1 1 November 1 898, AMNH, BTC), Teit returned to Lillooet country again, reporting to Boas in July 1 899 that this

field research had also gone well (Teit to Boas, 1 2 July

1899, AMNH-BTC). In addition to seventeen artifacts,

including some very fine baskets, he had collected more oral narratives, bringing his total number of Lillooet

stories to sixty (Teit to Boas, 19 July 1899, AMNHBTQ.

Early in the year 1 900, with The Thompson Indians 'm

press (Teit 1 900), Boas urged Teit to write up his Lillooet

field notes: "What are you doing with your Lillooet

material? Do you expect to find time soon to send me

your notes?" (Boas to Teit, 7 February 1 900, AMNHBTC). Teit replied a week later that he would send him

"some (perhaps all) this spring" (Teit to Boas, 1 6 February 1900, AMNH-BTC). Boas was now so delighted

with Teit that he proposed a five-year research plan:

I should like to suggest to you to commence

systematic work in this line by writing down

texts in the Indian language with interlinear translation, and putting down at the same

time material for a dictionary. It is best to select for the texts, on the one hand tradi- tional material, such as myths, and on the

other hand material in the form of conversations or speeches, because the grammatical

forms that occur in the latter are, on the whole quite different from those found in the

former. I hope you will be willing to undertake this work, and I believe I shall be able to

set aside a certain amount of money to compensate you for the time that you

devote to this matter. I think if you could

continue work of this kind for four or five years, we shall be able to obtain a very full dictionary and grammar of the Thompson

language (Boas to Teit, 27 January 1900,

AMNH-BTC).

In July 1900, Boas made his second and final field trip

to the Northwest Coast under the auspices of the Jesup

Expedition. As he had done in 1 897, Boas started out

at Spences Bridge where he spent a week working

with Teit prior to heading to Alert Bay to work with

William Brotchie, George Hunt, and others.

After Boas' departure, Teit undertook two months

of field research in August and September 1 900 among

1 28 PARTICIPANTS/ JAMES A. TEIT
the Shuswap and Chilcotin: "I have now interviewed

old men belonging to High Bar, Big Bar, Canoe Creek,

Dog Creek, and Alkali Lake," he wrote to Boas (Teit to

Boas, 20 September 1 900, AMNH-BTC). "I had one man

living with me for three weeks under wages, and

pumped him until he got tired." Teit was pleased with

his results: "I think I have obtained the great majority

or nearly all the stories remembered by the Fraser River Shuswap" (Teit to Boas, 2 1 October 1 900, AMNH-BTC).

By November, he had crated and mailed to Boas some

seventy items gathered during this trip (Teit to Boas,

1 5 November 1900, AMNH-BTC). Meanwhile, he continued his work on his Lillooet report for the JNPE series

noting that, "I am writing the whole out in chapters in

the same way as you grouped my paper on the

Thompsons." He worked hard on this: "As I am writing

steady every night I expect to be able to send you the whole paper before very long. As soon as I have finished it, I will commence to write out the Shuswap

myths" (Teit to Boas, 23 November 1 900, AMNH-BTC).

Teit hoped to get to the more westerly bands of the Shuswap the following summer: "I think it will be a

wise thing if you can see your way clear to send me as

early as possible next summer to the Shuswaps of Canim Lake, Upper North Thompson and Shuswap Lake.

. . . If this were done I would be able to write out a paper on the whole Shuswap tribe in the same way as

the Lillooet and Thompsons have been dealt with" (Teit

to Boas, 23 November 1 900, AMNH-BTC). Finally, early

in the year ] 90 1

, Teit sent Boas the last chapters of his

Lillooet report (Teit to Boas, 26 February 1 90 1, AMNHETQ.

After a six month trip to the Shetlands in 1902,

Teit resumed his work for Boas: "I am going up Nicola on the fourteenth to collect myths there," he wrote to Boas in July 1 902, "and I expect it will take me until the end of the month" (Teit to Boas, 1 2 July 1 902, AMNHBTC). Later, he noted that he would be willing to go to

the coast to work among the Lower Fraser people.

"Please give me full directions for the carrying out of same" (Teit to Boas, 1 9 November 1 902, AMNH-BTC).

By mid-March 1903, Teit had completed this work.

Perhaps due to the success of the field research

undertaken by Teit and Hunt, Boas decided against a

field trip in 1 903. As he explained to Teit: "I am sorry

to say that I shall not be able to go out West this summer. I have not had time so far to work out the

material that I collected three years ago, and so I think

it better to stay here and finish that work. I shall send

$400 for your Shuswap work within a few days. I am

looking forward to your next shipment" (Boas to Teit,

1 April 1903, AMNH-BTC). Just one month later. Boas

outlined to Teit a five-year research plan:

I wish you would take the time before you

start to think over the further development

of your work on the Shuswap, and also the extension of your work on the Okanogon

[sic] and the Salish tribes of Washington. I should like very much to be able to continue

your work in the whole region, which you

know so well, and to push it a little more

rapidly than we have been doing these last few years. Could you not make some

estimate, say, for a period of about five years, including in such an estimate the expenses for fieldwork during such period

and a salary for yourself. I should like to see included in this work also the recording of

texts in the Thompson language about

which we have so often spoken. My idea

would be that you should begin to write

these texts down, and that after you have

made a considerable collection, I should come out, and that we should spend to- gether some time with the Indians, getting

really thorough information on the grammar

of the language (Boas to Teit, 5 May 1903,

AMNH-BTC).

Teit responded that he needed financial compensation to do this: "I am quite willing to devote more of my own time to it (the southern tribes), if you could

manage and afford to give me sufficient remuneration

so I could be able to give up some other lines of work

I at present partly depend on ' (Teit to Boas, 1 4 June

1 903, AMNH-BTC). Teit estimated that he would need

$850 to cover five years of research at eight months

per year. By the end of the summer of 1903, Teit reported

to Boas that he had "visited all the Shuswaps and their

W. WICKWIRE 1 29
villages excepting the Spallumcheen and, of course,

the Kootenai band. I got some additional information

and cleared up some points, but on the whole I did

not add much to the information I obtained from the

Fraser River Shuswaps two or three years ago" (Teit to

Boas, 24 August 1903, AMNH-BTC).

With his Shuswap report well under way by the

following spring, Teit began to make plans for further work among the Okanagan. "Personally I feel much

interested in the work," he wrote to Boas, "and will try

to take an elderly man with me from this region, who

is well acquainted with the Southern dialects, and interested in old things" (Teit to Boas, 25 May 1904,

AMNH-BTC). "I think I will make a trip there this summer

leaving in about two weeks time, and making the Okanagan River my objective point for this year. Going, I will pass through Similkameen where I will probably stay a short time, and returning I will visit Okanagan

Lake. I am not sure yet if I will cross the Boundary Line

with the pack train as there may be bother with the customs" (Teit to Boas, 1 3 May 1 904, AMNH-BTC). By

the middle of August, he had completed six weeks of

work among the Okanagan (Teit to Boas, 12 August

1904, AMNH-BTC).

Meanwhile Boas, by 1904, had spent only five months in the field during thejesup Expedition. His

productive ethnographic exchange by mail with both

Teit and Hunt, and his faith in both field researchers to work largely on their own for months at a time had

eliminated the need for Boas to be on site. Smith and

Farrand were similarly dependent on their mail corre- spondence with Teit to finalize their Jesup Expedition

reports (Teit to Smith, 4 December 1 899, AMNH-BTC).

Boas had not been pleased with his own fieldwork

during the first Jesup season in 1897, mainly due to slow and awkward travel through the inland regions.

And Farrand's month at Puntzi Lake had resulted in

very sparse results. Meanwhile, Teit, who dealt with

slow and awkward travel on a daily basis, had generated a rich ethnographic database. He had also become a sensitive and sophisticated fieldworker

who could negotiate easily between the world of

his interviewees and that of his distant employers.

For example, on the basis of unacceptable protocol,

he refused to comply with the AMNH's request for

signed receipts from aboriginal interviewees:

To them 'touching the pen' is a very serious

and solemn matter requiring much deliberation, and explanation, as for instance when

they make an argument with the Government, or with some big tyhee about some

important matter. It is also very unhandy for example in open camps, in all kinds of

weather (raining or blowing) or perhaps

pested with mosquitoes, or blinded with

smoke, to get the Indian to mark a voucher

for some little specimen I have purchased

from him. Understanding the Indian mind

about the thing as I do, it seems to me in the nature of a joke. I know it is business, but up

to date New York City methods do not always work out in the wilds of B. C. Any

way it is no check on me, for it would be

easy for me to put crosses and Indian names

on any amount of them, and no one would

know whether they are genuine or not. Signatures are different, but not one Indian in 200 can sign his name. Even amongst the Whites it is not the style here (in small

matters) when say you get a meal (as I may

sometimes do when on a trip) to ask the

waitress to sign a voucher for it (Teit to Boas,

10 March 1904, AMNH-BTC).

Teit's Place in the Publication Record of

the Jesup North Pacific Expedition

Of the twenty-seven publications under the AMNH

Jesup North Pacific Expedition series, Teit authored four:

The Thompson Indians {] 900), The Lillooet{] 906), The

Shuswap {] 909), and Mythology ofthe Thompson Indians

(1 91 2). He was a major contributor to four others, acting as a field assistant (identifying sites, collecting artifacts) and consultant to Harlan Smith for the latter's Archaeology of Lytton (1 899) and Archaeology of the Thompson River {] 900a); facilitating the photographic

work that formed the core of the Expedition's Ethnographical Album ofthe North Pacific Coasts ofAmerica

and Asia (Boas 1 900); and providing the bulk of the

primary data featured in Livingston Farrand's Basketry

Designs ofthe Salish Indians {] 900). In comparison. Boas'

1 30 PARTICIPANTS/ JAMES A. TEIT
written contributions were substantially smaller, consisting of five JNPE publications, of which three (Boas

and Hunt 1905, 1906; Boas 1909) drew heavily on

the research of George Hunt, and two (Boas 1 898b,

1 898c) drew on data provided by Charles Edenshaw,

a Haida artist at Port Essington, and an unidentified

storyteller at Bella Coola. Teit's monographs on the Thompson, Lillooet, and Shuswap, were also the only

full ethnographic overviews ("basic ethnographies") of

the individual aboriginal groups completed for the Northwest Coast segment of the JNPE and published

under the Expedition's series.

Conclusion

Thejesup North Pacific Expedition was one of the great

expeditions of American anthropology (Fitzhugh and

Crowell 1988:14). Historian Douglas Cole described it

as "the most cherished" of Boas' museum projects. It

was, he notes, "the showpiece of Boas' association

with the American Museum of Natural History" (Cole

2001:29). For Boas it was also important for establishing American anthropology as a field-based discipline. It is ironic, therefore, that other than two short

field trips to the Northwest Coast in 1897 and 1900,

the JNPE marked the end of Boas' longterm fieldtrips.

After the JNPE, his fieldwork consisted of a small archaeological study in the American Southwest, fol- lowed by two short trips to British Columbia in 1914

and 1 923 and a longer one in 1 930. In fact, the JNPE

helped establish Boas as a supervisor of distant teams

of resident fieldworkers. The key members of the British Columbia field team were Teit and Hunt, who submitted their results regularly to Boas by mail. Boas' decision to move away from on-site field research may

be a consequence of the problems he encountered

during his 1897 field season, especially the inconvenience and expense of cumbersome travel through the

inland areas of British Columbia. Shortly after the JNPE,

he concluded that ethnography produced by observers who had command of the language and who were

friends with the Native peoples was of a higher quality

W. WICKWIRE

than that of the scholarly types "who had to work

through an interpreter" (jacknis 1 996:22 1 ).

Clearly Boas had Teit and Hunt in mind when he

made this statement, as by the end of the Jesup Expedition, he had secured both as long-term, dedicated

assistants. In the case of Hunt and the ethnography of

the Coastal region, Boas could claim some credit as a

co-fieldworker. But Teit's case was different. Although

Boas had tried to do fieldwork in the Interior regions,

he never managed to accomplish anything close to what he had accomplished on the Coast. Indeed, without Teit, the JNPE ethnographic record for the interior

regions would have been weak. For this reason, Teit deserves to be recognized today as more than a

"JNPE informant" or a "Boas' research assistant," but

rather as a full and productive JNPE team-member who

made a lasting contribution to the anthropology of

aboriginal North America.

Acknowledgements

First, I would like to thank Igor Krupnik and Laurel Kendall

for planning this special volume and working so diligently with us to bring it to completion. I am especially grateful to Sigurd Teit, who supported my work

on his father with such enthusiasm and generosity over

the years. In particular, I would like to thank Sigurd for

donating the photographs of his father, James Teit, and

of the historical Spences Bridge community that appear in this essay. Special thanks to my workstudy

student assistant, Quinn Dupont for his work on the photographs that appear in this essay. I also extend

my thanks to the British Columbia Provincial Archives

in Victoria, BC, the Kamloops Museum, Kamloops, BC,

and the American Museum of Natural History in New

York for allowing me to reproduce photographs from

their collections.

Notes

1 . Anthropologist Ronald Rohner's reference

to Teit as "one of Boas' principal informants"

(Rohner 1966:183) is typical.

1 3 1
2. Anthropologist Roderick Sprague has ar- gued similarly that Teit's contribution to the study

of Plateau ethnology, folklore, linguistics, and

ethnographic analogy in archaeology has often

been "overlooked by researchers in that culture area" (Sprague 1991:103).

3. James changed his surname from Tait to

Teit on arriving in Canada (Sigurd Teit, personal

communication).

4. Many names have been applied to the "In- terior Salishan" peoples who occupy the south

central interior of British Columbia. In the early

published ethnographic record, they were called the "Thompson," the "Okanagan," the "Shuswap,"

and the "Lillooet." In recent years, these anglicized names have been replaced by the indigenous

names, spelled variously: "NIaka'pamux," "Sec- wepemc," and "Sta'atl'imx." "Okanagan" has re- mained the same. Throughout this paper the terms

are used interchangeably.

5. For fuller biographical details on Teit, see

Pat Lean and Sigurd Teit (1 995:3-60) and Wickwire

(1993, 1998, 2002). There is some difference of

opinion regarding Teit's early residency in British Columbia. According to Peter Campbell (1 994:38),

Teit spent time from 1 887 until 1 892 in Nanaimo

working in the coal mines. Teit's son, Sigurd Teit,

however, reports that his father spent only two

weeks in the Nanaimo coal mines (Sigurd Teit,

personal communication 1989).

References

Berman, Judith

1 996 "The Culture as It Appears to the Indian Himself: Boas, George Hunt, and the Methods of Eth- nography. In Volksgeist as Method and Ethic: Essays on Boasian Ethnography and the German Anthropological Tradition. George W. Stocking, Jr., ed. Pp. 2 1 5-56.

History of Anthropology, 8. Madison: University of

Wisconsin Press. Boas, Franz

1 895 TheTinnehTribesof Nicola Valley. In TheNorth- Western Tribes of Canada—J 0th Report of the Committee. Report of the Sixty-Fifth Meeting of the Brit- ish Association for the Advancement of Science, vol.

8, pp. 295-7.

1 896 The Limitations of the Comparative Method

of Anthropology. Science, n.s. 4:901-08.

1 898a Thejesup North Pacific Expedition. TheJesup North

Pacific Expedition, vol.1 , pt.l , pp. 1-1 2. Memoirs of

the American Museum ofNatural History, vol. 2. New

York: G.E. Stechert.

1 898b Facial Paintings of the Indians of Northern

British Columbia. The Jesup North Pacific Expedition, vol.1 , pt. 2, pp. 1 3-24. Memoirs of the Ameri- can Museum of Natural History, vol. 2. New York:

G.E. Stechert.

1 898c The Mythology of the Bella Coola Indians. The

Jesup North Pacific Expedition, vol.1 , pt. 2, pp. 25-

127. Memoirs of the American Museum of Natural

History, vol. 2. New York: C. E. Stechert.

1 900 Ethnographical Album ofthe North Pacific Coasts ofAmerica and Asia: Jesup North Pacific Expedition.

New York: American Museum of Natural History.

1 909 The KwakiutI of Vancouver Island. The Jesup

North Pacific Expedition, vol. 5, pt. 2, pp. 301-522.

Memoirs of the American Museum ofNatural History

8. Leiden: E.J. Brill; New York: G.E. Stechert. Boas, Franz, and George Hunt

1 90 5 KwakiutI Texts. The Jesup North Pacific Expedition, vol. 3. Memoirs ofthe American Museum ofNatural HistoryS. Leiden: E.J. Brill; New York: G.E. Stechert.

1 906 KwakiutI Texts (Second Series). TheJesup North

Pacific Expedition, vol. 1 0, pt. 1 , pp. 1-269. Memoirs

ofthe American Museum ofNatural History 1 4. Leiden:

E.J. Brill; New York: G.E. Stechert. Campbell, Peter

1 994 Not as a Whiteman, not as a Sojourner: James

A. Teit and the Fight for Native Rights in British Columbia, 1884-1922. Left History 2(2):37-S7

Cole, Douglas

1 973 The Origins of Canadian Anthropology. Jour- nal ofCanadian Studies 7( 1 ): 3 3-4 5

1985 Captured Heritage: The Scramble for Northwest Coast Artifacts. Vancouver: Douglas and Mclntyre.

2001 "The Greatest Thing Undertaken by any Museum": Franz Boas, Morris Jesup, and the North Pacific Expedition. In Gateways. Exploring the Legacy of

the Jesup North Pacific Expedition. Igor Krupnik and

William W. Fitzhugh, eds. Pp. 29-70. Contributions

to Circumpolar Anthropology 1 . Washington, DC:

Arctic Studies Center. Farrand, Livingston

1 900 Basketry Designs ofthe Salish Indians. TheJesup

North Pacific Expedition, vol. 1 , pt.5, Pp. 393-99. Memoirs of the American Museum of Natural History, 2. New York: G.E. Stechert. Farrand, Livingston, and W.S. Kahnweiler

1 902 Traditions oftheQuinault Indians. TheJesupNorth

Pacific Expedition, vol.1, pt.3, pp. 77-1 32. Memoirs

of the American Museum of Natural History!. New

York: G.E. Stechert. Fitzhugh, William, and Aron Crowell, eds.

1988 Crossroads ofContinents: Cultures ofSiberia and

Alaska. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.

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Jacknis, Ira

1 996 The Ethnographic Object and the Object of Ethnology in the Early Career of Franz Boas. In Volksgeist as Method and Ethic: Essays on Boasian Ethnography and the German Anthropological Tradition. George W. Stocking, Jr., ed. Pp. 185-2 14. History

of Anthropology, 8. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press. Lean, Pat, and Sigurd Teit

1 995 Introduction. In Teit Times 1 (Summer):3-5.

Rohner, Ronald

1 966 Franz Boas: Ethnographer on the Northwest

Coast. In Pioneers ofAmerican Anthropology. June Helm,

ed. Pp. 149-222. Monograph of the American Eth- nological Society 43. Seattle: University of Washington Press. Rohner, Ronald, ed.

1 969 The Ethnography of Franz Boas: Letters and

Diaries of Franz Boas Written on the Northwest

Coast from 1886 to 1931. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Smith, Harlan I.

1 899 Archaeology of Lytton, British Columbia. The

Jesup North Pacific Expedition, vol.1 , pt.3, pp. 1 29-

6 1 . Memoirs ofthe American Museum ofNatural History, 2. New York: C.E Stechert.

1 900a Archaeology of the Thompson River Region,

British Columbia. The Jesup North Pacific Expedition,

vol.1, pt. 6, pp. 401-42. Memoirs of the American

Museum of Natural History, 2. New York: G. E. Stechert. Sprague, Roderick

1 991 A Bibliography of James A. Teit. Northwest

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Teit, James A.

1 900 The Thompson Indians of British Columbia. The

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392. Memoirs of the American Museum of Natural

History, 2. New York: C.E. Stechert.

1 906 The Lillooet Indians. The Jesup North Pacific Expedition, vol. 2, pt.5, pp. 1 92-300. Memoirs of the American Museum of Natural History, 4. New York:

C.E. Stechert.

1 909 The Shuswap. TheJesup North Pacific Expedition,

vol.2, pt. 7, pp. 443-81 3. Memoirs of the American

Museum of Natural History, 4. E.J. Brill: Leiden; New

York: C.E. Stechert. 1912 Mythology of the Thompson Indians. TheJesup

North Pacific Expedition, vol.8, pt. 2, pp. 199-416.

Memoirs ofthe American Museum ofNatural History,

1 2. E.J. Brill: Leiden; New York: C.E. Stechert. The Shetland Times

1 904 Obituary: Death of Mr. John Tait, Merchant,

Lerwick. The Shetland Times, 24 December.

Thom, Brian

2001 Harlan I. Smith's Jesup Fieldwork on the North- west Coast. In Gateways. Exploring the Legacy of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition, 1 897-] 902. Igor

Krupnik and William W. Fitzhugh, eds. Pp. 1 39-81

Contributions to Circumpolar Anthropology 1 . Washington, DC: Arctic Studies Center. Wickwire, Wendy

1 993 Women in Ethnography: The Research ofJames

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1 998 We Shall Drink from the Stream and So Shall You: James A. Teit and Native Resistance in British Columbia, 1908-22. Canadian Historical Review

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British Columbia, 1 897-1 920. American Indian Quarterly 25 {3):43] -52.

W. WICKWIRE

rranz boas and an "anf.nisKed Jesup" on

in Island: ^hedciins^ (\Jew on ^erthoid [ aufer

and ^ronislaw f^ilsudski

KOICHI INOUE

Sakhalin Island, which was inhabited by three groups

of the North Pacific indigenous people—the PaleoAsiatic Nivkh (Cilyak), Tungusic Uilta (Orok), and the Ainu—was included in the original fieldwork and operational plan of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition (JNPE)

at a very early stage (cf. Boas 1 905:92,99). However, none of the Sakhalin Native nations were represented

in the subsequent JNPE publications, except for the

Nivkh featured in a special monograph contributed by

Lev (Leo) Shternberg. His monograph entitled "The

Social Organization of the Gilyak," however, was not

published with other volumes under the main JNPE

publication series nor in any related contemporary

proceedings. For several reasons, it remained in a manuscript form for several decades, until its recent publication by the American Museum of Natural History in 1999 (Shternberg 1999; Grant 1999; Kan 2001).

The first section of this paper reviews and assesses

the "unfinished" fieldwork conducted on Sakhalin Island within the framework ofJNPE in 1 898-9. The sec- ond section deals with Franz Boas' presumed concerns about the quality of the JNPE Sakhalin data and his

desire to expand the study of Sakhalin indigenous

people. The latter was clearly demonstrated through

Boas' post-JNPE relationship with two Sakhalin-focused

scholars: Leo (Lev) Shternberg and Bronislaw Pilsudski.

Laufer's JNPE Fieldwork on Sakhalin

Berthold Laufer ( 1 874-1 934), a German orientalist, was

appointed by Boas in 1 897 as the first participant in

the JNPE Siberian operations (Boas 1 903; Kendall 1 988;

see also Cole 2001:36-7; Vakhtin 2001:75-6). Having just received his doctorate from the University of

Leipzig with a thesis on Tibetan texts, Laufer arrived in

Sakhalin via San Francisco, Vladivostok and Khabarovsk on July 10, 1898. This started his field survey of the

Sakhalin Island and its Native people that lasted eight

months—until March 21,1 899.' During his eight-month

stay in Sakhalin, Laufer studied three local Native languages, the Nivkh, Tungusic [Orok?], and Ainu, and visited the northern, central, and southern sections of the

island (Freed et al. 1988a: 12-3; Kendall 1988:104).

From a preliminary published account of his field- work (Laufer 1900a), it appears that Laufer began his

Sakhalin survey with visits to the Nivkh (Gilyak) villages

near the mouths of the Tym and Nabyl Rivers and along

the shore of the Sea of Okhotsk, in the present-day

Nogliki District (rayon). These were the residences of

the so-called "Tro-Gilyak" whose main villages were

Milk-vo, Nabyl-vo, Lun'-vo, Tyrmits, Nyi-vo, Chay-vo, and

Kaekr-vo (Laufer 1 900a:3 1 5). Laufer laconically writes:

"1 visited them [i.e., seven above mentioned villages

K.I.] in the summer of 1 898" (ibid).

It was probably on this first survey that Laufer also

paid a brief visit to "the village of Wal" (today's Val

K.I.) and its vicinity, in expanding his ethnographic exploration to the "Olcha" people. These were actually

not the Olcha/Ulchi (who reside on the Siberian mainland, along the Amur River) but the Orok/Uilta, who

still comprise the core of the present-day residents of

1 3 5
the village of Val, about 50 km north of the eastern

Sakhalin district center, the town of Nogliki. Laufer

collected a number of valuable ethnographical speci- mens (see his brief description of amulets in: Laufer

1 900a:326-7). He also observed a series of traditional Orok funeral rites and ceremonies. In his brief published account (Laufer 1 900a:327-9), he presented a fairly

short, though detailed information on certain Orok funeral practices, such as placing coffins on trees or on

high wooden frames, and, in particular, about the funeral of a drowned hunter. By September 1 898, Laufer

sent the following field report to Boas:

I have taken about [a] hundred

[anthropometrical] measurements and carried on investigations on the physical types and

the culture of those tribes [i.e. the Nivkh and

Orok (Tungus)—K.I.], particularly regarding

their decorative art, of that I have obtained

interesting specimens together with good

explanations, daily life, fishing and hunting,

social organization, shamanism, medicine

and so on; as to their healing methods, I got

a very important collection of amulets. ..[for protection] from diseases and representing

the figures of various animals [quoted from:

Kendall 1988:104].

Laufer also recorded songs and folktales on wax cylinders by making use of the Edison phonograph. In March

1899, he even requested from Boas "a small instant camera" with the aim to secure visual documentation

of what he observed in the field. In response, Boas recommended that he hire a professional for field photography. Laufer followed his recommendation

promptly.^

Judging from the aforementioned field reports, we may assume that Laufer was, or at least tried to be,

faithful to the initial fieldwork instructions given to him

by Boas in 1 897, to write a "rounded" ethnography of

the Sakhalin Native people. Meanwhile, Laufer's specific and keen interest in the patterns of Native decorative art was already clearly manifested in his reports.

In early September 1 898, Laufer fell seriously ill with influenza and was obliged to attend to his

health fortwo-and-a-half months (Laufer 1 899b:733).3

This two-and-a-half month time roughly corresponds

to a period from September to mid-November, when,

upon recovery from the influenza (and also pneumonia

contracted among the Cilyak—see Freed et al.,

1 988a: 1 3), Laufer resumed his field survey. He stopped

first for five days at the village of Rykovskoye [now

called Kirovskoye] where he observed a Nivkh bear

festival, and then proceeded southward on horseback,

and reached the valley of the Poronay River (Laufer

1899b:733). Here he arrived at the southern portion

of the territory occupied by Uilta (Orok) people in

Sakhalin. Laufer summarized his trip as follows:

I visited the whole valley of the Poronai

[Poronay River] as far as the mouth of the

river on a reindeer sledge, and stayed for some time in the large Tungus village Muiko,

where I had the great pleasure of obtaining

additional information in regard to the texts which I had recorded during the preceding summer. I have measured almost the whole

population of this area and collected statisti- cal information. ... In December I reached

Tikhmenevsk [present-day city of

Poronaysk—K.I.], which is called Siska by the

natives. ... On the following day I started on an

excursion eastward, in which I was particularly fortunate and successful. I obtained many

specimens and much information on the Shamanistic rites and the ceremonials of the

natives (Laufer 1 899b:733).

With regard to Laufer's Orok survey, we should pay

special attention to the fact that he not only collected museum specimens, but also recorded sound information on wax cylinders and made ethnographic notes.

Laufer's Sakhalin wax cylinders and field notes deserve

serious investigation, if they can be found (see Keeling

2001:280). Since we have Pilsudski's contemporary

comparable ethnographic and phonographic materials on the Orok (Pilsudski 1 985, 1 987, 1 989), it would

be desirable to make a comparative analysis between

the two sets of documentation.

Although Laufer wrote: "There are a great many

errors in Schrenck's descriptions of the tribes of Saghalin"^ (Laufer 1 899b:733), it was Laufer himself who

made an error when he said: "The Orok tribe, to which

1 36 PARTICIPANTS/ LAUFER AND PILSUDSKI
he [i.e., Schrenk—K.I.] refers, does not exist" [cf. Laufer

1 901 :36], since the "Tungus", the "Olcha", or the "Olcha

Tungus" in Laufer's denomination were nothing but the Orok (Uilta) (cf. Demidova 1 978:1 1 9). The area of Taraika through which the Poronay River

flows was also inhabited by the so-called Taraika Ainu.

Laufer first met them on his visit to the villages of Tarankotan and Taraika (present-day town of Ust'ye) located

across the river. He later visited the Orok villages of

"[U]nu, Muiko and Walit, having passed the famous lake

of Taraika"^ (Laufer 1899b:734).

On December 31 , Laufer returned to Siska and on

January 2, 1899, he

"[s]tarted by dog-sledge for Naiero [presentday town of Gastello—K.I.], where I had the

best results in my work with the Ainu. Then I visited all the settlements on the [east] coast

as far as Naibuchi, which is 260 versts from

Siska. This journey was exceedingly difficult, and sometimes even dangerous" [ibid].

In fact, Laufer encountered numerous difficulties during his fieldwork among the Ainu. First, a winter dogsled trip along the coast-line was physically very

trying, and Laufer experienced a near drowning in icy

water when his sledge broke through the thin ice (Laufer

1899b:734; Kendall 1988:104). Second, he suffered

from the lack of an operational language, since Russian was entirely unknown among the Ainu. Laufer was

forced to make full use of his knowledge of the Japanese language, with which, however, the Sakhalin Ainu were barely familiar at that time (Laufer 1 899b:732).

Third, and probably the most serious, gaps in communication and shortage of time (even though he spent

almost a month on that trip), resulted in Laufer's inability to gain the confidence of the local Ainu. That was

obvious from his very poor data on physical anthropology, since he did not succeed in obtaining any

anthropometrical measurements among the Ainu, except for a single "man of imposing stature" in Korsakov.

Laufer attributed his failure to the extreme superstitions of the Ainu (Laufer 1899b:733).

K. INOUE

Some comments to Laufer's trouble and methods

he used were noted in a letter to Leo (Lev) Shternberg

written in 1903 by Bronislaw Pilsudski:

Several days ago I heard that he [i.e., Laufer

K.I.] had taken measurements of eight Ainu

people in Korsakov and paid to each one by

ten bottles of spirits. I don't intend, of course, to give either spirits or such amount

of money that may be equal to the [price of|

spirits, and the question is, whether I will be

able to obtain those [Ainu] who are willing to be measured (Pilsudski 1996:212-3, Letter

no. 59).'

Laufer summarized his evaluation of the field survey on

the Ainu in the following manner:

I succeeded in obtaining a great deal of ethnological material and information,

traditions, and a large amount of grammatical and lexicographical material, although a short time only was available for this pur- pose. ... I am well satisfied with the results of my ethnographical researches among these

people. I have obtained full explanations of

their decorative designs (Laufer 1 899b:733-4).

I am of the opinion that Laufer did not record Ainu

texts on wax cylinders. Despite the fact that he widely

informed others about his success in recording Cilyak

and Orok songs by the phonograph (Laufer 1 899a:36), no other mention is found with regard to his Ainu recordings. On the contrary, an additional message runs

as follows: "The only difficulty is that the instrument

cannot be used in the winter, owing to the effect of

severe cold" (Laufer 1 899b:732). As we know, his Ainu

survey was conducted exactly in the mid-winter,

through the month ofJanuary.

Toward the end of January, Laufer arrived on

horseback in Korsakov, the southernmost town of the

Sakhalin Island. Although he intended to return from

there northward along the west coast of the island,

this idea proved to be impossible, due to the lack of any reliable means of communication in winter. Hence,

he was obliged to return following the same track he

used before, and proceeded "[a]s rapidly as possible

in order to reach Nikolaievsk'^ in time", i.e., by the end

1 37
of March. Thus in the morning of March 4, 1899, he

returned to the starting point of his Sakhalin journey

(Laufer 1 899b:734), most probably the town of Aleksandrovsk, the Russian military post and sea-port situated on the Northwest coast of Sakhalin Island. Here,

he finished writing his field report cited above.

Was Laufer's Sakhalin expedition successful? As far

as his own accounts are concerned, it appears that

Laufer was fully confident that he had fulfilled the whole task assigned to him by Boas, and that the data he collected would enable him to write a

"rounded" ethnography of the Sakhalin people, i.e., the

Cilyak, the Orok, and the Ainu. In addition to those

field reports quoted above (Laufer 1899a, 1899b,

1 900a), Laufer published a few other pieces with some

data gathered during his Sakhalin trip. These include

his short monograph on the decorative art of the Amur

River people (Laufer 1 902); two short articles on rockpaintings (Laufer 1 899c, 1 901 ); an article dealing with

the issue of the "Koropokguru" and "Tonchi" [prehistoric people on Sakhalin Island—K.I.] (Laufer 1 900b); a

single linguistic paper on Ainu numerals and phonology (191 7a); and a fairly long paper on the origin of

reindeer breeding in Siberia, in which he covered the Orok reindeer economy extensively (Laufer 1 91 7b).

Laufer's ethnography of the Nanay (Cold) people

of the Amur River was once announced on the list of forthcoming JNPE publications as its Volume IV, Part II,

entitled The Cold (Boas 1 905:94). However, this monograph was never published and, moreover, as Sergei

Kan recently pointed out, was "probably never written" (Kan 2001 :232). Besides, the Nanay are not among

the Sakhalin indigenous people, as they reside along

the Amur River on the mainland.

Then, why did Laufer never publish his advertised

monograph on the Gold (Nanay) nor those on the Cilyak,

Orok, and Ainu? Since I was unable to look through the voluminous personal correspondence between Laufer and Boas at the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia, I can only speculate in trying to find a reasonable explanation. Even taking into account the various

other collections made by Laufer on his Sakhalin trip,

including the ethnographic specimens now at the AMNH, the wax cylinders, his field notes, and manuscripts, it is beyond my present focus to evaluate

Laufer's legacy as a whole, that of a great scholar who

produced more than 200 scientific publications (Anony- mous 1934:352-62; Hummel 1936:103-1 1). Laufer's

further career was different from his early fieldwork on

Sakhalin Island, as he "stood out primarily as an ethnologist, and perhaps his chief contribution was the

application of the principles of ethnology to historic

civilizations" (Kent 1934:349; Cale 1935:137). Therefore I am eager to confine my role here simply to a

very general evaluation of what Laufer could (as well

as what he could not) achieve during his eight-monthlong Sakhalin fieldwork. As to the former, Laufer's contribution regarding

his collection of ethnographic specimens has been al- ready examined by several modern curators. Here one may refer to Laurel Kendall's unpublished review of

Laufer's collection from the Amur River area (Kendall

1986), as well as to the most recent evaluation of

Laufer's ethnographic collections from the entire Sakhalin-Amur River region (Roon 2000). As far as

Laufer's Ainu collection at the AMNH is concerned, it was carefully examined recently by Prof. Y. Kotani from

Nagoya University and his team (Kotani et al. 1 993).

According to their report, 418 Ainu items are preserved

at the AMNH altogether, of which Laufer collected

thirty-eight items in 1898-1900. Although only nine

items are registered as obtained on the east coast of

Sakhalin, we may safely conclude that the whole set

of thirty-eight specimens was collected on Sakhalin,

including three pieces of nettle robe, six "moustache

lifters," and other utensils for everyday use (Kotani et

al. 1 993:1 1 8-20). This Ainu collection, though not nu- merous, well represents the Sakhalin Ainu culture at

the turn of the twentieth century, at a time when the

Ainu barely retained many traditional forms of their

culture. In this sense, Laufer's collecting was a successful enterprise, and we may well call him a successful

1 38 PARTICIPANTS/ LAUFER AND PILSUDSKI
field collector not only of Ainu, but probably also of Orok and Nivkh (Cilyak) specimens. It would be desirable for the Orok and Nivkh items obtained by Laufer

to be also re-examined and re-assessed in the same

way.'°

With regard to what Laufer could not have achieved

during his Sakhalin journey, I cite another quote from

Pilsudski's letter to Shternberg written at Rykovskoye

on September 4, 1898:

Oh yes, I have forgotten about a main issue. Young Doctor Laufer from Berlin, who is a member of an American expedition, has

already been here. He heard of me still in Vladivostok and wanted to drop in Aleksandrovsk, but he didn't come. Then, I left for Rykovskoye. Hence, it was just here

where we got acquainted with each other. He called upon me with another German, i.e., an engineer. . . . Laufer has remained at Natro. He has with him an interpreter, i.e., a German deportee. Laufer himself does not understand even a word in Russian, and it is interesting to see what will come out. He is going to stay the whole winter. Although I did not say anything definite, I was and am

ready to give advice, but he showed very

little interest, and more often kept silent during his visit. Despite my proposal that I would answer him whatever he might be

eager to ask about, he appeared the second

time not at the appointed hour, and the following day he departed. I do not know

what will occur further. I did not give him my

own notes, but I shall not refuse him in any

advice and guidance (Pilsudski 1996:161-2,

Letter no. 46).

Pilsudski's depiction of Laufer and his circumstances on Sakhalin—however subjective and personal it might

be—is the sole source so far that may disclose Laufer's

real posture and behavior in the field. What was particularly disappointing to me was Laufer's invariable

reluctance to ask for Pilsudski's insight and advice,

notwithstanding the latter's repeated offers. No further communication between the two ever took place

after the expedition. I deeply regret this situation, since

it was Laufer who could have benefited from Pilsudski's

consultation and help. Pilsudski was then the only per- son on Sakhalin Island who was engaged in the study

of its Native people, the Nivkh, the Orok, and the Ainu.

Therefore, he was an invaluable resource and the only

available consultant at the very beginning of Laufer's

fieldwork. Besides, no language barrier existed between

the two, since Pilsudski was fully proficient in German.

With regard to Laufer's language competence,

Pilsudski referred that "Laufer himself does not understand even a word in Russian." Although this was an

exaggeration (since Laufer had mastered Russian in his

student years), often a foreigner who is competent in

reading Russian, hardly understands the speech of

Russian village people, let alone the Russian speech of

indigenous people in Siberia. I encountered this exact

situation during my early fieldwork in Siberia. I wonder

if Laufer, when placed in a similar situation, might not have become fully dependent upon his local interpreter,

"a German deportee." While Laufer used Russian as his

operational language in the Nivkh and Orok surveys,

he was unable to while among the Ainu, as mentioned

above. It was great loss that Laufer did not resort to

asking for Pilsudski's help, since the latter was by that

time already proficient in Sakhalin Ainu to a certain

extent.'^

It has to be taken into consideration that Laufer was rushed into his Sakhalin fieldwork very shortly after his doctorate course in philology, presumably with

little if any training and preparation for field research

(Cole 2001:36). The Sakhalin Island trip for the JNPE was his first experience conducting an ethnological

survey in this distant and inhospitable terrain, meaning

that he was obliged to educate himself in the field. In

addition, he spent two-and-a-half months of his Sakhalin journey recuperating from infectious diseases he had

contracted there. Eventually, he finished an ethnological survey of the Sakhalin Island Nivkh, Orok, and Ainu

within five-and-a-half months.

And yet, as seen from his field reports and early

publications, Laufer was confident that he had fulfilled

the whole task assigned to him by Boas and that Laufer was well satisfied with the results, even from his less

successful Ainu survey. Are we then to call Laufer's

K. INOUE 1 39
Sakhalin expedition a "success"? I wish to refrain from

any final judgment for the time being, since many of

Laufer's Sakhalin materials are still missing and no full account of his Sakhalin survey has been found. Some

of his manuscripts may still be discovered, as happened recently with Pilsudski's unpublished work and

other materials (Pilsudski 1996, 1998a, 1998b; Inoue,

1997b). But, it may also be possible that Laufer was

too proud and too rigorous of himself to produce a

substantial ethnographic monograph with a level of

preparation that he came to consider as insufficient. Or else, he simply did not like the idea of writing the

"rounded" ethnography he was assigned to produce.

In the meantime, Pilsudski maintained a keen interest in Laufer's achievements and continued to ask

Shternberg for information regarding Laufer's publications. The references are numerous during the following years: "What has Laufer written on the Gilyak? Where

is it published?" (Pilsudski 1 996: 1 78, Letter no. 5 1 written in 1 902); "Did Laufer publish anything? I should like

to have his works not only on the Gilyak but also the Ainu as the result of his trip on Sakhalin" (ibid, p. 2 1 2,

Letter no. 59 written in 1 903); "Did Laufer write, didn't

he?" (ibid, p. 259, Letter no. 81 written in 1910). If Laufer ever knew of Pilsudski's persistent interest in his work, would that have helped to change his mind

and initiate some contact between the two scholars

ifnoX. during than c?/terLaufer'sJNPE Sakhalin-Amur sur- vey of 1 898-9?

And lastly, I refer to a statement made by Boas in

1 902, two years after Laufer's return from his JNPE field- work, when his Siberian collections were already pro- cessed at the AMNH and most of his Sakhalin contributions were already published and/or written down.

In his summary paper on the Jesup Expedition presented

at the International Congress of Americanists in New

York, Boas asserted that : "[A]t the present time we

are unable to state definitely what the relations of the

Gilyak and Ainu to the other isolated Siberian tribes'^ may have been. ... It remains for future researches to show whether these tribes may definitely be classed

with the Northeast Siberian tribes" (Boas 1 905:99). This

may be a signal of Boas' growing dissatisfaction with

what Laufer achieved during his Sakhalin survey. I as- sume that this might have prompted Boas to contact

Shternberg for additional data on the Nivkh (Gilyak)

and to try to enlist Pilsudski to conduct new Ainu studies

several years after the completion of the JNPE.

Pilsudski's "Second Expedition" to Sakhalin:

A Non-Journey?

"I hear from a friend of mine, Mr. L. Sternberg that you

are interested in Aino-folklore" (Inoue 1 999a: 1 1 5). This was the opening sentence of Bronislaw Pilsudski's first

letter to Franz Boas, written on December 1 9, 1 907, in Zakopane, a resort Polish town in western Galicia, then

under the Austrian rule. Thus started Pilsudski's relationship with Franz Boas through the introduction of Leo (Lev) Shternberg.

Bronislaw Pilsudski (1 866-1 91 8), a Polish Siberian

anthropologist was born in the manor of Zulow (presentday Zaiavas) in Wilna province (today's Lithuania), which

had been annexed to the Russian Empire.''' In 1887,

when he was 1 9 years old, Pilsudski, a freshman at St.

Petersburg University, was arrested on the charge that

he had been involved in an abortive conspiracy to

assassinate the Russian Czar, Alexander III. Pilsudski was sentenced to penal servitude for 1 5 years and

exiled to the Sakhalin Island. He remained in the Russian Far East for 19 years (Fig. 46), first as a "state

criminal" in Sakhalin (1 887-97) and later as a "deported

peasant" (1 897-1 906). After the Russian-Japanese War

of 1 904-5, he managed to return—via Japan, the U.S., and Western Europe—to the Polish province of Galicia,

then under Austrian rule. He died in Paris on May 1 7, 1918. Pilsud ski's death, often referred to as a suicide,

occurred Just six months before the Polish statehood was resurrected owing to the efforts of his younger

brother, the future Polish military dictator, Jozef Pilsudski (1867-1935).

In 1 899, Pilsudski was able to leave Sakhalin Island for Vladivostok, the main Russian port city on

1 40 PARTICIPANTS/ LAUFER AND PILSUDSKI
the mainland, where he found a job as a custodian at

the IVluseum of the Society for the Study of the Amur

Region. But, as early as 1901, he fell into depression

and apathy. His old friend, correspondent, and a

Sakhalin co-exile. Lev Shternberg tried to help him by

organizing new fieldwork for Pilsudski through the Imperial Academy of Sciences. "Knowing that the sole

medicine for him is the work, and understanding that nobody can carry it out better than Pilsudski," Shternberg organized a trip to Sakhalin for Pilsudski (Latyshev

1996:395). Thus, in July 1902, Pilsudski commenced

his new fieldwork among the Ainu on Sakhalin Island where he had previously spent twelve years as a

political prisoner. This was Pilsudski's "first Sakhalin

expedition," which was extended for two more years

(1 904-5) at Pilsudski's own request in 1 903 under the sponsorship of the newly founded Russian Committee

for the Study of Central and East Asia' MInoue 1985:8).

Pilsudski's fieldwork in Sakhalin (1 902-5) was highly successful despite the interruption of the RussianJapanese War of 1 904-5. Shortly before the war broke

out, Pilsudski took part in an unsuccessful Russian expedition'^ (1903) to the Hokkaido Ainu, headed by a

Polish ethnographer and writer, WaclawSieroszewski'^

(Inoue 2003). Pilsudski collected valuable ethnographic

specimens, recorded folklore texts—especially on wax

cylinders'^—and took numerous photos of the Ainu,

Uilta (Orok), Nivkh (Gilyak), and Nanay (Gold) (Figs. 47-

49; see also Latyshev 1 998).

Six letters sent by Pilsudski to Boas between 1 907-

16 are preserved at the Franz Boas' Collection at the

Archives of the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia (APS-BP), of which I reproduced the five then

available in an earlier Japanese publication (Inoue

1990:309-18). Upon re-reading Pilsudski's six letters

to Boas'^ at the APS as well as his numerous letters to

Shternberg (cf. Pilsudski 1 996), I have come to the conclusion that Boas had helped Pilsudski a great deal between the years 1 908 and 1918. Boas answered all

Pilsudski's letters promptly'^°; he published Pilsudski's

article on the Ainu in the Journal ofAmerican Folk-lore

K. INOUE

(Pilsudski 1912a); and he most probably acted as a go-between in the sale of Pilsudski's photos to various

American museums (Figs. 46-49)'^'. He also persisted

in encouraging Pilsudski to continue his scientific work.

However, Pilsudski's biggest morale boost came, I believe, when he was asked by Boas to go on a new

Sakhalin expedition in 1909. Although this trip never

materialized, the fact remained that Boas—one of the

leading anthropologists of the time—regarded Pilsudski

as a first-ranking expert on the Sakhalin Ainu.

Presumably, in the beginning of 1909, Pilsudski wrote to Shternberg:

Several days ago, I received also a letter from Boas, who wrote [to] me to send a proposal to Chicago Museum, which might

probably dispatch me to collect ethnographical specimens among the Ainu. Boas

considers that Sakhalin Ainu artifacts are more preferable to the Hokkaido ones, although the Hokkaido Ainu might be more

interesting for me. He thinks that the whole

expense may be 6000 dollars (Pilsudski

1996:240, Letter no. 68).

And later he informed Shternberg about his progress

in this task in another letter (stamped as March 8, 1 909),

saying: "I have sent my proposal to Chicago, asking

for 2000 dollars for my work and living during 9-1 months" (Pilsudski 1 996:243, Letter no. 71). In the next

letter to Shternberg (no. 72), however, Pilsudski reported

that "From Chicago I have received no answer, even though I asked to let me know by telegram about the

decision, so as to prepare for my departure as early as

possible. Now I want to write again, asking for the answer. I had better write to Boas himself (Pilsudski

1996:245; the date is missing). Presumably, Pilsudski wrote a new letter to Chicago, and on May 1 0, 1 909,

he informed Boas that:

[I] have received the answer from Dr. Dorsey,

who writes me [that] Chicago Field Museum

wishes [to] send me to the Ainu and will take

steps to secure the sum of 6000.00$ and

request You to ascertain what I might

undertake to the Journey (APS-BP, no. 470;

Inoue 1999a:123).

1 4 1
On October 1 0, 1 909, Pilsudski wrote the first letter to

Shternberg from Paris:

Not the slightest answer from either Dorsey

or Boas. I asked Boas to give me instructions, as to what I should pay attention to. I would

agree to go to Sakhalin, if he considered it indispensable, even if I myself had planned a

trip to Northern Hokkaido. Boas wrote in reply that he didn't write to me, since he had

heard nothing from Dorsey. Here [i.e., in Paris—K.I.] Prof. Manuorte" told me that Dorsey worked in a very large museum, and

that I should turn up the heat, but how and

in what way? I understand myself that this is the only way-out for me. But, how to break

through? I wrote to Hawes'' who was

currently professor at Madison, but I have

received no reply. I want to ask Kennan

who once promised me help, if it was

necessary (Pilsudski 1996:248, Letter no. 75).

And, on November 7, 1 909, Pilsudski again wrote to

Shternberg from Paris:

I got a letter from Dr. Dorsey, who was

already in Europe and six weeks afterwards was planning to come to me in Lwow. I answered that I was at the moment in Paris and preferred to see him here. And, in case he

could not come, I would try to appear wherever he asks (Pilsudski 1 996:250, Letter no. 76).

Pilsudski's next letter to Shternberg (the date is

missing but the letter was most probably sent in November 1 909) includes the following direct quotation from Dorsey's letter, which runs:

I thank you for the references you gave me in Cracow and will be glad to call upon your

friends. I shall probably not reach Calicia for two or three months yet. I am sorry there has

been this delay in our getting together, but I will warn you that you cannot in any sense

consider yourself as employed by the Field Museum until I have taken the matter up

formally with my Director and secured his permission, and before this can be brought

about, it is necessary that I should talk the

situation over with you. I say this, feeling lest you might be disappointed (Pilsudski

1996:252, Letter no. 77).

Pilsudski's letter to Shternberg (no. 76) goes on:

I'm writing the same to Boas, who will be

surprised at the fact that Dorsey has not

seen me yet, since he promised Boas to do

so on leaving the US. I want to propose

Dorsey two plans: one is that I remain here

for a year in order to learn more English, to work on what could be done by treating the

materials at hand, to look up more literature,

and to obtain practical training both in photography and anthropometry. The other

plan is to start a field trip this winter, if he is in a hurry and doesn't want to postpone it. And anyway, if there were something for me

to receive in St. Petersburg, I should secure it (Pilsudski 1996:250-1).

Meanwhile, commenting bitterly on Dorsey's letter,

Pilsudski writes to Shternberg:

Consequently, it delays, he writes to me

nothing of when we shall meet, obviously

three months later and not earlier, and he will

still return to America and have a talk with

the director, although in his first letter he said that he was going to discuss with the

director. No doubt, there cannot be any trip

in 1910. There can be a better development,

too. But, I'm afraid that nothing will come of

it and it will be necessary for me to do

something, without any expectation

(Pilsudski 1 996:252, Letter no. 77).

It seems to me that Pilsudski never met with Dorsey,

since I have found no reference to this meeting in his

letters to either Shternberg or Boas. And, consequently,

his second Sakhalin expedition did not take place at

all—not only in 1910 but also later, as Pilsudski had

anticipated. The reason(s) and the cause(s) of why the

idea was eventually dropped remain unknown. My

guess is that too many personal motives were involved. George Amos Dorsey (1868-1931), an American

anthropologist, held the position of curator in charge

of Anthropology at the Field Columbian Museum of

Natural History in Chicago from 1898 to 1915. He

took a three-year leave (1909-12) from his museum

work and traveled abroad as a foreign correspondent for The Chicago 7r/i»iv/ie (Calhoun 1 991 :1 53-4).

Therefore, although he arrived in Europe in 1 909, he was surely too busy to meet Pilsudski even in Paris. In

Europe, Dorsey was acting not as a Field Museum

curator but primarily as a journalist. Besides, I wonder

if the well-documented personal hostility between

1 42 PARTICIPANTS/ LAUFER AND PILSUDSKI
30/ KwakiutI Indians dancing at the Chicago Worlds Fair. Photographer, John H. Crabill, i 893 (AMNH 3372 1 7).

1 43
3 1/ Franz Boas, with George Hunt and his family, Fort Rupert, B.C. Photographer, Oregon C. Hastings,

November 1894 (APS neg. # 466)

1 44
THE KWAKIUTL INDIANS. 697

[To page 464.]

SONG OF HA'MSHAMTSES.

1. Hamasa'ya'lag-ila haisai ye hamamamai.

Trying to look for food all around yo hamamamai.

the world

2. Ba'bakuaya'lag-ila haisai ye hamamamai.

Looking for men all around tlie ye hamamamai.

world

3. Q'ula' mEiisayag-ila haisai ye hamamamai.

Life swallowing all around the ye hamamamai.

world 4. Xa'xauquaya'lag'ila haisai ye hamamamai.

Looking for beads all around the ye hamamamai.

world

TUNK, RECORDKD BY F. BOAS. J. =72.

He ye ha ma ma ma ha ma ma mai ha -

Beating. J^l^lJ' IJ^*'/*'/!®**- —•

1— 1 r3 *

il^', —

—t _ t _ t - -X

ma - sa ba - kua

ya - ya • g'i - g'i -

A

la

la etc. a a - hai sai

P—

h

y—

1—•

1 _t

•

s>-^

1 ^ —)- 1+-

9i- ha ba ma - ma ma a mai . .

.

=3(i fr-f-_

^

P=

1

1 1- ^' _i5iJ=± 1= -t 1 F

ha me mai ba ma - ma ma mai ha me ma he

ha - ma - ma mai ha ma a ma mai ha me mai ha

± m ma a ha ma mai ha ma - ma - me ha - me.

32/ Musical notation by Franz Boas: Song ofHa'msliamtses. Reprinted from: Franz Boas, Tine Social Organization

and Secret Societies of the KwakiutI Indians, Report of the U.S. National Museum for 1 895. 1897, p. 697

1 45
33/ Hamatsa skull rattle (Kwakiutl). Collected by

George Hunt in Quatsino, B.C., 1 899. Photo by Lynton

Gardiner, (AMNH Cat. #16/6897, neg. 2A 19017)

34/ Pit house, Spences Bridge, B.C. Photographer, Harlan Smith, 1897 (AMNH 42776)

1 46
35/ Wax cylinder machine: Edison Standard Phonograph with horn, ca. 1 900. Photo by Carl Fleischhauer. Library of

Congress, American Folklife Center

1 47
36/ Lucy Antko, wife ofJames Teit, one of the six singers recorded by Franz Boas at Spences Bridge, B.C., 1897.

Photographer, Harlan Smith, i 897 (AMNH 22695)

1 48
37/ James Teit and two friends in Lerwick, Scotland, prior to his departure to Canada. Courtesy of

Sigurd Teit

38/James Teit's uncle John Murray in British Columbia, circa 1 888. Courtesy of Sigurd Teit

1 49
39/Spences Bridge, / 887. Note John Murray's white cottage is visible on the

left. His store is the large building in the center of the photograph. Courtesy of

the Kamloops Archives (Kamloops, BC)

40/ Spences Bridge, circa

1890. This photo shows

Spences Bridge on both

sides of the Thompson

River. Courtesy of Sigurd

Teit

1 50
»

4 1/ Drying salmon on the beach on the north side ofthe Thompson River, just belowJohn Murray's store. Courtesy

ofSigurd Teit.

1 5 1

43/James Teit in his cabin at Tswall Creek. Courtesy ofSigurd Teit

] 53
44/James Teit and George Tomaxkain on the banks of the Thompson River, 1 890. Courtesy ofSigurd Teit

1 54
45/James A. Teit and Harlan I. Smith's pack train, Spences Bridge. Courtesy of the British Columbia Provincial

Archives, Vancouver.

1 55
46/ Bronislaw Pilsudski, three "Oltchi" (Ulchi) men, and a local settler. Studio photo. Original hand-written

caption by Pilsudski: "Oltchi (Mangun) from Amur River. Three standing men are Oltchi (the middle is son of a

Chinese man and Oltchi woman), the sitting I am (the left) and a Jew (the right)." (SI-NAA 041 253.00)

1 56
47/ Sakhalin's Ainu

bear festival. Photographer, Bronislaw

Pilsudski. Original handwritten caption by

Pilsudski: "Ainu of

Saghalien. The bearfest. The bear is wounded." (STNAA

047396.00)

1 5 7
49/Sakhalin Ainu bear festival. Photographer, Bronislaw Pilsudski. Original caption by Pilsudski: "Ainu ofSaghalien.

The bear-feast. The feast about the killed bear. " (SI-NAA 047398.00)

1 58
Dorsey and Boas (cf. Freed et al. 1 988b:97-8) might

have contributed to the collapse of the planned new

Sakhalin affair.

In the meantime, Boas was eager to help Pilsudski

in the venues he controlled. In 1908, Boas tried to

publish Pilsudski's abundant Ainu folklore material in

the U.S." Boas advanced this possibility to an AMNH

patron, Arthur Curtis James, by asking him a direct

question: "Would you be sufficiently interested in this

matter to let me look over the material in detail and

give you a more definite report regarding the value and the status of his manuscripts?" (Franz Boas to A. C.

James, June 6, 1 908, APS). Although this proposal failed,

it is evident that Boas was seriously interested in

Pilsudski's Ainu material and regarded it very highly. At

the end of his letter to A. C. James, Boas presented his

evaluation: "I am reasonably certain from what I know

about it that it is exceedingly unlikely that material of

this kind could ever be duplicated" (ibid.).^*'

In Lieu of a Conclusion

Notwithstanding his passion and endeavor. Boas could

not succeed in either obtaining the desired publications from Laufer's Sakhalin survey nor in incorporating

Shternberg's as well as Pilsudski's contributions into

the JNPE proceedings. Hence, the Jesup Expedition

program on Sakhalin Island remained "unfinished"

for several decades to come. Sakhalin Island, or more

properly the larger Sakhalin-Amur River area, was of

critical importance to Boas. This portion of the transPacific "Jesup region," from the Amur River in Northern

Asia to the Columbia River in North America presented

a unique cultural area, where the deeply rooted cultural impact from, and connections with, the ancient

agricultural civilizations of China, Korea, and Japan met

with the hunter-gathering cultures of the North Pacific

indigenous people. This was why, in my view. Boas

tried very hard to organize a multidisciplinary study

of this area under the JNPE program. He asked Laufer

and Fowke, an archaeologist, to do the same Job that he had assigned to Bogoras and Jochelson in more

northerly areas in Northeast Siberia as well as to

Smith, Swanton, and others (but first and foremost to

himself) on the Northwest Coast of North America.

However, neither Laufer nor Fowke were in any way

comparable to Bogoras, Jochelson, or to Boas himself,

as field researchers. Due to repeated failures of Boas' several attempts

to document the culture, the Sakhalin-Amur area re- mained one of the least studied sections under the JNPE program and for years afterwards. The initial effort was not completed until almost ninety years later. In

1 998, the Mouton de Cruyter Publishers started the

publication of The Collected Works ofBmnislaw Pilsudski

in seven volumes. The first two volumes are already

printed (Pilsudski 1998a, Pilsudski 1998b). The first volume, entitled The Aborigines of Sakhalin, contains

twenty of Pilsudski's articles on the Ainu, Nivkh (Gilyak),

and Uilta (Orok), which had been published previously

in various languages (Russian, Polish, Japanese, etc.), and have been translated into English by the volume's

editor. Prof. Alfred F. Majewicz from Poznan. The sec- ond volume is a modern reprint of Pilsudski's only Ainu

monograph published in his lifetime (Pilsudski 191 2b),

with the addition of An Ainu English Index Dictionary to

B. Pilsudski's Materials, compiled by Alfred and Elzbieta Majewicz (Pilsudski 1 998b). Subsequent volumes include Nivkh/Cilyak folklore texts, the Orok grammar

and dictionary, vocabularies of the Nanay and Olcha

languages, and other contributions by Pilsudski, which were discovered recently as unpublished manuscripts.

These works were mainly the products of Pilsudski's

first Sakhalin expedition of 1 902-5.

As The Collected Works of Bronislaw Pilsudski will

be finally available to scholars eighty years after the

death of their author, it is safe to say that Pilsudski was

one of the critical figures in the ethnography of the Sakhalin-Amur region. He was a contemporary of the

Jesup Expedition efforts and was in contact with some

of its key participants, like Boas, Laufer, and Shternberg.

Therefore, we have but to regret that Pilsudski's

expertise was never used by Laufer during his field

K. INOUE
work on Sakhalin. Nor was Franz Boas fortunate in the

following years in strengthening his cooperation with

Pilsudski—either through American publication of his

folklore materials in 1 907-8 (Inoue 1 999a: 1 1 5-20) or

in arranging Pilsudski's "second Sakhalin expedition"

of 1909-10 that never materialized.

Acknowledgements

This paper is a substantially revised version of the original presentation delivered at the Franz Boas' Centenary Conference in New York (November 1 3-1 7, 1 997;

Inoue 1999b). In the present paper, the original sections that dealt with the relationship between Shternberg and Pilsudski are omitted, and a new section

focused on Berthold Laufer's work on Sakhalin Island was added, thanks to the suggestion of Igor Krupnik.

My thanks are due, first of all, to Igor Krupnik, for his

persistent encouragement and support; to Prof. Jiro

Ikegami, Hokkaido University; and to my colleagues at

the Slavic Research Center, Hokkaido University, for

their valuable comments to the earlier draft of this text.

I am also grateful to Paula Fleming from the National

Anthropological Archives (NAA), Smithsonian Institution and to the NAA staff for assistance and permission to use four of Pilsudski's original Sakhalin photographs as illustrations to this paper.

Notes

1 . This is confirmed by one of Laufer's earli- est reports published in Globus, which says that

"[D]r. Laufer left New York in May 1 898 and trav- eled to Sakhalin Island via Japan and Vladivostok

where he lived among the various local races from

Summer 1898 until March of 1899." (Laufer

1899a:36).

2. See one of the studio portraits of the Amur

River people that Laufer ordered to be taken

(Fitzhugh and Crowell 1988:25).

3. The place where Laufer fell ill was most

probably the village of A/£?rro (Pilsudski 1996:161).

4. Without doubt, this was not a Tungus (i.e., Evenk) but the Uilta (Orok) village, since Muiko was known as an Orok summer campsite on the Poronay

River (Oral communication by Prof. Jiro Ikegami).

5. The book referred to here is by Leopold von Schrenck (1 881-95).

6. Lake Nevskoye on present-day maps.

7. A contemporary Russian name is Ust'- Dolinki.

8. All quotations from Pilsudski's letters that have been published in Russian (see Pilsudski

1996) were translated into English by myself.

9. The town of Nikolayevsk-na-Amure, the

main Russian administrative center located on the

continent, is at the mouth of the Amur River, across

the Mamiya/Tatar Strait from the Sakhalin Island.

1 0. This task was recently fulfilled by Tatyana

P. Roon from the Sakhalin Regional Museum (Roon

2000). For over nine months, between December

1998 and September 1999, she conducted an

extensive survey of the Amur and Sakhalin ethnographic collections preserved at the various Ameri- can museums.

11. Friedrich Kleie, an oil prospector. Cf. Pilsudski 1996:309, Note 99.

12. A testimony thereto was given by John

Batchelor who met Pilsudski in Hokkaido in 1 903.

Batchelor writes: "I met this gentleman [i.e., Pilsudski—K.I.] in Sapporo several years ago and

the only language we could properly converse in was Ainu! He in Saghalien Ainu and I in Yezo."

(Batchelor 1938:3).

1 3. Evidently, the Chukchi, Koryak, Even, and

the Yukagir, surveyed by other JNPE Siberian teams.

14. Main biographical sources on Bronislaw

Pilsudski in English are: Inoue 1 985; Sawada 1 985;

Kowalski 1995; Majewicz 1998.

1 5. The Chairman of the Committee was Prof. Vasily V. Radloff, then Director of the Russian Imperial Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography

(Kunstkamera). Shternberg was appointed as the

Committee's executive secretary. Concerning the

Committee, see Inoue 1999b:146.

16. The expedition was organized by the

Russian Imperial Geographical Society and the

Russian Academy of Sciences. Being invited as

the only Ainu expert in Russia, Pilsudski joined

the team directly from Sakhalin. It was on this occasion that he met John Batchelor in Sapporo

(see above note 1 1 and also Inoue 2003)

17. Waclaw Sieroszewski (1858-1945), a

Polish revolutionary exile to Siberia, was an au- thor of the basic ethnography on the Sakha

1 60 PARTICIPANTS/ LAUFER AND PILSUDSKI
(Yakut) people (Seroshevskii 1896). From his trip to Hokkaido, he published two small pieces of

travelogue entitled '"Wsrod kosmatych ludzi"

(Among the Hairy People) in 1926 and "Volcano

Bay" {]903). Both were included in Sieroszewski's

Collected Works, vol. 1 8 (1 961 ).

1 8. It appears that Pilsudski followed Laufer's example of making use of the Edison phonograph

in recording Native language and folklore. In 1 981

,

some eighty years afterwards, more than eighty

original phonographic cylinders on which Pilsudski

had recorded Ainu folklore texts and which were

preserved at A. Mickiewicz University in Poznan,

Poland, gave birth to the so-called ICRAP (the In- ternational Committee for the Restoration and As- sessment of Bronislaw Pilsudski's Work). ICRAP has

been engaging in editing and publishing The Col- lected Works ofB. Pilsudski, in seven volumes, under

the editorship of Prof. Alfred F. Majewicz of A. Mickiewicz University in Poznan.

19. They are registered as "Franz Boas Pa- pers, nos. 1 1 69; 41 4; 470; 607; 472" (APS-BP), and

a letter without any catalog number (Inoue 1 999a).

20. Unfortunately Boas' letters to Pilsudski are not preserved at the APS, except for one carbon

copy (APS-BP, no. 524a), which is reproduced in: Inoue 1 999a:l 30-1 . Nevertheless, there are signs

of Boas' answers, as indicated by handwritten

messages found on a letter sheet: "F.B./ Ordered

July 7, 1914" and "Answered July 7th" (APS-BP, no. 472; Inoue, 1 999a: 1 27-8).

21. APS-BP, no. 607; Inoue 1999a:125.

22. Latyshev's reading for this name notwithstanding, it was in fact French physical anthropologist Louis Pierre Manouvrier (1 850-1 927), that Pilsudski had referred to here. For this clarifica- tion, I want to thank Aleksandr M. Reshetov of

the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography

(MAE) in St. Petersburg, who has kindly confirmed

its Cyrillic spelling as "Manuvriye," looking up the

original hand-written letter. 23. Charles H. Hawes, a British traveler, who

published a book on the Russian Far East entitled

In the Uttermost East ( 1 903).

24. George Kennan, an American journalist,

who published several books, including an excellent essay, Siberia and the Exile System (1 891 ). 25. On Dec.l 9, 1 907, in his first letterto Boas,

Pilsudski made a proposal to deliver a complete

set of Ainu folklore texts (240 tales andl20

riddles) to be published in America, if he were

guaranteed a monthly income of $120 for eight

months (APS-BP, no.l 169; Inoue, 1999a:1 17). 26. Pilsudski's Ainu folklore material was partially published by Boas in a short article (Pilsudski

1912a). Most probably, however, Boas meant

here the whole material that Pilsudski had offered

to Boas for publication (cf. note 25). It was printed

in Poland as a more extended collection (Pilsudski

1 91 2b). That was Pilsudski's only monograph published during his lifetime.

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K. INOUE
J
Louis ^hotndge and Indigenous 1 iingit

thnOgrapht): Ti^en and Now

NORA MARKS DAUENHAUER

AND RICHARD DAUENHAUER

One of the lasting features of Franz Boas' work during

and after the years of the Jesup Expedition was his

collaboration with indigenous writers and intellectuals

such as George Hunt for KwakiutI, Henry Tate for

Tsimshian, and Louis Shotridge for Tlingit. As far as we

can tell, these relationships were productive and mutually beneficial, and resulted in scholarship of enduring quality and value. Details of how Boas' working

relationships actually shaped the texts are only more

recently attracting critical attention (Rohner 1 969;

Hymes 1 985; Maud 1 993, n.d.)- In Tlingit, for example,

Boas, working with Louis Shotridge, a Tlingit Indian from Klukwan, was able to document Tlingit phonology accurately for the first time (Boas 1 91 7). This analysis

has been confirmed by subsequent generations of linguists. For his part, Shotridge attended Boas' lectures

at Columbia University, and he benefited greatly from

Boas' training in phonetics and current anthropological theory and methods. Shotridge became the first

Tlingit, and possibly the first Northwest Coast Native,

with professional training in linguistics and anthropology. He led expeditions to the Northwest Coast, and

between 1913 and 1 929 he published several articles

in the University ofPennsylvania MuseumJournal, one of which is the subject of this chapter.

Louis Shotridge and the Jesup Expedition

Connection

Although not a part or project of the Jesup Expedition

per se, Shotridge's work belongs to the spirit of the

Jesup Expedition era and is intimately linked to one

of its major figures, Franz Boas. The beginning of

their collaboration falls within the wider timeframe

of the period, and, along with the work of John

Swanton, it forms one of the cornerstones of Tlingit

research and publication. His work with Boas seems

to have been a pivotal event in shaping Shotridge's

career. This chapter covers the biographical and historical background of the relationship and examines

the mutual influence of Boas and Shotridge on each

other's work. Focus is on the scholarly publications

of language and folklore by Louis Shotridge, especially his 1920 article, "Ghost of Courageous Adventurer," and his role in the 1917 grammar of Tlingit

by Boas. The chapter examines and evaluates Louis Shotridge

as a Tlingit intellectual in the western, academic sense

of the term; as the first indigenous transcriber and translator of Tlingit oral literature; and as a stylist in English.

He deliberately used archaic English and "poetic diction" in an attempt to retain the integrity of the original

Tlingit style. The result is a highly crafted translation,

but one that is awkward by modern standards and

difficult for or even unintelligible in places to the aver- age contemporary reader. Parallels between the stilted

English and everyday Tlingit become clear when the

English is back-translated into Tlingit (a work in progress by Nora Marks Dauenhauer, not included here). The

heart of the paper is Nora Marks Dauenhauer's new

English editing of Shotridge's 1920 translation.

1 65
Biographical Background and Early Career

of Louis Shotridge

Louis Shotridge was born in 1 882 in the Chilkat village

of Klukwan, in southeast Alaska. He died in Sitka in

1937. He was the son and grandson of prestigious

Tlingit leaders. His paternal grandfather, L Shaaduxisht

(ca. 1819-1889) from whose Tlingit name the anglicized form "Shotridge" derives, was a leader of the Kaagwaantaan (Eagle moiety) Finned House (Keet

Cooshi Hit), an off-shoot of the Kaagwaantaan Killer Whale House, and was one of the leaders of the 1852

Tlingit raid on the Hudson Bay trading post at Ft. Selkirk

at the confluence of the Pelly and Yukon Rivers. His

father was George Shotridge (1852-1917), whose

Tlingit name was Yeilgooxu, and who was leader of

the prestigious and famous Whale House (Yaay Hit) of

the (Raven moiety) Caanaxteidi. George was a friend

of Lt. George Emmons, the famous ethnographer and

collector among the Tlingit (see Kan, this volume), and

both Louis' father and grandfather are well documented

in historical writings and photographs. Shotridge's

mother was Kudeit.saakw of the Finned House Kaag- waantaan. Thus Louis belonged to the same house

group as his paternal grandfather.

Louis Shotridge was no stranger to the Englishspeaking world. His family had a long history of interaction with Euro-Americans, and he was educated in

the Presbyterian mission school. Louis' marriage to his

first wife Florence was arranged by their families at

birth, but their relationship blossomed at mission school. She was Susie F. Scundoo (c. 1 882-1 91 7), of the Mountain House Lukaax.adi, whose Tlingit name was Kaat><; waantsex. Photographs show her to be a stunning

beauty, and by all accounts she was a talented and

charming woman. They were married on December

25, 1902, in Klukwan.

in 1905, Florence Shotridge was invited to demonstrate Chilkat weaving at the Portland International

Exposition, and Louis accompanied her. There he met

and impressed Dr. George Gordon of the University of

Pennsylvania Museum, who a decade later hired Louis

as an agent and to document the museum's North- west Coast collection.

Milburn (1997) traces and examines a number of phenomena that converged in the lives of Louis and

Florence Shotridge. The rise of tourism and the "curio"

trade paralleled the start of museum collecting. At some

point, Louis decided to become involved in the curio and collecting trade. He was no stranger to this activity, the Chilkat area being influenced by earlier mu- seum collectors, such as the Krause brothers, Emmons,

and various Presbyterian missionaries. The latter en- couraged Native carving as crafts to generate revenue, while Sheldon Jackson was collecting traditional

artifacts for his museum in Sitka (the future Sheldon

Jackson Museum). Milburn observes that Shotridge's

pursuit of an entrepreneurial career through his interaction with American society was consistent with the

activities of his father and grandfather, and she suggests that this may be seen as an attempt to maintain

his prestige within a rapidly changing Tlingit society

(1 997:1 03). Despite the high level of schooling in Southeast Alaska, only a small percentage of Natives suc- ceeded in breaking into Euro-American professions. The

"civilizing" rhetoric of Protestant missionaries was aimed

at creating an indigenous laboring class. Perhaps Louis

and Florence saw the curio market as a stepping-stone

to become involved in professional, intellectual work.

The years from 1 907 to 1 91 1 were highly productive for the young couple. They hired tutors to teach them English and music. Florence was an accomplished

pianist, and Louis is remembered for his outstanding

baritone voice. They performed duets and toured with

an Indian Grand Opera Company. From the time when

Florence was first asked to demonstrate Chilkat weaving through their years of participation in Indian fairs and the Opera, the Shotridges functioned as what

Milburn calls "cultural" entrepreneurs, re-inventing their

"authentic" and "exotic" selves as the circumstances

dictated (Milburn 1997:1 1 7). It is difficult to evaluate

this phase of their careers, which seems embarrassing

and stereotyped today. To some extent, Louis and

1 66 PARTICIPANTS/ LOUIS SHOTRIDGE
Florence may have "bought into" this style of presentation as the prevailing model, but even if they

found it offensive and demeaning, living up to the

popular stereotype may have been the only vehicle

available to them at the time. As his later career demonstrates, Louis Shotridge constantly fought

against the trivialization of Indian culture by the

white establishment.

In 1910, Louis was offered a temporary position at

the University of Pennsylvania Museum in Philadelphia.

He was essentially a "show and tell," dressing in Plains

Indian style to meet public expectation. Florence was

the "Indian Princess." George Emmons urged the mu- seum officials to hire Shotridge full time. Edward Sapir

also wanted to hire him for the Canadian National

Museum in Ottawa, but Louis decided to stay in

Philadelphia. In 1 9 1 2 he was admitted to the Wharton

School of Finance and Economics, where he studied for two years. Through talent, ambition, and hard

work, the Shotridges had achieved the educational

and social refinements that were necessary to participate in the middle-class worlds of academe, mu- seum patronage, and business administration

(Milburn 1997:122). In 1913, Florence authored an

article for the University of Pennsylvania Museum

Journal (Shotridge 191 3).

George Cordon, Franz Boas, and Shotridge'

s

Flourishing Career

In the meantime, George Gordon had been busily developing an Anthropology Department at the University of Pennsylvania Museum (UPM). In the winter of

1914, he set up a meeting at Columbia University be- tween Louis Shotridge and Franz Boas. For two months

the two men worked together every morning recording Tlingit songs and phonetics. Some of the excite- ment of their working out the phonetics of Tlingit is

recorded in Shotridge's letters of November 4 and 1 7, 1914, to Gordon (Milburn 1997:123-4,143). This research resulted in the publication of the first reliable

Tlingit grammar (Boas 1917). While in New York,

Shotridge also attended Boas' General Anthropology

classes at Columbia University and participated in weekly anthropological discussions with a group of

peers. Although he did not receive a formal degree,

Shotridge was the first academically trained Native

American ethnographer from the Northwest Coast. This

achievement earned him the authority to work unsupervised within the Euro-American art/culture system.

In 1915, Gordon offered Shotridge full-time employment as Assistant Curator in the UPM North American

Section. He worked for the museum for the next sev- enteen years, the first Native American from the North- west Coast to be employed full-time within a museum

context (Milburn 1997:124).

Growing interest in collecting texts in the indig- enous languages positioned Native ethnographers such

as Hunt and Shotridge in the forefront of scientific ethnography. Milburn's fascinating study of the evolution

of anthropological thought during this period is be- yond our scope here, and we only note the developing conflict between two personal and professional

influences on Shotridge's life: the clash between Boas

(and other "scientific professionals") and George T. Emmons, the amateur entrepreneurial pragmatist.

Shotridge had great potential as a cultural insider with

outside professional training. However, his circumstances were very complex, and ultimately he contin- ued to be tokenized and stereotyped by the establishment. But still, Shotridge managed to use the sys- tem and to exploit it to his own professional agenda,

which, as Milburn demonstrates, was congruent with

the widely accepted progressive Tlingit societal goals

of the era.

In 191 5, Shotridge led the Wanamaker Expedition

(1914-8) to Alaska (named after its sponsor, John

Wanamaker, department store magnate and member

of the UPM's Board of Managers; Milburn 1986:64-5),

the first anthropological expedition led by an Alaska

Native. Much has been written about Shotridge as a

collector, and most of that has been rather negative

(cf. Mason 1960; Carpenter 1975; Cole 1985; Price

N. M. DAURENHAUER AND R. DAUENHAUER 1 67
1 998). Milburn reviews and refutes this anti-Shotridge

line of argument (Milburn 1997), and we agree with

her. Shotridge's detractors have grossly oversimplified;

much of their evidence is hearsay and is not borne out

in reality. The situation in southeast Alaska was complex and times were changing rapidly. Shotridge had

two major agendas: to show the greatness of Tlingit

culture through the clan art; and to find an institutional

sanctuary for Native art objects that were then being

seen as obsolete, negative, or contested in a Tlingit

society that was advocating assimilation to western norms, patrilineal inheritance, and Christianity. In particular, his collecting goals were then fully compatible

with the "progressive" (modernist) cultural agenda of

the Alaska Native Brotherhood, founded in 1912, of which Shotridge was elected Grand President in 1 930.

It seems unlikely that Shotridge would have been

elected to the office of Grand President if his personal

life and professional philosophy were not in keeping

with the mainstream or majority of the membership.

Thus, in his collecting practices, Shotridge subscribed to a "salvage paradigm." Rather than being in

conflict, the acquisition goals of the University Museum

and the Tlingit assimilationists' goals of removing traditional art objects from the community were complementary with each other and with Shotridge's personal

and professional goals. Milburn sees this as a synthesis

of Native Tlingit and institutional Euro-American attitudes and desires (1997:268). Shotridge worked to

preserve what he considered to be the strengths of

his heritage without compromising Native American

ability to achieve civil equality. In this regard Shotridge

exemplified the Native American struggle of the early

1 900s for recognition within the dominant society and

he was personally impacted by the ambivalent, often

contradictory worlds within which he operated. He

evidently achieved support from the Alaska Native

Brotherhood (ANB) membership because he wanted

to preserve and display objects as texts on the history

of Tlingit society and as monuments to Tlingit greatness (Milburn 1986:203-4).

Personal tragedy entered Shotridge's life in 1917.

His wife Florence had tuberculosis; her health deteriorated and she died on June 12, 1917. One wonders

what her achievements would have been had she lived

another twenty years or more, and shared the decades

during which Louis' research and writing came to fruition. Louis remarried in 1919, and returned to Philadelphia. His employment with the museum was secure; Gordon, the Anthropology Department's head, encour- aged and promoted Shotridge as a professional ethnographer, and the next ten years were highly productive. During these years, Shotridge continued to build and document the collection, and he published eight

articles in the University Museum Journal, one of which

is the subject of this chapter (Shotridge 1 920). Of his

assigned activities, Shotridge did not care for writing,

but preferred fieldwork and collecting.

It was Shotridge's grand strategy to collect those

objects of clan art that best represent Tlingit societal

history and show Tlingit social structure in a micro- cosm. His agenda was to show the greatness of Tlingit

art and culture, but to do it in a clan-specific way. His

attention to clan identity is reflected in his collecting

and in his publications such as "Ghost of Courageous

Adventurer" (Shotridge 1 920) As noted previously,

these items were becoming increasingly controversial

in the Tlingit community because of the conversion to

Protestant Christianity (which was much more intrusive on Tlingit lifestyle than Russian Orthodoxy, and

which also had the full backing of the American secular authorities) and because of increasing conflict be- tween Native matrilineal and Euro-American patrilineal

systems of inheritance. Although recognition of clan ownership was "notarized" through the traditional protocol of reciprocity at potlatches, Shotridge felt that

this was only temporary, because people forget,

and times change. In contrast, a museum would provide a permanent record of glory. This would be an

honorable alternative.

Shotridge also sensed a growing shift away from

the clan system and toward the community as the

1 68 PARTICIPANTS/ LOUIS SHOTRIDGE
unit of identity and political action. He saw future political and social strength coming from a collective approach. In retrospect, we can see even more clearly

that Shotridge perceived correctly that clan-centered

identity and political power were already on the wane

and were being replaced by western forms and concepts. The ANB and other Pan-Indian movements were

(and are) community-based rather than clan-based. The

pattern becomes increasingly evident in the subsequent

history of the ANB and later Native organizations, such

as Tlingit and Haida Central Council, and Alaska Federation of Natives, culminating in the Alaska Native

Claims Settlement Act of 1971 and the creation of

regional, for-profit corporations; the latter (in 1 92 1 ) had no precedent or parallel in traditional Tlingit social structure. Shotridge saw this coming, and made a special

effort to collect and document Tlingit cultural achievement on a clan-by-clan basis, from a Tlingit point of

view, in contrast to the more generic and westernbased approaches of others. Museum management, however, was then characterized by a conflict of priority between catering to

public display and public expectation, and pursuing

the advancement of science. Shotridge collected what

the Tlingit considered significant, sometimes disagreeing with museum management on this. As noted previously, Shotridge wanted to represent the historical

greatness of the Tlingit clans. In doing so, his work

goes far beyond formal classificatory analysis or collection of texts. Shotridge goes into the social and

historical context of the art objects. He treated myth

and legend as events that situated the various Tlingit

clans in time and place, within history and geography.

For Shotridge, the agents by which groups were distinguished and by which social structure was defined were visually articulated in crest objects. We will return to this shortly.

The End of Louis Shotridge's Career

By the end of the 1 920s, Shotridge's career at the UPM

was winding down. George Cordon died in January

1 928, and in August, Louis' second wife, Elizabeth, died

of tuberculosis. With the stock market crash of 1929

and the Great Depression, funding became a problem, and new management had interests in areas other

than Native America. In 1932, after twenty years of

service, Shotridge was dropped from the UPM staff. Sometime between 1 93 1 and 1 932, Shotridge married for the third time. His last years were financially

troubled, and in 1 935 he was hired as a stream guard

to police fishing. In July 1 937 he apparently fell from a

roof He was discovered and taken to the hospital in

Sitka, where he died ten days later, on August 6, 1 937.

He was survived by his third wife and four children.

Milburn emphasizes that the factual record sharply contradicts the sensationalized accounts of Shotridge's

death published in the 1960s and 1970s (Milburn

1997:321; Cole 1985:266). These stories also circulate in oral tradition. We, too, have heard the oral accounts cited by Cole (1985:266) but have preferred

not to discuss them. As much as they may be fascinating folklore, they may not be accurate.

Shotridge's Concern with Context

Shotridge's insistence on the social and historical context of art objects raises an interesting and important

theoretical debate. This is covered fully by Milburn

(1 997: chapter 7, esp. 271 ff) but it is also necessary to

touch on it briefly here. Major experts in Tlingit eth- nography of Shotridge's time, such as Emmons, John

Swanton, and Boas differed in their approaches to objects and their meanings. Emmons was probably closest to Shotridge in his interest in obtaining detailed

Native interpretations of objects. Swanton explicitly

discounted the association of myth, oral history, and

the imagery found on crest objects (Swanton

1 908:395), and Boas advocated a formalist approach,

arguing that designs could be interpreted outside the

social context of clan and personal history (see especially Boas 1907:386-7, which is contained within

Emmons 1907 and discussed by Milburn 1997:272-

3; see alsojonaitis 1995:306-35). Milburn concluded

N. M. DAURENHAUER AND R. DAUENHAUER 1 69
that "The tightly knit Tlingit relationship between social structure, personal and clan histories, myths, and

objects was obscured when Boas opted to rely exclusively on a formal, decontextualized analysis of design

systems" (1997:273). Quoting Marjorie Halpin (1994:

1 3), Milburn continues, "By separating art from its stories. Boas and his followers separated art from the community context which gave it meaning and life, and,

finally, obscured the vital connection between art and

the land which, whether intentional or not, was part of

the colonial enterprise of separating Natives from their

lands" (1 997:2 74). For anthropological museums it was

essential to recontextualize ownership of Native American objects within a Western patrimony because there was no value in an exchange that continued to perpetuate concepts of Native ownership and the historic associations they represented. In this regard,

Shotridge's emphasis on the particulars of collective ownership was at odds with the anthropological configuration of objects within a Western system of acquisition and display (Milburn 1 997:274-5).

Milburn describes how Shotridge's emphasis on the

accurate representation of Tlingit society and history

became even more of a focus after Gordon's death.

Shotridge then had sole discretionary responsibility for composing and framing the collection. In the final years

of Shotridge's employment, his work was essentially

neglected by the UPM officials, enabling him to base

his purchasing decisions almost exclusively on his own

agenda rather than on more generalized visual or interpretative considerations. In the final analysis, his combined oral history and photographic record places objects in the Shotridge collection at UPM among the

best documented of Northwest Coast objects in any

non-Native institution (Milburn 1997:271-2, 275).

The Knife and the Story as Text and Context

In 1920, Shotridge published "Ghost of Courageous

Adventurer" in the University Museum Journal {Shotridge 1 920). This article provides an excellent example

of Shotridge's philosophy as described previously. It

documents the history and social context of a single

artifact in the collection—one that, in fact, might easily

be overlooked by the casual museum visitor. The Tlingit

knife named "Ghost of Courageous Adventurer" (Fig.

50) was acquired by Louis Shotridge in Sitka in 1918

and was soon mentioned as being on display (Shotridge 1920:11). In his article, Shotridge shows how

stories illuminate the complex relations between objects, oral history, and social structure. It is a powerful

story and an excellent example of Shotridge's concern

with keeping objects in their cultural contexts of clan ownership and history—his emphasis on clan ownership and historical presentation, in contrast to timeless

and decontextualized, generic display (Fig. 51). As

Milburn explains, "Shotridge's histories were intimately

related to particular crest objects and the clans that owned them. Because of their detailed oral histories

the objects constituted a metonym for the existing

fabric of Tlingit society" (Milburn 1997:345). This will become evident in his story and its frame.

In his opening paragraph, Shotridge explained that

his purpose was to illustrate how a selected object of

Tlingit visual art represented its mythic prototypes, how

"prototypes of animals of land, air, and water, and the

denizens of the unseen world are represented". In what was to be recognized as the hallmark of Shotridge's

style, he described in detail the object and how he

acquired it:

To illustrate these arts, I have chosen, for this

article, a war knife. This specimen, although

not among the most conspicuous of the

many important objects exhibited in the

Northwest Coast Hall of the University

Museum, has its own story and has in fact a

special importance. The knife itself, its name,

the material in which it is wrought and

everything connected with it have many

sentimental associations for the Tlingit.

The blade and guard are made of iron and

the pommel of ivory. The grip has an iron core covered with mesh made from the hair of the wild goat. Both the iron and the ivory

are said to be the same pieces mentioned in the legend given in the following pages. The

ivory pommel is carved like a human skull

1 70 PARTICIPANTS/ LOUIS SHOTRIDGE
which represents a ghost, the cavities being

inlaid with blue iridescent abalone shell that glows with soft hues. The blade is well hardened metal with sharp edges on both

sides, wrought out in one piece with one end

reduced like a stem or tang which is driven

into the ivory pommel. A separate piece of

the iron is shaped to fit the handle end to form a guard. The length of the weapon,

from tip to the top of the handle, is fifteen and one-half inches.

I obtained this old knife from the last of

Thunderbird House group of the Shungukeidi

50/ The "Chost of a Courageous Adventurer" knife,

with sheath, both of which are associated with the story. UPM Coll #NA 8488 (knife 38.6cm long)

clan of Chilkat. It was the only object which

carried with it to the present day a record of

the important part which the clan took in establishing a trade connection between the

northern Tlingit and the alien tribes of the

Interior. It was the last link with the past and

therefore the last thing with which the clan was willing to part (Shotridge 1920:1 1-12).

The knife alludes to or recalls an expedition by the

Chilkat Tlingit from Klukwan over what is now known

as the St. Elias Range to the Copper River. The trek was led by a man of the Shangukeidi clan named

N. M. DAURENHAUER AND R. DAUENHAUER

Gaayshaayi, who is called in the story by the English

translation of his name. Eagle Head. Shotridge explains:

There is no accurate geographical information to be offered to indicate the exact

location of the regions referred to in the account of the journey, and we can only

guess at localities by computing the time it took to walk from the starting point. The

legend shows that after crossing the desert

of ice, the party went along the Pacific coast

all the way to what is now known as Copper

River. This journey on foot, which is said to

51/ Yendaayank', the last direct descendant of Tlingit

chiefEagle Head, who headed the party described in the

story, as photographed in Sitka, / 908.

have taken all of the favorable season, proved a difficult one. Even at the present

time with maps and modern equipment, one

is often puzzled as to a safe course over the

deserts of ice along the way.

When the explorers returned to Klukwan, the

old Native town on the Chilkat River where I was born, only very few of the men survived to receive the honors of discovery and the prospect of acquiring riches. Some lost their

lives while crossing the ice and others died of

starvation. The survivors on their return told

their story and made known the inhabited

1 7 1
regions of the west coast. They also brought

back iron and ivory, articles previously unknown

to the Tlingit people (Shotridge 1920:12-4).

The aspect of Shotridge's work that we focus on in

this chapter is his English version of the history that the

knife recalls. The pattern of the text and context of the

story is typical in Tlingit folklife and oral tradition. An

important narrative genre consists of accounts of how

clans acquired the right to claim and use certain areas,

objects, or crest designs, called in Tlingit at.dow, literally meaning "an owned or purchased object." As in

the case of the knife, the purchase was through the

lives of clan ancestors, whose experience gives subsequent generations the right to claim and use the crest

or object. As Shotridge articulates in an editorial com- ment in the story, "Only through sacrifice does man

acquire something of value. It was at the cost of brave

lives that we now have in our hands those objects

that constitute our pride." For more on this, see Nora Dauenhauer (1986, 1995) and Dauenhauer and

Dauenhauer (1987, 1990, 1994).

The Style of the Story

Shotridge's style in the story itself is quite different from his style in the introduction cited above. The biggest problem the modern reader immediately faces in

the story is Shotridge's use of archaic English. This was

a deliberate choice. He explains: "In rewriting the ac- count of the journey I have preserved the original form

as far as translation from Tlingit to English permits. The

language in which these legends are told is what might

be called poetic in form and often archaic. It is a form

of diction that will sometimes yield in translation to

obsolete forms of English" (Shotridge 1 920: 1 4).

This raises a point of translation theory on which we disagree with Shotridge. Is it correct to use deliberately archaic and obsolete forms in translation if the

style of the original is not really archaic or obsolete?

Shotridge chose archaic English in an attempt to con- vey a sense of the Tlingit. He also used unnatural English word order to convey a sense of Tlingit syntax.

On one hand, he brilliantly succeeds. Upon reading his

text, Nora Marks Dauenhauer's first reaction was, "I

could hear the Tlingit on the back side of what he was

saying." In fact, this gave her the idea of back-translating the English into Tlingit, a work currently in progress

but far from completion. She found this relatively easy

to do, because the Tlingit grammar was so transparent in Shotridge's English text. We are not suggesting

that there was ever a written Tlingit "Ur-text" from which

Shotridge translated. Although Shotridge was a good

speller of Tlingit and there are many examples of his

linguistic transcriptions of names and terms extant, it

is unlikely that he ever transcribed or wrote a version

of the story down in Tlingit. It would be an archivist's

delight if there were. But there is no extant text of the

story in Tlingit written by Shotridge, and we have no

reason to assume that he ever did write it out in Tlingit.

His written version composed in English is based on

Tlingit oral accounts. He probably called to mind oral

traditions that he had heard in Tlingit, and translated them into written English.

Shotridge undeniably succeeded in conveying a

sense of Tlingit in his English. The down side of this

success is that his translation is difficult and even unintelligible to the average reader of English. It uses the

full set of archaic English locationals and directionals:

here there where

hither thither whither

hence thence whence

These are not obsolete in Tlingit, and in fact match

quite well. Most educated readers would be able to

follow these. But some vocabulary sends even educated readers, unless they are educated in Middle English, to the dictionary, like: whilom = formerly

I trow = I think

Shotridge's impression and description of Tlingit

as "poetic in form and often archaic" is true only relative to his English translation. The style of Tlingit narratives such as this tends to be formal and conservative

in Tlingit, but not alien or archaic. Unlike Tlingit oratory

1 72 PARTICIPANTS/ LOUIS SHOTRIDGE
with its rich metaphor and simile that people consider

bewildering and often call "old time Tlingit," the prose

narrative of crest stories is relatively straightforward.

Therefore, one could argue that the level of style called

for in English should be also formal and conservative,

but not archaic or confusing. This is the balance we

have tried to strike in the revised translation: it is intended to be formal, but natural (see below). Thus, we

debated many of Shotridge's vocabulary choices. For

Shotridge's "comrades," the word "buddies" was too

conversational. Likewise, the leader's taunt to his de- spondent trekkers, "Did you come here for pleasure?"

sounds a bit stiff, but "Did you come here for a good

time?" is too colloquial.

While the planned obsolescence of Shotridge's

translation succeeds in conveying a sense of Tlingit

structure, it creates unnecessary barriers for all readers, even the most educated, and therefore it fails to communicate the power of the story as fully as it might.

His effort to preserve the letter of the original fails to

preserve the spirit; it does not convey the emotional

power and function of the original because it fails to communicate even literally to the modern reader.

Our Editorial Procedures

The balance of this paper is our edited version of the

Shotridge's English composition. Here are some of the

general procedures we have followed in the revision:

1 . We have kept the gems of "poetic diction" wherever they are "poetic" but not obscure. For example "foliage moon." We like this so much

that we have added a few of our own, such as the buds "puckering," which conveys the theme

of the Tlingit verb.

2. Most of Shotridge's parenthetical notes are incorporated into the main text, especially where

they explain the "poetic diction"; for example

"the month of May" in the opening line. Some of

his comments are relegated to notes, and we

have added some notes of our own.

3. All archaic English nouns, directionals, and

locationals are replaced with modern English.

Thus "girdle" becomes "belt," and all the hithers,

thithers, and whences are dropped. The "drift log

with spurs of queer genus," which borders on

bombast, becomes "a drift log with an unusual

kind of spur." It sounds more pedestrian, but

clear.

4. Where the word order is unnatural or unclear,

it is changed. "To follow that river big" becomes

"to follow that big river."

5. Anything that creates linguistic confusion is edited and in extreme cases paraphrased.

6. Generally translators do not translate personal names such as Eagle Head, but Shotridge did,

and we have left them as is. Shotridge also plays

with ethnonyms: Tlingit, meaning "human," and

Cunanaa, meaning Athapaskan but literally

"other," or "alien," which now conveys all kinds of

sci-fi associations. Technically, "alien" as an

English word comes from the Latin for "other."

Here is an example of a passage we edited: "Carefully that man looked and felt, then to the camp and

to comrades he told. Right away with him they went

thither." This becomes: "Carefully the man looked at it and felt it. Then he returned to camp to tell the rest of

them. Right away they went back there with him."

This review of examples illustrates Eugene Nida's

idea of levels of "transfer" (Nida 1 964: 1 84-92). He identifies literal transfer, minimal transfer, and literary transfer. "Literal transfer" is word-for-word, whereas "mini- mal transfer" is whatever is necessary to make acceptable sense in the target language: for example, adding

"a" or "the" in English when translating from languages

that have no articles, such as Russian or Tlingit. In Nida's

context, it seems that Shotridge confused the literal and minimal transfers. His style is optional and operates at the level of literary transfer; his grammar is not

optional and exemplifies the minimal transfer. We should note that the division of the narrative

into sub-sections with titles is not in the Shotridge

original, but is a preferred publishing convention

today, and one that we hope will be of help to

readers in following the story and possibly tracing

its route.

N. M. DAURENHAUER AND R. DAUENHAUER 1 73
"Ghost of Courageous Adventurer,"

[Translated from Tlingit oral tradition by Louis Shotridge

(1 920), edited by Nora Marks Dauenhauer (1 997)]

Opening Frame

It was May, the foliage moon, the month when buds

are puckering on trees, when the Shangukeidi laid their

packs in canoes and poled away to lands unknown.

They weren't many. Maybe they numbered twenty men. Among them was Eagle Head. They steered their ca- noes toward TIeheeni, a branch of the Chilkat River. A

traveler never took this stream too far inland because

a glacier grew there, shutting off their passage.

From Sea Level to Timberline

The canoes of cottonwood moved on and on. Now

they pole and now they tow. Through ice water wade

the bare feet of those brave men of long ago. The common cold was unknown in those days. Where did

the man of today come from to be so soft? Regardless of all protection he catches cold. One camp ahead they reached Trout Creek, across from where the town of Porcupine now is. Here the canoes were beached, turned upside down, and

wrapped with underbrush. "Maybe we'll be lucky

and make our return through here." Though the trail

of the sun was still long, they didn't go any farther

that day, for as always on such a journey, little things

must be fitted together, retying packs so they lay better on backs. Staffs, too, were always made to fit the

hands. Thus, they always made camp there at the ca- noe landing.

As the sky turned gray at dawn, faces passed

through loops of pack straps. Those packs of food were heavy. Trout Creek Mountain was steep. The journey moved in that direction, without eating breakfast,

because the tongue was still coated. How different is

the man of today. Eat first and work next. But with the man of long ago it was work first, and with sunrise comes time for breakfast. Food eaten before the tongue

is cleared, they say, was unwholesome to the stomach. It was when the sun was sliding down that the

journey climbed to the timberline. Their guess was right. The next trees were far away from here, so the journey

made camp.

Chilkat Summit; O'Connor and Tatshenshini Rivers

Then from that place, while it was still dark, they

mounted the journey again. When the sunbeams lowered their feet to the base of the mountain, the expedition had reached the summit. They made a fire for

their lunch stop. When they had finished eating, the group continued, following the short cut called De- spondent Man's Trail, that ran from the prairie to Chilkat

Pass. The expedition moved on and on. At times the new trail was good, and sometimes bad. In hollows

the old snow was melting slowly and retarded their

travel without snowshoes.

After two camps in that direction, no more trees were seen, only a low growth of willows here and

there. From the summit of Chilkat Pass there is a stretch

of rolling land of about forty miles, a divide between

the timber line of the Tlingit forest and the interior. Maybe six camps from home, the group came to a

big river. Now people call it Alsek (Tatshenshini). ' From

there they moved downriver along the shore. Two

camps in that direction, they thought they might be

too far down. From piles of driftwood they dragged

logs and right away they lashed together a raft. This is how they gained the far side of the river. From there

the group went westward.

Following the Ice Field to Yakutat

One camp from the river, the group came to the face

of a glacier. Looking north and south, they couldn't

see the end. Their guess was right: that growth of ice was wide. Where should the journey go? To the ocean, one would think. It was from there that a traveler had

formerly come. The expedition had wandered onto

the route that strangers had taken home.^ The group

stopped to camp at the timber line of the glacier. That

evening the men agreed on a certain course.

1 74 PARTICIPANTS/ LOUIS SHOTRIDGE
When the Big Dipper [Yaxte; Great Bear] was turning over to daybreak, they were already walking on

the glacier. In the cool of dawn, it was firm underfoot.

But as the sun rose higher, the firm surface began to

melt, and fear crept in. But ready was the rope of the man of long ago. It was strong, made from the hind

quarter of mountain goat. It was tied to the leader's

waist and stretched through the hands of all the men.

Far ahead of them, side by side, stood two mountains, (Seattle and Ruhamah). In between them looked

good. They kept their faces moving that direction. Eagle

Head was in the lead. It was slow going, they say, because of many crevices. Even though the mountains

looked quite near, when night fell they still were far

ahead. At night, it was like a tanned skin underfoot,

with less precaution needed for each step. Twilight lay

over the icefield and it was clear to the men where the danger lay. No one had making camp to rest in mind,

and the line moved on throughout the night.

Those travelers of long ago stood in the haze of

dawn. They looked up to the face of the mountain on

the north side, and then up to the face of the mountain on the south. It was Chaan Yuka, Midway of the Ice

Field called Chaan. From that time on this name, given

by those men of long ago, was fixed in our language.

No one knows what language the name is borrowed

from. [Probably the Athabaskan name had been applied to these mountains in more ancient time, and the name made more widely recognized only since the

Tlingit discovery—NMD].

On went the journey till the mountains with the

night were left behind.^ The sun was falling into its

slide when the sound of a great drum reached the men's ears. The wind was down, and through the still

air louder and louder came that thunder-like drumming

as they traveled on. It was the ocean, the great salt

water, beating its arms against the shore in waves. When they recognized the sound, relief swept through

their heart and limbs, and their pace increased. The sun had taken its last steep slide when the group came to camp among the first timber. There was no courage

N. M, DAURENHAUER AND R. DAUENHAUER

left in anyone to go farther; sleep had overpowered

courage. How much sleep had they taken when each man

squatted into his pack straps and rushed off to follow

the first to leave camp? Maybe joy was what they felt. What did each expect from where the sound was reaching their ears? It's always this way: a little change in a

hard experience brings a feeling like berries to the mouth—for a while it's good, but soon the taste melts away. The sun was half way along its trail when the group came to a lake. Where is this? They thought it was a lake, but it was really Yakutat Bay. Until the tide went out, they had no idea they had come to the

shore of the ocean. The sun had sunk behind a mountain when the group arrived at the lip of the waves.

Against the shoreline, up and down, the great salt water moved its arms. But there was no sign of human habitation. Where were those feelings of joy now? Like

spruce pitch from a tree, slowly, they melted away.

Malaspina Glacier

After this, their feet, just like their feelings, became heavy,

too. They camped one night. With pointed words, they

disagreed. What kind of a man was strong willed enough to continue? So one speech went against another. It is said that Eagle Head, that real man, while

humming a little tune to himself, pushed and drew an

awl through his moccasin patch. They say that Eagle

Head's little humming was an omen of the anger in his

heart. Speaking slowly, he said, "You sound to me like homesick children. Did you come here for fun? Turn in your tracks now if you choose, before it gets any harder. As for me, my feeling is not to turn my face homeward

empty handed." It was then the men realized their shame and how they were discouraged and disheartened. Once more courage pierced their weak hearts.

But in camp on the edge of another glacier (probably

the Malaspina Glacier) this talk continued. There are few men with courage enough to blame them. Maybe

they too, even these courageous few, would have

weakened had they stood there face to face with this

1 75
glacier with its end unknown.'' Toward dawn the expedition moved along on the glacier. They say this was even more dangerous, since the crevices were many and bigger. On and on slowly, the expedition

moved. Had two young men taken more care, no grief

would have come to the travelers. Maybe their minds

wandered away from thoughts of caution. From this,

the first two deaths occurred among them. They

fell into ice crevices. This is the way it always is: a man may take much care, but his time to die ignores that care. Who was to blame for these lost lives? No one

dared to say the way he felt about what happened.

They feared the words of Eagle Head. The travelers sat

in meditation. Maybe some minds vacillated and decided now one way and then the other, but no one

there was strong enough to turn back. While the travelers sat with troubled hearts. Eagle Head snatched his pack strap and said, "Let's keep going. Is it something new to you that a man should die?" With this remark

he started to walk. One by one the men slowly moved

after the leader. There was trouble underfoot, but in

spite of everything, the heart of Eagle Head never

yielded. How strong the heart of that man must have

been. Maybe it was like European steel from people

beyond the horizon; it never bent. It took them two

days and one night to reach the other side of the glacier. From there, once again the expedition moved

along the wave-lip shoreline.

Following the Shoreline; the Discovery of Iron

After making camp, one of the men was walking along

the shore. Unless there was something that needed to be done, the traveler of long ago never kept still or sat around in camp. What was he looking for? It was to

drive away the tiredness that created such a habit. He was walking not too far from camp. There, across his

path, lay a drift log with an unusual kind of spur. The man had never seen such spurs. From his belt, that man of long ago drew out his adze. What could be

harder than this green stone? ^ Therefore, little did that

man of long ago take care. He struck the unusual

growth with all his strength. "Dummm" the sound came

out. What was it that had such a sound, and what did

it mean? The edge of that hard, green-stone adze

had broken off, with only a bright spot where it had

slipped on the spur. "My adze—so much depended

on you," he said in amazement. For a moment, trouble

pierced his mind, but the thought of the unusual log was stronger.

Maybe then came to mind for the man of long ago

that something lay at hand superior to his green-stone.

For some moments the man contemplated the unusual log. Then he rolled it over. More of the spurs were sticking out. Carefully the man looked at it and

felt it. Then he returned to camp to tell the rest of

them. Right away they went back there with him. They

carried the log to camp. First they pounded on it with

rocks. No, these unusual spurs only bent. "What will fire do to it?" They laid the unusual log on the fire, and on

it lay all eyes. Behold! Before their eyes the log burned,

but what they thought were spurs only turned like

red-hot coals. Thus, through a drift log, iron was carried to the hands of the Tlingit.

To the Copper River

In late summer, when the Coho salmon were swimming, one by one, in streams to shore, the expedition reached the bank of a large river. Maybe it's

the one now called the Copper. Here their minds

vacillated, deciding now to cross the river and continue on along the ocean shore, and now to follow

the river upstream. Camping at the same place one

night after another. Eagle Head slept through all

those days. Never were his feelings heard from his

lips. Maybe now his strong heart and courage were

bending a little. No one can say what luck will favor

any man's effort. They don't say how many days it was that they'd

been camping in this one place when smoke was

sighted toward away upriver. "Aliens. Gunanaa," someone said.*^ They wanted to make certain, but no one

1 76 PARTICIPANTS/ LOUIS SHOTRIDCE
said anything. Whoever happened to be near his

pack squatted to put it on, and with one accord they

made a run toward the smoke. The smoke appeared

close, but in spite of their haste, night fell before they

reached it. But it was not too dark, and they could see

the way ahead clearly. Where did the depression go?

Excitement overwhelmed it, and onward rushed the

hurried feet.

Up the Copper River: Encountering the Athapasi<ans

The travelers came out from behind a point, and

right before their eyes lay many fires. It looked like a

long row of houses, maybe a sizeable town. Maybe

they never scented all that smoke because the

breeze was blowing away from them. The travelers were still some distance away when the dogs be- gan to bark at them. On the opposite side of the stream from the town, the travelers quietly halted. From out of the village came forth a voice. Maybe it meant, "Who are you?" No one was there to tell them

what the strange language had said. "We are hu- man—^Tlingit—and we seek your presence." Likewise,

they failed to understand the person from another place.

While they hesitated to wade across, the fires were all

extinguished. Alien people, always, like wild animals,

are shy. Above the swishing sound of the running stream

they could hear talking at night. Infants in cradles were

crying. There was nothing else the travelers could do

but to wait for daylight. The people they had searched

out were afraid of them.

Gradually night faded away, and dawn opened on

a large camp with a long row of brush houses. Presently, one by one, smoke rose from within each dwelling. It was Eagle Head who came out to the stream

edge. He gestured to the people across, and one by

one those new people assembled. In front of them

stood their headman, who likewise talked by gestures

to the travelers. He only exchanged a few words, and

when he was finished, they talked among each other. They all seemed happy. Then the travelers were sum- moned to come over.

Trading with theAthapasl<ans

The Tlingit waded across and walked among the alien

tribe. To this day we still walk toward a place in the same manner. The travelers were surrounded in the

open, and strange eyes were on them. Maybe they were curious to those eyes. From among the crowd,

their leader emerged. Likewise Eagle Head stepped

forward to meet him, and face-to-face stood the Tlingit

and the man of the alien tribe. Gesturing, they acknowledged each other. Presently, from his pouch, the Tlingit

brought out his daadzi for him to see (a fire-making

apparatus of flint and pyrites - NMD). With it was some

tinder of shredded cedar root. Before the eyes of the

alien people a fire began to blaze from a spark. For a moment there was silence, and then confusion of

voices. The alien people were amazed. After demonstrating his daadzi, Eagle Head placed it in its pouch

and then offered it to the alien man. "I brought this for

you, my friend." With these words he placed the fire- making set in the hands of the alien man. Those inland

people used a wooden drill to make fire. In return, the

leader lifted his quiver of arrows from his shoulder, and

with his bow gave it to Eagle Head. This is how the

greetings of the Tlingit and the alien were expressed

with gifts. No longer was there a feeling of suspicion. Before

feasting there, those alien people lined up to dance for

the travelers, according to their custom. They greet

friendship with dance. Do they put on special makeup for dance, as we do? Not at all. Those nomads

whoever happens to be near, some maybe with packs

of infants—move, just as they are, into dancing the moment a song is started. Happy are they, these inland people. Though all the dangers of man were known to them, life among them was peaceful. Why

do the Tlingit not learn this good life? How bad it must

have been on our ancestor for his offspring only to be

the antagonist to another man. Maybe we were bothered first, and then we struck back hard at the other

man.'

N, M. DAURENHAUER AND R. DAUENHAUER 1 77
It is not told how long they camped with the alien

people. All through their stay, of course, they went on

exchanging things. Everything the travelers had went

as gifts in return for the many things the alien people

gave them. It was at that time that walrus tusk ivory was given to the Tlingit, which, up to that time, like

the iron, was unknown to them.

The people the travelers met in that camp pointed

to still other people, (probably Eskimo - NMD) living

further to the west, and told them that this was the meeting and trading point.* Maybe it was at that time

the Tlingit came to know of copper, but we don't know. It was from that region, in later years, that we

acquired copper.

Returning to Klukwan

It was autumn, when the cottonwood trees had turned

yellow, when a warning cry of the return approach of

the Chaan Yuka travelers was heard in Klukwan. Their canoes drifted in front of the town. When the canoes came ashore there, only a very few of those men

came home. The missing had fallen along the way.

To some person a son, to another a husband, or per- haps a father, too, was missing. That was a moment

of sorrow. From the different parts of the village, only

cries of grief were heard.

In his canoe stood Eagle Head. Never before in his manhood did his voice tremble. Maybe sorrow entered

his strong heart from above, when he called out those names, one by one, of the brave men who fell along

the way. From the beginning it was this way. Only

through sacrifice does man acquire something of value.

It was at the cost of brave lives that we now have in our hands those objects that constitute our pride.

Forging of the Dagger from tine Iron; Ceremonial

Debut ofthe Dagger; Oratory; Naming and Passing ofthe Dagger

It is not known how long after that they had this

piece of iron. Until Kaa.ushti, a war leader of the Kaagwaantaan rose in his maternal uncle's stead, it was

1 78

never brought into view. During his possession it was

first formed like a war knife. When first completed, it was not as you see it now. Only after we came to have grindstones was its rough surface made smooth.

The ivory head, however, was never changed. It's just

the way it was first made.

It was during a Kaagwaantaan encounter with

T'ikanaa, a Tlingit division occupying the southwest

coast of Prince of Wales Island, that the knife was finished The man of long ago always did a thing like this

at the right time. Thus it was in wartime this knife was

awarded. One day a messenger went from house to

house, announcing "Kaa.ushti is calling all his clansmen

to the Finned House." When all were seated in his clan house, that great

warrior stood before the people. "You men of Nees.adi,

Shangukeidi, and Kaagwaantaan, I desire your support.

Without you, what can I accomplish? At this moment I

call on you to confirm the desires of those men in whose place I stand before you. From the moment it was told to me, not once did the deed performed in

confirmation of the noblest claim by those men who

gave their lives in the Chaan Yuka journey ever leave my mind. My heart feels good that it has fallen to me

to bring out the object of concern on the minds of

those men whom I have succeeded." When their minds were set at ease. Eagle Head stood up and spoke,

"Only our ghosts have returned to you, you children of

Shangukeidi." From that time on, people never forgot

his remark.

At the end of his speech, that great warrior drew

forth from its sheath this knife, called "Denizen of Unseen World."'° It was Kaa.ushti who pronounced the name. With outstretched hand he lifted it and called

him, saying, "Eagle Head, take it. In your hands shall

rest the memories of those brave men." Eagle Head came forward from the group. He was all bent over,

his eyesight, too, was very short; old age had over- come him. "Kaagwaantaan! I can only offer acceptance

in this old age. Only in my dream will it be my post. If

only this moment had come while I was young! I take

PARTICIPANTS/ LOUIS SHOTRIDCE
this knife only to pass it through these old hands, I

think, to hands of greater power." In this way the knife

passed to the Shangukeidi.

Thus it was the remark made by the courageous

adventurer that inspired the artist who made an image

of the name" as the pommel of the war knife, and as

nearly as the Tlingit idea can be interpreted in English,

the name of the knife is The Ghost of Courageous Adventurer.

Conclusion

We hope that this newly edited translation is faithful to

Shotridge's intention to show the greatness of Tlingit,

and will in fact help convey it by removing his meaningful work of almost 80 years ago from relative obscurity and placing it in the linguistic mainstream for a new generation of readers. The example of his style shows us how language

changes. The example of his life's work shows us how

attitudes can change as well. Milburn summarizes, "To

Shotridge and others of his era, preservation and representation were key factors in seeking institutional

sanctuary for objects, while today, control over representation and possession are the issues that dominate

Native American peoples' concerns. ...What emerges

from this discussion is a realization of the historically

contingent and politically charged nature of possession and interpretation and its long and complex history among the Northwest Coast peoples" (Milburn

1997:347).

We are all part of that history, and as we judge

those who have gone before us, so will we be judged

by those who will come after us. We are dealing with

the same issues as Louis Shotridge, but almost a century later. His concern was recording the greatness of

the Tlingit clans through their visual art documented in

the fullest context possible. Our concerns are more for

recording the Tlingit language and the classics of Tlingit

oral literature composed and published orally in that

literature. It is perhaps indicative that we focus on

Shotridge's writing here, as an example of his success.

We believe that Milburn is correct in her conclusion

that Northwest Coast art has always been

contextualized politically, and that the context changes

from generation to generation. Back in Shotridge's time

("Then"), it was politically correct to assimilate to Western culture, and to remove traditional art from the community. Now it is seemingly "politically correct" to de- mand that art back, with the demands often couched

in confrontational terms. Then, the Tlingit language was

not in danger; now it is, with fewer than 600 speakers

remaining today, most of whom are above the age of

fifty, it is similarly politically correct these days to de- mand "the language" back, as if it were an object kept

in a vault or in a display case, rather than a living process and relationship. Languages are not like objects

of art, and the dynamics of loss and restoration are far more complex.

We would like to conclude with two quotations

from the letters of Louis Shotridge, in some small way

to link our work in general and this paper in particular

to his legacy. In 1 923, Shotridge wrote, "It is now clear

that unless someone goes to work to record these

old things as evidence, the noble idea of our forefathers shall be entirely lost" (Louis Shotridge to George

Gordon, January 27, 1 923; Milburn 1 997:345). We subscribe to this, even today, and especially today. In this

spirit, we also edit Shotridge's composition of 1 920,

which has now joined its place among the "old things."

In 1 932, in his farewell words to the University of Pennsylvania Museum, Shotridge wrote, "I hope that in the

future the old Tlingit objects will always have a fair chance in representing their former masters" (Louis

Shotridge to Horace Jayne, January 18, 1932; Milburn

1 997:346). We hope that our small editorial effort will

help to keep this fair chance going.

Acknowledgments

We express our debt to Maureen Milburn, who has

been researching and writing about Louis Shotridge

for over 1 5 years (Milburn 1 986, 1 994, 1 997). We have

relied heavily on her unpublished Ph.D. dissertation

N. M. DAURENHAUER AND R. DAUENHAUER 1 79
(Milburn 1997) for historical and archival information on Shotridge. This is the most definitive study on this

issue, and it is indispensable for anyone interested in

Shotridge's life and work. We also thank Judith Berman

for her comments and support, and the staff of the

University of Pennsylvania Museum in Philadelphia for

their assistance in securing illustrations.

Notes

1. What some older travel accounts call the

Alsek River is now called the Tatshenshini River. Sometime since the turn of the twentieth century,

the major river names used in the early travel ac- counts have all "rotated" one position counter-clockwise to the northwest on modern maps. The name

"Alsek" no longer refers to the Tatshenshini, but now

refers to both to the Upper Alsek River, which re- quires a helicopter portage to navigate, and to the

Lower Alsek River which flows into the Pacific at Dry Bay. The Shotridge reference to Alsek is now

called the Tatshenshini, which flows into the Alsek

and continues to the coast as the Lower Alsek River. What was formerly called the Tatshenshini is now

called the Blanchard River, and is a tributary of the Tatshenshini River joining it shortly above the usual

put-in spot for rafters at Dalton Post, Shawshe in Southern Tutchone. One possible route for the journey Shotridge is describing was for the group to follow the drainage of what is now called the

O'Connor River and to cross the Tatshen-shini River

below the confluence. On the famous Kohklux map

drawn in 1852 (Davidson 1901:76; de Laguna

1972:88; Kohklux 1995:15) there is a dotted line labeled "reported trail" connecting the headwaters

of the Tklaheenae (TIeheeni) River and "Sticks Vil- lage," an Athapaskan village on the east bank of

the All-Segh (Alsek = Tatshenshini) River, north of

the confluence of the O'Connor River. The travelers head down river on foot. There are several points in this section of the river where they could have

crossed to the west bank and to the ice fields. They

probably went westward on the ice from this section of the river and not after the confluence with

the Alsek, which would be more than a two-day

hike. The trekkers presumably crossed the Alsek

River over an ice bridge. Glaciers and ice fields covered rivers in places, and there are songs and

1 80

stories in Tlingit oral tradition about people coming

down rivers under the ice. Alternatively, their route could have been over what is the Novatak glacier on modern maps, below the confluence of the Alsek

and Tatshenshini Rivers. This is now the inland side

of the Alaskan Glacier Bay National Park, and a re- gion of dramatic ice movement. All of these glaciers are part of the same larger ice field, and however the hikers ascended, they eventually used Mt. Ruhamah as a bearing. This mountain is also on the

Kohklux map and modern maps. It is near Russell

Fjord, an area of spectacular glacial advance in re- cent years.

2. Other travel. Shotridge noted: "It is evident

it was this bit of vague information, which occasionally, had been heard in Chilkat as passed on

from no known authority, that convinced these men

to be all the more determined in their purpose to penetrate into the unknown country" (Shotridge

1 920:1 7). By the time of Russian contact in the late

1 700s, there was established travel between Chilkat

and Yakutat. Traveling in 1 788, Izmailov and

Bocharov noted that they met people in Yakutat

who were from Chilkat (Shelikov 1 981 :94); but it is unclear if they traveled between Chilkat and Yakutat

by land or sea. River travel between Dalton Post and Dry Bay was well established (de Laguna

1972:85-90). The present story treats the legendary time of first exploration of the route, but sug- gests that even these early travelers suspected they were not the first to use the route.

3. Light. It is now approaching midsummer,

and the trekkers are facing the land of the midnight

sun; the sun is gradually moving to the north, where

the sky will appear red all night, and night is literally

in the south, behind them.

4. Malaspina Glacier, of today's map. The original is ambiguous here: literally "at this moment." We

take the reference as not to the men at this mo- ment in the story, but to Shotridge's audience of

readers in the present time frame. Possibly he meant

both. Who among us is to say that he or she wouldn't

weaken at the thought of continuing when faced

with the awesome sight of the Malaspina Glacier. This glacier is larger than the entire state of Rhode

Island. There are historical accounts from the Russian period by an officer named Tarkhanov who

accompanied the Yakutat Tlingit over that glacier to the Copper River.

PARTICIPANTS/ LOUIS SHOTRIDGE
5. Green Stone (probably jade). The pre-contact adze or axe was made of stone. According

to Tlingit traditional accounts (including this story)

the first metal was found in driftwood from Euro- pean ships. After contact, steel axes replaced

stone, and the technology of Northwest coast wood carving was revolutionized. The Tlingit obtained native copper from the interior, notably

from the Copper River, and indigenous techniques

evolved for working it.

6. Athapaskan Indians. The Tlingit term is Cunanaa, meaning "alien" or "other tribe." The origi- nal is: "Cunanah" [alien tribe] man said. In the next paragraph, the original is: "Tlingit [human] we are,

it is thy presence we seek." As with many other

ethnonyms around the world, the Tlingit word for themselves is Lingi't, meaning "human."

7. "Happy Athapaskans". Shotridge seems to be indulging in some romantic stereotyping here

about the idyllic life of primitive people in contrast to the warlike tendencies of the sophisticated people of the coast.

8. The reference here is most probably to the Chugach or Pacific Eskimo, also called Alutiiq or Sugpiaq. This passage is ambiguous and we

are guessing and paraphrasing that the aliens are not telling the Tlingit of yet another separate place

where they can meet and trade with the Eskimo,

but rather that this is the same trading spot where

the Tlingit found the Athapaskan. Shotridge's

original is, "The people found in that camp

pointed to still other people [probably Eskimo]

living farther on [westward], and meeting point

it was where they were found" (Shotridge

1920:25 —brackets are Shotridge's). The "aliens" were probably either Eyak or Ahtna. Presumably,

this is their trading spot. The reference to brush

houses indicates a temporary camp rather than

a permanent village.

9. Precise clan identification of the T'ikanaa

is unclear. The term is unique here, and means

"the tribe on the outer or seaward side of the

island," from t'ika (outer, seaward) and naa (tribe). The Nees.adi, Shangukeidf, and Kaagwaantaan

are clans of the Eagle moiety. The host,

Kaa.ushti, makes a speech alluding to the departed leaders of his clan. At the end of the

passage. Eagle Head responds and addresses

"Children of Shangukeidf." This term is normally

used when a person of one moiety is addressing

people of the opposite moiety whose fathers are of the speaker's clan. Thus, this phrase makes

sense only if members of the Raven moiety were

present as witnesses to the passing of the knife

by Kaa.ushti of the Kaagwaantaan to the Shangukeidf. The Finned House is also the house group

of Louis Shotridge, so listeners and readers know

that his clan and house passed the dagger on to the Shangukeidf. It is important to note here that the story does not end with adventure and the

return of the explorers, but with the creation, his- tory, and social contextualization of the art object that alludes to that adventure. This part of

the narrative structure is very important in Tlingit

oral tradition and to Shotridge's efforts at contextualization.

10. "The Denizen of Unseen World" is pre- sumably a spirit or a ghost, an inhabitant of the

spirit world. We have not heard the orginial name

of the dagger in Tlingit, but Shotridge calls it "Deni- zen of Unseen World" or "as near as Tlingit idea can be interpreted in English, the "Ghost of Courageous Adventurer" (Shotridge 1920:21) Passing the knife to Eagle Head, a participant of the

original journey, also identifies it with him and

his spirit.

1 1 . We added the word "image" to

Shotridge's translation—cf. his original text, "artist who fashioned the name of the war knife on

the Pommel" (Shotridge 1920:26). We take this not as written inscription, but use of the artistic image and design of the death's head —the spirit or ghost. The story illustrates how an art object

becomes at.oow, an object purchased with the

lives of ancestors, in this case the courageous ad- venturers who died on the expedition. The object is made, brought out ceremonially, and passed on to new stewards. Along with the memories

and spirits of the original men who lost their lives and all the previous stewards of the object, Eagle

Head, who survived the journey but who will die

and join the spirit world, becomes included among

those whose spirits are remembered by the object, and who are typically recalled in ceremonial

oratory, for examples of such traditional oratories connecting and contextualizing individuals

and the art objects (see Dauenhauer and Dauenhauer

1990:229-323).

N. M. DAURENHAUER AND R. DAUENHAUER
References

Boas, Franz

1907 Notes on the Blanket Designs, to Emmons

1907:351-400. Reprinted in: Jonaitis 1995:188-

247.

1917 Grammatical Notes on the Language of the Tlingit Indians. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum. Carpenter, Edmund

1975 Collecting Northwest Coast Art. In Ameri- can Indian Art of the Northwest Coast: A Dialog on Craftmanship and Aesthetics. Bill Holm and Bill Reid, eds. Pp. 9-27. Seattle: University of Washington Press. Cole, Douglas

1985 Captured Heritage: the Scramble for

Northwest Coast Artifacts. Seattle: University of

Washington Press. Dauenhauer, Nora Marks

1986 Context and Display in Northwest Coast

Art. Voices of First America: Text and Contest

in the New World. Special Issue of New Scholar

10:419-32.

1995 Tlingit At. oow: Tradition and Concepts. In The Spirit Within: Northwest Coast Native Art from

the John H. Hauberg Collection. Abbott, Brown,

Price, and Thurman, eds. Seattle: Seattle Art Museum.

Dauenhauer, Nora Marks, and Richard

Dauenhauer

1 987 Haa Shukd, our Ancestors: Tlingit oral Narratives. Seattle: University of Washington Press.

1 990 Haa Tuwundagu Yis, for Healing our Spirit:

Tlingit Oratory. Seattle: University of Washington

Press.

1 994 Haa Kusteeyf, Our Culture: Tlingit Life Stories. Seattle: University of Washington Press. Davidson, George

1901 Explanation of an Indian Map of the Rivers,

Lakes, Trails and Mountains from the Chilkaht to the Yukon drawn by the Chilkaht Chief, Kohklux, in 1 869.

Mazama 2{2):7S-82.

De Laguna, Frederica

1 972 Under Mount Saint Elias. The History and Cul- ture of the Yakutat Tlingit. Smithsonian Contributions

to Anthropology, vol. 7, pts.1-3. Washington, DC:

Smithsonian Institution Press. Emmons, George T.

1 907 The Chilkat Blanket. Memoirs of the Ameri- can Museum of Natural History, vol. 3, pt. 4, pp. 329-350.

Halpin, Marjorle Myers

1 994 A Critique of the Boasian Paradigm for North- west Coast Art. Culture XIV (1 ):5-l 6.

Hymes, Dell

1 985 Language, Memory, and Selective Performance:

Cultee's Kathlamet Sun's Myth as Twice-Told to Boas. Journal of American Folklore 98(390):391-

434.

Jonaitis, Aldona, ed.

1995 A Wealth ofThought. Franz Boas on Native Ameri- can Art. Seattle and London: University of Washington Press. Vancouver and Toronto: Couglas and

Mclntyre.

Kohklux Map

1 995 The Kohklux Map. Whitehorse: Yukon Historical and Museums Association.

Mason, J. Alden

1 960 Louis Shotridge. Expedition 2:1 0-1 6. Maud, Ralph

1 993 The Porcupine Hunter and other Stories. The

Original Tsimshian Texts of Henry Tate. Vancouver: Talonbooks.

n.d. "The War ofthe Ghosts:" Two Tellings by Charles

Cultee to Franz Boas, 1891 and 1894. Manuscript

in a yet-untiteld and unpublished collection of

papers on Northwest Coast literature edited by

Richard and Nora Dauenhauer.

Milburn, Maureen

1 986 Louis Shotridge and the Objects of Everlast- ing Esteem. In Raven's Journey. Susan Kaplan and

Kristin Barsness, eds. Pp. 54-90. Philadelphia: Uni- versity of Pennsylvania Press. 1994 Weaving the 'Tina' Blanket: the Journey of

Florence and Louis Shotridge. In Haa Kusteeyf, Our

Culture: Tlingit Life Stories. Nora Marks Dauenhauer

and Richard Dauenhauer. Pp. 549-64. Seattle: University of Washington Press.

1 997 Politics of Possession: Louis Shotridge and the

Tlingit Collections of the University Museum. Unpublished Ph.D. Thesis in Anthropology. University of

British Columbia, Vancouver, B. C. The edition cited

in this paper is Draft 4, February 1 6, 1 997.

Nida, Eugene A.

1 964 Toward a Science of Translating. Leiden: E. J.

Brill. Price, Sally

1 989 Primitive Art in Civilized Places. Chicago: The

University if Chicago Press. Rohner, Ronald P., ed.

1 969 The Ethnography of Franz Boas. Letters and

Diaries ofFranz Boas written on the Northwest Coast from 1886 to 1931. Chicago: University of Chi- cago Press. Shelikov, Georgii

1981 [1791] A Voyage to America 17683-1786.

Translated by M. Ramsey. Ed. by Richard Pierce. Kingston, Ontario: The Limestone Press.

1 82 PARTICIPANTS/ LOUIS SHOTRIDGE
Shotridge, Florence

191 3 The Life of a Chilkat Indian Girl. The Museum

Journal. University of Pennsylvania Museum 4:101-3. Shotridge, Louis

1 920 Ghost of Courageous Adventurer. The Museum

Journal. Universityof Pennsylvania Museum 1 1(1):1 1-

26.

Swanton, John R. 1908 Social Conditions, Beliefs, and Linguistic

Relationship of theTlingit Indians. Twenty-Sixth Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology

forthe Years 1904-1905, pp. 391-512. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.

N. M. DAURENHAUER AND R. DAUENHAUER

^iiinguai/'£)icuiturai Interpreters and

Informants of the Jesup Expedition ra

SERGEI KAN

Much of the writing on the Jesup North Pacific Expedition ONPE) (e.g., Freed et. al. 1 988, 1 997;Jonaitis 1 988;

Krupnikand Fitzhugh 2001) as well as a number of the

essays in this volume which celebrates the expedition's

centennial, inevitably focus on its organizers and sponsors and, especially, on its field ethnographers. After

all, they are the ones who collected the data sought

by Boas and whose names appear in the JNPE publications. Our research on the lives and scholarly contributions of these ethnographers is obviously made easier by the availability of substantial biographical materials, published and archival (see Al'kor 1935; Codere

1959; Cole 1999; Rohner 1969; Kan 1992, 2000,

2001a; Krupnik 1996; Shavrov 1935; Stocking 1974,

1996; Vakhtin 2001; Vdovin 1991; Wickwire 1993).

However, as the present paper as well as several

other essays in this volume demonstrate, we could

achieve a much better understanding of the

expedition's contribution to circumpolar ethnology by

paying serious attention to these ethnographers' local

informants, interpreters, research assistants, and collaborators (see chapters by Dauenhauer and Dauenhauer, and by Wickwire, this volume).

At the turn of the twentieth century, when the JNPE

volumes were being put together, most anthropologists did not bother to include much information on

their local interpreters and Native as well as non-Native consultants, considering it to be irrelevant to scholarship. In the context of the JNPE, the only exceptions

to this rule were, of course, James Teit (see Wickwire,

this volume) and Boas' long-term collaborator and colleague, the great Kwakwaka'wakw ethnographer,

George Hunt (Cannizzo 1983; Jacknis 1991; Berman

1996, 2001; Webster this volume), whose name appears next to Boas' as the co-author of the KwakiutI

Texts (Boas and Hunt 1905, 1906). While Hunt's role

as theJNPE's key Native participant is unique, a number of other Native American and "mixed-blood" (Creole, Metis) interpreters, amateur ethnographers, and in- formants played a major role in collecting and making

sense of this and related expeditions' voluminous data

(see Wickwire 1 993; cf. Milburn 1 986; Dauenhauer and

Dauenhauer 1 994, this volume).'

In recent decades many practicing cultural anthropologists as well as historians of anthropology have

become interested in the interaction and the relationship between the ethnographer and his or her infor- mant as the context within which "ethnographic data"

is not only collected but, to some extent, constructed

(see Buckley 1 989; Kan 200 1 b). A number of scholars have been referring to this interaction as a "dialogue"

(Dwyer 1977; Tedlock 1979). As Clifford and Marcus

(1986:15) have pointed out, "In this view, 'culture' is always relational, an inscription of communicative processes that exist, historically, tefween subjects in relations of power."

Like many other ethnographers of theirtime,JNPE

expedition fieldworkers, with the exception of Bogoras

among the Chukchi (Bogoras 1904-9); Jochelson

among the Sakha (Yakut) (but not among the Koryak,

1 85
cf. Jochelson 1 908, 1 926); Hunt (Boas and Hunt 1 905,

1 906) and Teit (1 900), were not fluent in the local Native languages. Therefore, they had to rely on bilingual

interpreters and informants who could speak at least some English or Russian.-^ Such interpreters or cultural

brokers, as Karttunen (1994:xi) has suggested, "functioned as conduits through which information flowed

between worlds in collision, translating more than just

words and bringing comprehensibility to otherwise

meaningless static".

I believe that by examining the biographies and

the ethnic/cultural background of these local participants in JNPE we would not only gain a much deeper

and more nuanced understanding of the nature and

the quality of the ethnography bequeathed to us by

Boas and his colleagues but would also assign these

unnamed (or barely mentioned) men and women to

their proper place in the JNPE's annals.^

Jesup Expedition Ethnographers

Even a cursory examination of the ethnographic monographs included in the JNPE series reveals how uneven

theirquality really was. Some, like Bogoras' TheChukchee

(1 904-9) or Teit's The Thompson Indians (1 900), were

true classics of early twentieth century ethnology, covering many of the major aspects of Native material,

social, and spiritual culture. Other, such as Farrand's

collection of Chilcotin myths (Farrand 1 900) or Laufer's

brief ethnography of the Amur River people (Laufer

1 900), were rather disappointing.

The reasons for this disparity are quite obvious. On

the one hand, we are dealing with very experienced

field workers, like Waldemar Bogoras, a Russian eth- nographer who, prior to JNPE, had spent years living

among the Chukchi and spoke their language (Kan

1 992; Krupnik 1 996), or James Teit, a British expatriate

who had settled among the Thompson Indians (Nlaka'- pamux), married a Native woman and became fluent

in NIaka'pamux (Wickwire 1 993, this volume). Both of

these men had already conducted some ethnographic

research before they joined Boas' team.

On the other hand, there were some JNPE team

members who were like Livingston Farrand. He was

not an anthropologist by training, had ever conducted

any fieldwork, nor had even visited American Indians

prior to his trip to the Northwest Coast in 1897. To

make matters worse, he seemed to have trouble establishing good rapport with the "Indians." Here, for example, is what he said about his research among

the Chilcotin: "The conditions were not particularly favorable for the work, for the Indians were by no means

cordial at the outset, and good interpreters were not

to be found. That great resource of ethnological work

in the Northwest, the Chinook jargon, was also not

available in this tribe" (1 900:3-4)." Farrand did not fare much better among the Quinault whom he visited during the summer, when most people had already left

for their salmon fishing camps. In addition, many of

those remaining behind had converted to Shakerism a few years prior to his visit and considered the old religious traditions to be evil and not worth discussing.

Luckily, Farrand located an elderly man who had refused to become a Shaker and was willing to talk about the old culture. This man. Bob Pope, who was

dying of TB, became Farrand's main informant (Farrand

and Kahnweiler 1 902:79; Jonatis 1988:191).

I would argue that if we could obtain biographical

information on this Quinault man, on Teit's Shuswap

informant Sixwilexken, orSwanton's Haida informants

and interpreters, such as Henry Edenshaw (Blackman

1 982), Mary Ridley, Walter McGregor and "Abraham,"^

the ethnographic texts produced by these JNPE participants might tell us a lot more than they currently

do.*' Similarly our understanding and appreciation of

Bogoras' ethnography of the Chukchi and Jochelson's monograph on the Koryak—JNPE's classic publications—could be enhanced if researchers ever manage

to figure out who their local informants and interpreters were.' To illustrate this argument 1 devote the rest of

this paper to the discussion of a relatively short but

rich account of certain key aspects of the nineteenth

1 86 PARTICIPANTS/ BILINGUAL INFORMANTS
century Tlingit culture given in the 1 880s to George

T. Emmons, the great "amateur" ethnographer of the

Tlingit, by his bilingual RussianATIingit informant, Ivan Zhukov.

George T. Emmons, Sergei I. Kostromitinov,

and Ivan Zhukov

Although George T. Emmons (1 852-1 945), one of the

characters in my story, was not a participant in the

JNPE, his outstanding and voluminous ethnography of

the Tlingit, both published and unpublished (see de

Laguna 1991; Emmons 1991)** clearly complemented

the new information being collected by Boas and his

associates. In fact, because of Boas' familiarity with

Emmons' research in southeastern Alaska, this region was not the focus of the expedition's activities (Boas

1903:77). This would also explain why Swanton's

monumental ethnography of the Haida (Swanton 1 905)

did appear as part of the JNPE publication series

while his two important works on the Tlingit did not (Swanton 1908, 1909).

Like Bogoras and Teit, Emmons spent years interacting with the Native people, learning their language

and studying their ways. Having come to southeastern Alaska in the early 1 880s to serve on a Navy ship

that policed the area, he eventually became the major

authority on Tlingit culture and the main collector of

Tlingit artifacts (de Laguna 1991; Low 1991). He de- veloped good rapport with a number of Tlingit families, including that of Shaaduxicht (ca. 1819-89), the head of the Finned House of the Kaagwaantaan clan and a powerful Chilkat leader; he was also the maternal grandfather of Louis Shotridge (Dauenhauer and

Dauenhauer 1 994:549-5 1

, this volume). The latter may

have been the one to adopt the Navy officer into his

lineage and clan. As Emmons himself put it, "I have

visited all of their villages. ... I have made a study of

their history and I have lived with them on the most

intimate terms, until they have given me one of the

their family names and look upon me as one of themselves" (de Laguna 1 991 :xvii).''

Emmons' most important work on the Tlingit, a monograph entitled The Tlingit Indians, which he began

working on in the late 1880s, was never completed

and languished in the AMNH archives until it was finally published in 1991, after having been painstakingly edited by Frederica de Laguna.'" While putting

together this manuscript, Emmons not only relied on

his own observations and interviews but used a unique

ethnographic account, entitled A Glance at the First Customs of the Tlingit or Kolosh as the Russians Found

Them at Sitka.^ ' According to Emmons' notes, this text was written in Tlingit by "Shukoff," a half Russian and

half Tlingit, and given to a Russian interpreter who translated it into English in 1 887 or 1 888.'^ The English version of the sketch is about twenty

typewritten pages long and contains a variety of

interesting data, from myths of the Raven cycle to

descriptions of memorial ceremonies (potlatches) and

shamanism. By the time this text was written and

translated only two other detailed ethnographies

of the Tlingit had appeared in print. The first one was

Ivan Veniamlnov's pioneering account, based on his

sojourn as a Russian Orthodox missionary in Sitka in

the late 1830s and published in Russia in 1840

(Veniaminov 1984). The second was Aurel Krause's monograph based on his trip to southeastern Alaska

in 1 881-2 and published in Germany in 1 885 (Krause

1 956). The latter account relied heavily on the former,

particularly when it came to mythology and spiritual

culture. Compared to those two works, A Glance at

the First Customs of the Tlingit was less detailed and was not written as a scholarly work, but as a rendition

of an oral presentation. However, it did contain some

unique pieces of information that were more likely to have come from a speaker of Tlingit and a partial insider, like "Shukoff," than from outsiders, like Veniaminov

and Krause.

in order to better evaluate this text, we must establish the identity of "Shukoff' and that of his translator. The former task is fairly easy, since Emmons tells

us that the man was educated by the Russian Church

S. KAN 1 87
in Sitka and in the early 1 880s was employed by the

U.S. Naval Commander and later by the civil authorities

as a native policeman in Sitka. He died in the mid1880s at the age of sixty.

The only individual who fit this profile was Ivan Zhukov, who was born in about 1825 at a RussianAmerican Company (RAC) post on the Nushagak River

to a Tlingit mother and a Russian father, a Baranov-era pmmyshlennik ico\on\a\ hunter and trader).'^ As a young man in 1 841 , Zhukov served as an apprentice (iunga) on the Company ships. He later studied at the NovoArkhangelsk (Sitka) seminary to become a priest for

the Tlingit but was expelled for some "disgusting

deed." However, due to a significant increase in the

number of Tlingit converts in Sitka, the Church decided to appoint him as its interpreter in 1844. A

letter to the local RAC office by the local Orthodox

priest, Fr. Misail, in which this reassignment of a young Tlingit Creole''' was requested, stated that Zhukov could also work as a teacher, instructing

Tlingit children in the Russian language and teaching the Tlingit language to the non-Tlingit seminarians. The Company agreed to honor the Consistory's

request, bringing Zhukov back to Novo-Arkhangelsk

and appointing him the official tolmach (interpreter)

of the Alaska Consistory, with a salary of fifteen

rubles a month, plus five rubles a month for teaching the "Kolosh" (Tlingit) language.

Zhukov must have been a gifted interpreter and

teacher: in 1 845 Bishop Innokentii (Ivan Veniaminov)

instructed the Consistory to award him 85 rubles

for his diligent two years of service as a church interpreter, and especially for his work on translating

the Gospel into Tlingit. In 1849-50 he received a

large monetary award for translating several new

chapters of the New Testament as well as other

religious texts into his mother's native tongue. However, a letter from a member of the Consistory to

the RAC Governor, Michail Teben'kov, dated August

1 850, pointed out that, while Zhukov had been an

excellent interpreter and did not drink.

His behavior in other respects has become

so unclean in the last few years, that only a

dire need forced us [the Consistory] to continue employing him. However, lately, despite all of our measures aimed at making

him improve his conduct, it has become even

worse, thus damaging the cause of Christianizing the Kolosh. Consequently he must be

removed from the Church's service . . . and

sent away from Novo-Arkhangelsk to some

other Company post; in the meantime, he

should at least be sent away from the town,

so that he would no longer be in contact with the Kolosh.

One wonders whether Zhukov had been involved

in some sexual misconduct (as he seems to have been

in the post- 1867 era) or whether he was obtaining

illicit benefits from his special position as a powerful

intermediary between the Church and the local Tlingit

community with which he was still connected through

his maternal kin. In any event, he appeared to have

been a real survivor. While transferred to Kodiak by

Teben'kov in 1 850, he must have been needed by the Novo-Arkhangelsk parish and was brought back there by Voevodskii, since he continued to work for the

Consistory until 1 852-3 when he was finally fired from

his job at the Seminary and as the Church's main interpreter, having been given his final monetary reward for good work.

In the mid-1 860s, Zhukov reappeared in the church

records as the RAC interpreter assigned to the NovoArkhangelsk port, whom the current missionaries relied on for information about the Tlingit population of

Sitka and whom they wished to rehire as a church

interpreter. In 1 866, having been frustrated by his own

lack of command of the Tlingit language and having

examined Tlingit translations available in NovoArkhangelsk and found them inadequate, Fr. Nikolai

Kovrigin, assigned to serve as a missionary to the

"Kolosh," decided to ask Zhukov if he had done more

and better translations and to give him Tlingit lessons

(ARCA, D 316). Zhukov replied that he had no additional translations in his possession and that he would

not mind teaching Kovrigin some Tlingit for a nominal

fee. When the priest asked him to take part in his visits

1 88 PARTICIPANTS/ BILINGUAL INFORMANTS
to Tlingit homes, the interpreter replied that he was

too busy working in the port but, if offered a salary, he

would be willing to help the priest not only to speak

to the Natives but to work on translating Orthodox

prayers.'^ Despite Zhukov's bad reputation among the

local clergy, Kovrigin, desperate to have a Tlingit-speaking assistant, hired him to help compile a census of

Sitka's Native population. Before leaving NovoArkhangelsk, Fr. Nikolai recommended that the Church

hired a full time Tlingit interpreter, "even a man like

Zhukov." However, because of Zhukov's dubious reputation, the local bishop vigorously objected to this

proposal.

We know almost nothing about Zhukov's mother

and her family, except that she must have been a highranking woman, since missionary records mention her

sister being married to one of the Sitka lineage heads

(ARCA, D 316). Zhukov must have learned to speak

fluent Tlingit from his mother and other Tlingit relatives and it is very likely that he maintained close ties with

them, listening to their stories and taking part in their ceremonies or at least observing them, since he seemed

to know a great deal about them (see below). After

all, their houses were just outside the walls of NovoArkhangelsk where he lived during the 1840s to

the 1 860s. At the same time, the tone of his ethnographic sketch suggests that he identified more with

the Russians.'^

When Alaska was sold by Russia to the United

States in 1 867, Zhukov, like many other Creoles, did

not take advantage of an opportunity to return to his

father's country. But neither did he try to obtain American citizenship.''' However, like other "Russians" who

remained in Sitka after its purchase by the U.S., he must

have had a difficult time trying to make ends meet,

since his name appeared on an 1 874 list of 1 23 local

Russian and Creole inhabitants requesting financial assistance from the Russian government to cover the

cost of moving to Russia."^ This request was not

granted and Zhukov continued to reside in Sitka. Al- though, like most other local Russians and Creoles, he

remained listed in the parish records, he must not have

been devout, since the record-keepers referred to him

as a "doubtful" (somnitel'nyi) Christian (ARCA, D 405; D

414).

A real survivor, Ivan Zhukov continuedto use his

linguistic skills as well as his ability to act as an inter- mediary between his mother's people and the newcomers. Thus we know that the local American officials relied on him to spy on the restless members of

the Kiks.adi clan during the so-called 1 879 "Tlingit unrest" (ARCA, D 434; The Alaskan 2/6/1886, p. 3; Kan

1 999: 1 98-20 1 , n.d.). Soon thereafter, as I have already

mentioned, he was hired by the U.S. Naval commander,

in charge of maintaining law and order in Alaska, to

serve as an interpreter and an Indian policeman.

Zhukov served in that capacity until his death (caused

by syphilis and a wound which led to gangrene) on

February 2, 1886.^«

Before discussing Zhukov's ethnography, a word

must be said about his sketch's translator, referred to by Emmons only as "George." I believe that he was

none other than Sitka's most prominent Russian resident, Sergei lonavich Kostromitinov, known to the Americans as George Kostrometinoff. A son of a RAG

employee and a Creole (Russian-Aleut) woman, he was

born in Sitka in 1854 and educated at the local Russian colonial and later American schools.'^' Having

grown up in Sitka, Kostromitinov must have had plenty

of opportunities to interact with the local Tlingit. It was also rumored that he had a Tlingit mistress (Stepan

Ushin's Diary, ARCA D 434)." From these contacts, he

must have learned to speak fluent Tlingit. Using that knowledge as well as his fluency in Russian and English," Kostromitinov served for twenty years as an

official interpreter for court and civil officials in Sitka and traveled throughout the region in that capacity.'^'' As a Deputy U.S. Marshal, he frequently took Native

and non-Native prisoners south to Seattle and Portland. A respectable and fairly well-to-do Sitka citizen,

he belonged to the town's upper crust and was the

darling of the Russian clergy and American officials

S. KAN 1 89
alike, who called upon him for

information on Sitka's pre- 1 867

history and Tlingit culture. Sergei

lonavich often wrote articles on

these subjects for the Sitka

newspaper and was among the

founders of the Alaska Society

of Natural History and Ethnology

established in Sitka in 1887. In 1893 he was appointed Lieutenant Colonel of the organized

militia of the District of Alaska

and he continued to be referred

to as the "colonel" for the rest

of his life. A staunch Russian

patriot, he also served as the warden (starosta) of Sitka's St.

Michael's Russian Orthodox cathedral from 1 886 until the early

1910s, when he decided to become an Orthodox priest.

Ordained in 1912, he became

one of the Sitka parish's most

popular pastors, well liked by its

Creole and Tlingit parishioners

alike. For his work for the Or- thodox Church, Kostromitinov

received two awards from the

Russian government: a St. Daniel's cross in 1900 (Fig.

52) and a silver goblet in 1 906 (Ziorov 1 893, passim;

The Alaskan 1 /5/1 901 , p.2; 1 2/29/1 906, p.2; Russian

Orthodox American Messenger 1912, vol. 1 6:305-7).

When "Fr. Sergei" died in 191 5, the Church honored

him by burying his body underneath the cathedral floor.

Thus, like Zhukov, Kostromitinov was a bicultural and

multilingual cultural broker who found a new niche for

himself on the new post- 1 867 Alaska frontier.

While it is impossible to establish how much of

Kostromitinov's own knowledge of Tlingit culture is

reflected in his translation of Zhukov's ethnographic

sketch, I suspect that he did modify the text; in fact,

52/Sergei lonavich Kostromitinov, ca. 1 90 1 in Sitka. Photographer, Elbridge W.

Merrill. Alaska State Library, Vinokouroff Collection, PCA 243-1 -27.

there is a parenthetical note by Emmons which says

that "George" had added some information on a "wouldbe shaman."

Zhukov's Ethnography

Zhukov's ethnographic sketch is an interesting document. While its author was a semi-educated amateur,

he was trying to offer Emmons a description of "traditional" Tlingit culture of an earlier era while offering

occasional comments on the changes that had taken

place in it during his lifetime." Thus his brief and rather

naively worded ethnography has a temporal dimension, something lacking in the accounts of indigenous

1 90 PARTICIPANTS/ BILINGUAL INFORMANTS
cultures produced by Boas himself and most of Boasian

ethnographers of the JNPE era. For example, Swanton

(1 908)—whose early works are archetypically Boasian

portrayed the Tlingit culture as a timeless entity. To a

lesser extent, so did Emmons (1 991) in his monumental work, even though the latter does contain a significant number of references to important historical events

involving the Tlingit.

In contrast to Swanton, Zhukov sprinkled his text

with such statements as, "I am writing about ancestors of present race. The present race are far from their

ancestors, although they are trying to follow in steps

of ancestors but not with same force" (p. 2). His rich

account of the killing of slaves at a ritual for dedicating a new lineage-owned house (pp. 4-8) ends with

the following comment, "Now [they] tear blankets [and?

or?] cotton instead of killing slaves" (p. 8).

Zhukov's biculturalism can be felt in the two voices

with which he speaks about his mother's people. On

the one hand, one can hear some nostalgia, or at least

regret, in a passage which tells us that the ancestors

of the present-day Tlingit were healthier and physically stronger, since they did not drink. On the other

hand, as a son of a Russian father who identified himself with the Russians and who spent his entire life working for them and later for the Americans, he gave

his Tlingit contemporaries credit for being "very industrious" and earning money by fishing, hunting, cutting

wood, etc. (ibid).

At the same time, some of Zhukov's observations

are written in a non-judgmental, neutral tone, more

typical for ethnographers than missionaries or govern- ment officials. For example, immediately after describing traditional magical practices and formulae, he states

that the modern-day Natives' use Christian prayer as a way of bringing luck in hunting as well as gambling,

something of which neither Russian nor American clergy

would approve (p. 4). On the whole, Zhukov's account offers a lot more

information on Tlingit religion and mythology (much of which he describes in a section entitled "Superstitions

of [the] Tlingit," thus switching from his more neutral

"ethnographic" voice to that of an outsider and longtime interpreter for the Orthodox Church) than on social organization or material culture. This might be a

reflection of his experience as a missionary interpreter

who had to translate theological concepts from one

language into another. Not surprisingly, Veniaminov's

ethnography has the same quality (Kan 1990, 1999).

Of course, some of the things Zhukov says about Tlingit

mythology (especially the episodes of the Raven myth

cycle), religious beliefs, and ritual practices can also be

found in Veniaminov's and Krause's works as well as in

the subsequent ethnographies by Kamenskii (1905/

1 985), Swanton (1 908, 1 909) and Emmons (1 991 ).

Zhukov's account, nevertheless, is valuable in some

of its minor but unique ethnographic details" as well

as in its use of direct quotations from ceremonial

speeches and magical formulae. Zhukov's ethnographic

sketch is also sprinkled with Tlingit terms, some of which would be familiar to most modern-day speakers of this language as well as to specialists in Tlingit

linguistics and ethnology, while others appear to be

archaic and would require careful scholarly examination (something I am not ready to do at this point).

Thus in his description of the magical observances involved in halibut fishing, Zhukov quotes an actual utterance made by the fisherman addressing the fish,

"Look out, you will tear your mouth [if you struggle].

Your bones were in the fire long ago!" (pp. 3-4). The

last sentence meant that this particular halibut was

a reincarnation of its ancestor whose bones had

been burned in a ritually correct manner (cf. Emmons

1991:145).

Another example of the richness of Zhukov's ac- count is his description of a special ritual involved in

the potlatch host's greeting of his out-of-town guests,

which took place just before they landed in front of

his village. According to the Creole ethnographer,

having been asked by the host where they had come

from, the guests (standing in their canoes) replied,

"We came here by the road ... of the sun." Since

S. KAN
the sun-wise direction was a ritually positive one, tliis

reply meant that, as Zhukov himself explained, "they came with good faith; they came to have a joyous

time" (p. 7). Prior to the guests' landing, the chief host

ordered some slaves to be sacrificed, so as "to kill the

trail" about to be followed by the guests from the

beach to his house (ibid). Although Zhukov does not

explain the meaning of this expression, I have ar- gued that this is another illustration of the central

notion of the entire cycle of Tlingit memorial feasts,

i.e., that the guests, who were members of the moiety

opposite to that of the hosts, served as the link between the latter and their departed matrilineal

kin (see Kan 1989).^8

My final example is from Zhukov's description of a smoking feast, which was a major component of a

series of rituals following a high-ranking aristocrat's

death. According to Zhukov, at the conclusion of smoking and an exchange of speeches between the hosts and the guests, the chief host addressed the spirit of

his deceased predecessor, in whose honor the cer- emony was being given, with the following words,

"Stand on one side and let your fathers go by." As the

author himself explains in parenthesis, this meant that

the spirit of the deceased was present in the house

until his body was cremated (p. 1 7). While other eth- nographers mentioned the existence of such a belief among the Tlingit, Zhukov offers us an actual ritual

utterance confirming it.

Conclusion

Compared to Emmons' monumental ethnography of

the Tlingit, Zhukov's sketch is not long at all. Nonetheless, a careful review of the former demonstrates that Emmons did learn a lot from this Sitka Creole and incorporated bits and pieces from Zhukov's account into

his own text. Hence, A Glance at the First Customs of

the Tlingit or Kolosh as the Russians Found Them at Sitka

not only adds some rather significant details to our knowledge of the nineteenth century Tlingit culture

1 92

(presented from the point of view of a partial insider

fluent in the local Native language) but helps us better understand the material presented in Emmons' own

oeuvre. How much more this classic work could have

told us about the Tlingit people of the pre-JNPE era if we had similar information on Emmons' other Native

sources of data and the specific circumstances of his

fieldwork.'^''

This brief review of Zhukov's ethnography and its

relationship to that of Emmons, Swanton, Veniaminov,

and other fieldworkers who recorded information on

Tlingit culture is an attempt to suggest ways in which we could try to transform the old monographs of the

JNPE-era from monolithic and monological texts to more

polyphonic or dialogical ones. The same can be said

about several other papers appearing in this volume.

In its own unique way, each of them demonstrates

how much work still remains to be done on theJNPE

legacy, despite a century that separates us from it and the frustrating silence of many of its professional ethnographers about their bilingual/bicultural

interpreters, informants, research assistants, and

collaborators.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank all of the organizers of the Jesup

Expedition Centenary Conference, and especially Laurel Kendall and Igor Krupnik, for inviting me to present

a paper at this important scholarly gathering and then

to transform it into the present piece. Krupnik's suggestions and comments on the essay's first draft were

very helpful in my work on its final version. Over the

years, my understanding of George Emmons' contribution to Tlingit ethnography has benefited greatly from

conversations and correspondence with Frederica de

Laguna as well as Richard and Nora Dauenhauer. As

always, a special "thank you" (gunalcheesh) goes to my

Tlingit friends, adopted relatives, and teachers who

shared with me some valuable inside information on

both Emmons and Kostromitinov.

PARTICIPANTS/ BILINGUAL INFORMANTS
Notes

1 . Cf. Anderson and Halpin's discussion (2000)

of the recently published field notes of William

Bynon, a talented ethnographer of mixed

Tsimshian-Welsh descent.

2. This was true of Boas himself whose com- mand of Kwakwaka'wakw was limited and who

relied heavily on English as well as the Chinook

jargon in his research on the Northwest Coast and

the adjacent areas (Berman 1996; Rohner 1969).

3. Thusjudith Berman's (1 996, 2001 ) rethinking of George Hunt's role in Boas' Kwakwaka'wakw

research, including her detailed linguistic analysis

of the Boast/Hunt texts, has given us a very dif- ferent understanding of their nature and quality.

4. I suspect that the reason for the Chilcotin

unfriendliness towards the visiting anthropologist was the mistreatment they had suffered from gold

rush packers and prospectors in the 1 860s, which

eventually precipitated a violent confrontation,

mislabeled in the annals of British Columbia his- tory as the "Chilcotin War" (Lane 1 98 1 :4 1 1 ).

5. More information is currently available on some of Swanton's Tlingit informants and inter- preters during his later fieldwork of 1 904. Thus,

his principal Wrangell informant, Katishan, was a well-known local leader, prominent in his clan (the

Kaasxagweidi) and the Presbyterian Church (see

Swanton 1909:1; Young 1927). Don Cameron,

his main Sitka interpreter and a source of some of

the ethnographic data, was also an active member of the Presbyterian Church. Since some of his descendants still live in Sitka, his biography could

be reconstructed (Kan 1979-97). At the same

time, we know nothing about Dekinaak'w, "an old man of the Box House," the source of many of the

texts recorded by Swanton in Sitka in English and

Tlingit (ibid.).

6. For an interesting and thoughtful discussion of Native American ethnographers and anthropologists' informants outside the JNPE context

see, for example, several essays in Casagrande

(1960), Liberty (1978), and especially the more

recent and more theoretically-sophisticated works

by Buckley (1989) and Brown (1989).

7. Like Bogoras, Jochelson did mention some

of his Native assistants in the introduction to his works. Thus we know that his two main Yukagir

interpreters and informants were Aleksei Dolga- nov and Ivan Spiridonov, while a Russianized

Koryak, Nikolai Vilkhin ("the only tolerably good

interpreter in the Cishiga district") assisted him in recording and translating Koryak myths (jochelson

1908:1 5). 8 Emmons' most important publications on

Tlingit culture include a monograph on basketry

(1 903), the Chilkat blanket (1 907), and the Whale

House of the Chilkat (1916). The only other Native American culture that he studied was that of

the Athapaskan-speaking Tahltan of the British Columbia interior (1 911).

9. Clear evidence of Emmons' being ac- cepted by the Tlingit is the fact that he was in- vited to various feasts and potlatches (e.g.,

Emmons 1991:391). In addition several of my

Tlingit consultants and friends told me that for years Emmons was involved in an intimate rela- tionship with a Tlingit woman (Kan 1 979-1 997).

10. A related manuscript by Emmons, entitled History of Tlingit Tribes and Clans, still remains

unpublished, although material from it has been

incorporated by de Laguna into Emmons' (1991)

monograph and used by Hope (2000) in his on- going research on traditional Tlingit tribes, clans,

and clan houses.

1 1 . This document has been deposited in the

Anthropology Archive of the American Museum

of Natural History (AMNH-DA), together with

Emmons' The Tlingit Indians. 12. While the title page of this sketch lists 1882 as the date of its translation into English, a

parenthetical remark within the text itself indicates that in 1 887 the interpreter himself added some

information to Shukoff s (Zhukov's) account of sha- manism. Hence I cannot agree with de Laguna's

(1 991 :xi) dating of this translation as 1 884.

13. Biographical information on Zhukov

could be found in the Alaska Russian Church Ar- chives (ARCA, D 347; D 434). Some of the material presented in this paper appeared in my earlier monograph on the history of Russian Orthodox

Christianity among the Tlingit (Kan 1999:131-

3,167-8).

14. "Creole" was a standard term used by

the Russian-American Company to refer to the

offspring of a mixed Russian-Native Alaskan

union.

S. KAN
1 5. From Zhukov's other comments, it ap- pears that he was trying to get a higher price for

his services, portraying the study of Tlingit lan- guage as a very difficult task.

1 6. Thus Zhukov never referred to the Tlingit as "my people," calling them "the natives" instead.

1 7. Church records dating back to the early

1 870s list him as a "Creole" rather than an "Ameri- can citizen," a category which included the more

respectable segment of the local "Russian" community whose members did not or claimed not to have any Native Alaskan blood.

18. Fr. Nikolai Mitropol'skii's file (ARCA, B

20).

1 9. Thus, in 1 880 Zhukov traveled on board

of the U.S.S. Jamestown to various coastal villages

in order to interpret for the Navy officers in their deliberations with the Tlingit (Stepan Ushin's Di- ary, ARCA, D 434).

20. Zhukov's Tlingit fellow-policemen carried his coffin to the cemetery and were followed

by uniformed sailors and soldiers. As his body was lowered into the ground, guns were fired (Stepan Ushin's Diary, ARCA D 434).

21. For biographical data on Sergei I. Kostrornitinov, see ARCA (B 14), Kostrometinoff

(1 876-1 908), Pierce (1 990:262-3), and Kan (1 999,

passim).

22. According to Tlingit sources (Kan 1979-

97), a number of his descendants still reside in several Tlingit communities.

23. Kostromitinov might have also had the

command of Aleut. 24. The Russian Church also took advantage

of Kostromitinov's knowledge of Tlingit, assigning him the task of translating Veniaminov's fa- mous sermon. Guide to the Heavenly Kingdom, into that language. The translation was published in Sitka in 1 901

25. It is actually not entirely clear whether

Zhukov wrote his sketch specifically for Emmons.

26. Zhukov's sketch begins with am inter- esting page-long description of the physical characteristics and bodily adornment of the "old-time"

Tlingit men and women (Pp. 1-2).

27. Thus, for example, his description of the

practices involved in the preservation and ceremonial use of enemies' scalps (2) is more detailed

than Emmons' (1 991 :335).

28. Cf. an expression "killing the money," used

to refer to the potlatch hosts' distribution of

money among the guests (Kan 1979-97).

29. To Emmons' credit, he did occasionally

mention the name of a Tlingit person who had

given him a particular piece of information; he also

often indicated whether he had personally at- tended a native ceremony he was describing (see

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(AMNH I 1013)
PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND: AJESUP THEME REVISITED

1"he Jesup Expedition and the jViodemization

of f\jort!i pacific f\jaturai ["jistory

ROBERT S. HOFFMANN

At the turn of the last century, the Jesup North Pacific

Expedition of the American IVIuseum of Natural History

(1 897-1 902) established a new paradigm for the "field

sciences"—those scientific endeavors that explore the

natural world and the role of humans and their cultures

within that world. Disciplines such as geology, geography, botany, zoology, and anthropology were at that

time, and to a significant extent remain, based primarily on data collected directly from the natural world

("the field"), through observation, measurement, and

collection of specimens. While in the Western scientific

tradition such fieldwork had been carried on for at

least four centuries, it was given strong impetus by

the worldwide growth of European colonial empires in

the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, which allowed Western scientists freer access to the more remote

and less studied parts of the globe. This access was

primarily used to accumulate specimens in the narrow

field of the individual scientist's area of interest (for example, mammals), which were placed in museums

in Western, or in some cases, colonial capitals.

The significant difference in the Jesup North Pacific

Expedition and the later (1916-1930) Asiatic expedition of the American Museum of Natural History lay in

deliberate combining of scientists from different disciplines into a single field team ("the method of correlated work"; see Andrews 1932). Similarly, the Jesup

Expedition Centennial—with its arrays of papers, symposia, and historiographic research—brought to- gether anthropologists, linguists, geneticists, and

evolutionary and environmental biologists (note the changing disciplinary nomenclature) to examine

changes that have occurred in our knowledge and

understanding of both human cultures and biotas of

the North Pacific, including Beringia.

The Jesup Expedition as a "Natural History"

Venture

This "correlated work", which made the Jesup Expedition such a breakthrough, is effective only if the

several specialists staffing a complex expedition are

willing to spend at least some of their time working

outside of their own specialties. That this was true of

the JNPE pattern of fieldwork can be seen by the results of its mammal collecting (Allen 1 903). Altogether,

about 500 specimens of twenty-nine species were

obtained from seven different localities throughout

eastern Siberia. These were, from south to north;

(1) Vladivostok (43°09' N, 1 3r53' E);

(2) "lower Amoor" (Amur River, near Nikolaevskna-Amure, at 5

3" 10' N, 140°44' E);

(3) "Gichiga, on the west coast of the Sea of Okhotsk" (the town of Cizhiga, actually, at the extreme northeast corner of that sea, at the head

of Shelikov Gulf and mouth of the Cizhiga River, 62°00' N, 160 34' E);

(4) "Marcova, on the middle Anadyr River, 600

miles north of Cichiga" (the town of Markovo,

actually, about 330 miles northeast of Cizhiga);

20 1
(5) "near the mouth of the Anadyr River" (near or

at the site of the present-day city of Anadyr,

64°50' N, 1 76W E);

6) "Indian Point, on the extreme northeastern

coast of Siberia" (Cape Chaplin, actually, the southeastern tip of the Chukchi Peninsula, at 6474' N, 172°10' E); and

(7) "Verkhne Kolimsk, on the middle Kolyma

River" (the town of Verkhne-Kolymsk on the upper Kolyma River, at 65 38', N 1 50 40' E).

Most specimens were, to be sure, collected and prepared by Norman Buxton, thejesup Expedition's designated zoologist (Figs. 54-56); but a significant number were captured by several of the expedition's anthropologists—Bogoras, Jochelson, and Laufer (Allen 1903:101-2).

The collection, now at the American Museum, includes what were then considered to be twelve new

species, two of them named by their describer, J. A.

Allen, in honor of Norman Buxton. In addition, Buxton

obtained 800 birds representing 1 25 species, published

subsequently by Allen (1 905), including a new species

of lark, Alauda buxtoni; he was also commissioned to

collect other vertebrates. Norman Ceer Buxton (1 872-??), the only trained

biologist on the JNPE staff, remains a shadowy figure

in the expedition. His only written material appears to be section of J. A. Allen's report titled "Itinerary and

General Description of the Country" (Buxton 1 903; see

also Figs. 57-61). He was from Johnstown, Ohio, and

had served earlier as a collector for Edward Avery

Mcllhenny's expedition to Point Barrow, Alaska, for the

Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences in 1897-8

(Allen 1 903; Stone W. 1 900).' The only other source of

information about that expedition may be found in a popular article written by Mcllhenny (1 904). Although

it does not mention Buxton, it gives some hint of what

he experienced in Alaska on that trip. None of the new species from Siberia named by

Allen has retained its identity up to the present, all now being considered synonyms of earlier names. This

202

was due to the way in which post-Jesup systematists

altered their views of evolution and speciation in the ensuing century, discussion of which makes up the remainder of this essay.

Franz Boas, the lead scientist for thejesup Expedition, was a pivotal figure in this changing course of Western science. Formally educated in mathematics

and physics as well as geography, Boas was fascinated by what he saw as a fundamental dichotomy

between "physics" and "cosmography." Today we use

different words—inductive science versus deductive,

observational or field sciences (see above) that can be

grouped under the rubric of natural history (Boas 1 887).

It was his lifelong goal to produce a synthesis of these

two modes of science, which probably led him to staff

the Jesup Expedition with a variety of specialists.

The "natural history" aspect of the Jesup Expedition was thus quite broad. However, in contrast to the

anthropological team whose fieldwork was undertaken

by seasoned ethnographers (like Bogoras, Jochelson,

and Boas himself) or professionally trained young graduates (like Laufer), the fieldwork of the biology team was undertaken by hired collectors, such as Buxton in

Siberia, and A.J. Stone for the collecting in Alaska and

northwestern Canada supported by the American Mu- seum at about the same time. Whereas the anthropologists published their own scientific reports, the

natural history reports of the JNPE were written by other

people, such as J. A. Allen, Curator of Birds and Mammals at the American Museum, who was no longer

physically capable of field work under the strenuous

conditions encountered in Siberia or Alaska (Allen 1 903,

1 905). It was, however, common in the natural history

tradition for museum curators to remain with their collections, while they employed collectors to obtain the

material necessary for their research. Perhaps the best known such team was the British Museum's Oldfield Thomas and his collectors, among them Malcolm

Anderson and Douglas Carruthers. Andrew J. Stone was from Missoula, Montana, but no more is known of him than is of Buxton. He was

PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ NATURAL HISTORY
engaged by Allen to collect in Alaska, Yukon, and Northwest Territories from 1 896 to 1 903, funded mainly by

J. M. Constable, Trustee and First Vice President of the

American Museum. Logically, this might have been

considered the New World portion of the Jesup

Expedition, since the area surveyed was the counterpart of northeastern Siberia east of the Bering Strait.

However, it was not so designated, nor was it called

the "Constable Expedition" after its funder, but was named after the hired collector. Stone published only

one paper from his trip (Stone 1 900), covering his itinerary and geographical notes, observations of the larger

mammals, and a few comments on Native inhabitants

for 1 896-8 —the same type of material that Buxton

wrote for Allen— while the scientific results were published by Allen in a series of twelve papers between

1897 and 1905. Why Allen (and Boas) should have

downplayed the museum's fieldwork in eastern Beringia,

while publicizing it on the other side of the Bering Strait,

is unclear. It may be related to the fact that the U. S.

National Museum in Washington already had a

headstart in this area through the activities of W. H.

Dall, R. Kennicott, E. W. Nelson, W. H. Osgood, E. A.

Preble, and others.

Collections and the Changing View of the

Species

At the close of the nineteenth century, the term "biological diversity" had not been coined, and ecology was in its infancy. Species of organisms, and for that

matter, human populations ("races"), were defined typologically, on the basis of their morphology, and while

Darwinian evolution was generally accepted by the

scientific community, an understanding of the basis

the genetics of individuals and populations—was just

developing. It is interesting to compare the number of

species recognized by systematists of the Jesup Expedition era with those later in the century. I will restrict

myself to Beringian mammals, since that is my specialty, but similar trends are evident in most other

groups, and in the wider North Pacific region.

Table 2/ Total Number ofRecognized Land Mammal Species

in Behngia at the End ofthe Nineteenth Century

West Beringia only Holarctic East Beringia only

(Northeast Siberia) (Alaska and Yukon)

1 shrews 1 shrews

2 lagomorphs 3 lagomorphs

1 marmot 1 marmot

1 ground 4 ground

squirrel squirrels

1 red-backed 1 red- 3 red-backed

vole backed vole voles

3 lemmings 4 lemmings

4 gray voles 1 2 gray voles

1 4 carnivores 2 carnivores

24 carnivores

5 ungulates 4 ungulates

subtotal: 41 3 65

TOTAL 44 68

Around 1 900, a total of 1 09 species of terrestrial mammals had been named as inhabiting Beringia, fortyfour in eastern Siberia, and sixty-eight in the AlaskanYukon region (Table 2). But of these, only three were

considered Holarctic species; that is, found both in

Eurasia and North America. These were the northern

redbacked vole, Evotomys(=Clethrionomys) rutilus, arctic

fox, \/ulpes{=Alopex) lagopus, and polar bear Thalarctos

(=Ursus) maritimus. A fourth species, musk-ox Ovibos

moschatus, had a historically Holarctic distribution, but was extinct in both western and eastern Beringia at

that time; subsequently it was successfully reestablished on both sides of the Bering Strait. That more

than 1 00 species of mammals were to be found in the

northern North Pacific at the time of the Jesup Expedition suggests a degree of species richness that we

now believe was almost a two-fold overestimate. However, the application of systematics and taxonomy in

the study of biodiversity does not always lead to exaggeration of species richness. I will illustrate its ups

and downs in the twentieth century by focusing on a few major groups of Beringian mammals with which I am most familiar.

In 1900, there were thought to be ten species of

red-toothed shrews (genus Sorex) in east Beringia,

and nine in west, none shared, for a total of nineteen

species. Of the ground squirrels and marmots, there

R. S. HOFFMANN 203
were two in west Beringia and five in east Beringia,

again, none shared. Of the gray voles (genus Microtus), there were four in the west and twelve in

the east, none of which were Holarctic (Table 3). A pattern of more described species in east

Beringia (Alaska-Yukon) is evident, both in total mammals, and in the selected groups, caused for the most part by the tendency of North American mammalogists to "over-split" taxonomic units. In its ex- treme form, this was exemplified by the taxonomy

of the North American brown bears, or grizzlies,

published by Merriam (1918) in which he recognized seventy-six species of bears, allocated

among fifteen groups, in North America alone. This

for a species now regarded as a single entity, with

fewer than ten subspecies at most.

Genetics and the Biological Species

Concept

Table 3/ Numbers ofShrews, Marmots, Ground Squirrels, arid Cray Voles Recognized in Beringia, End ofNineteenth Century

West Beringia only

Shrews (Sorex) Sorex macropygmaeus

araneus

ultimus

sibiriensis sanguinidens

tomensis

vir gracillimus

tscherskii

subtotal: 9

Holarctic East Beringia only

Sorex personatus

pribilofensis arcticus tundrensis

richardsoni

sphagnicola

glacialis hoyi

hydrodromus

palustris 10 Marmots (Marmota) and Ground Squirrels (Spermophilus)

Arctomys kamtschatica

Citellus undulatus

subtotal: 2 Cray Voles (Microtus)

Arvicola slowzovii

buturlini tshuktshorum

Aschizomys lemminus

Shortly thereafter, a reaction against such taxon

splitting began to set in, culminating in the work

ofjulian Huxley (1 940, 1 942) and Ernst Mayr(l 942)

of the American Museum and supported by the work of the expatriate Russian geneticist and natural

historian, T. Dobzhansky of Columbia University

(1941). They introduced the important new ideas of

"polytypic species" and the "biological species concept." Mayr (1 942:1 46) commented that "new investigation . . . show[s] that many of the previously recognized species are nothing but subspecies of widespread

polytypic species. The acceptance of the modern biological concept . . . resulted in an extraordinary simplification of the system."

The shift from a monotypic, typological species

concept to a polytypic, biological one was important,

but the emergence of statistical applications and numerical systematics also contributed to "simplification,"

(i.e., the "lumping" of two or more taxa previously

considered distinct species into a single, presumably

polytypic one. This paradigmatic shift also had an impact on anthropologist's views of what constituted

subtotal: TOTAL:413

Arctomys pruinosus

Spermophilus empetra

beringianus

osgoqdi

barrowensis

5

Microtus miurus

abbreviatus

operarius

unalascensis

macfarlani

sitkensis kodiacensis

innuitus drummondii

xanthognathus

pennsylvanicus

12 27

human species and subspecies ("races"), particularly

by emphasizing the importance of gene flow between

populations. The shift resulted in an apparent decline

in mammal species richness in Beringia; in the 1950s

and early 1 960s, the number in west Beringia was thirtytwo, and in east Beringia, also thirty-two, equal on both

sides of the Bering Strait. But of these, twenty-five had

Holarctic distributions, so the total number of species

recognized fell to thirty-nine (Table 4), slightly more

than a third of the number recognized in 1 900. Of the

nineteen species of Sorex that had been named by

the early 1 900s (see Table 3), only six were recognized at mid-century, two of which were Holarctic. One marmot (instead of two) was recognized, but it was Holarctic, as was a single Holarctic ground squirrel. Five species of gray voles, instead of sixteen, were recognized, three of which were Holarctic (Table

5).

204 PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ NATURAL HISTORY
Cladistics and the Evolutionary Species Concept

The next, and current, phase of systematic analysis began in the mid-1 960s with the widespread

adoption of the concepts and principles of cladistic analysis of systematic relationships, or phylogenetic systematics, which have, in this period,

produced a revolution in evolutionary studies, including the evolutionary species concept. The concept was pioneered by G. G. Simpson, who held

joint tenure at both the American Museum and Columbia University. It is a "lineage" or "clade" concept

of the species, "a single lineage of ancestor-descendant populations which maintains its identity from

other such lineages, and which has its own evolutionary tendencies and historical fate" (modified from

Simpson 1961; quoted in Wiley 1981:25).

Additionally, development of several new techniques—comparative studies of chromosomes, protein

electrophoresis, and multivariate statistics—were fol- lowed by DNA studies (restriction site analysis, base

pair sequencing, etc.) and sophisticated modeling of

phylogenetic topology and significance testing. The

combination of new data generated by different

techniques, and their analysis through the principles

of phylogenetic systematics, has resulted in an increase once more in the number of species recognized, as

those previously thought to be polytypic species have

been shown to consist of two or more distinct species. Species richness in Beringia now stands at forty

species in west (Siberia), and forty-two in east Beringia

(Alaska and Yukon), of which eighteen are Holarctic in

distribution, for a total of sixty-four species in Beringia

as a whole (Table 6), more than one and one-half times

the number admitted during the period of indiscriminant lumping under the polytypic species rubric.

The Future:

Gene Sequencing and Phyiogeography

The new techniques mentioned above have led to more

robust hypotheses of phylogenetic relationships based

Table 4/ Total Number ofRecognized Land Mammal Species in Beringia, Mid-twentieth Century

West Beringia only

(Northeast Siberia)

Holarctic East Beringia only

(Alaska and Yukon)

3 shrews 2 shrews 1 shrew

1 lagomorph 1 lagomorph , 2 lagomorphs

1 marmot

1 ground squirrel

1 red-backed vole 1 red-backed vole

1 lemming 2 lemmings 1 lemming

1 gray vole 3 gray vole 1 gray vole

1 carnivores 2 carnivores 4 ungulates

Subtotal: 7 25 7

Total: 32 32

on cladistic analysis of larger and more diverse sets of

characters. Examples of such hypotheses can be illustrated by the shrews, marmotines, and voles I have

been emphasizing. George (1988) based her analysis on electrophoretic data from twenty-six species of

the genus Sorex, including ten from the North Pacific

region. She found that they clustered into three major

clades; a primitive North American one; then a Eurasian

group that included, in addition, two North American

species (S. arcticus, S. tundrensis); and, finally, a larger

group of North American Sorex belonging to the

subgenus Otisorex. Only one small clade, consisting

of S. araneus (Eurasia), S. arcticus (North American),

and S. rw/i(;/rens/5 (Beringian) displayed an Holarctic

distribution. Recently, Dokuchaev (1997) described a new allospecies, Sorex yukonensis, which with S.

m;>7uf/ss/ww5 forms an Holarctic superspecies.

With respect to the ground squirrels and marmots

(tribe Marmotini), ongoing work in molecular phylogeny of the Spermophilini by an international research

group- clearly demonstrates several novel points:

(1) ground squirrels are paraphyletic, with at least

five distinct clades (Harrison et al., n.d.);

(2) marmots, instead of being ancestral to ground

squirrels, fall within the ground squirrel clades;

(3) both ground squirrels and marmots have

distinct North American and Eurasian species groups, with only one species, the arctic ground

squirrel, having an Holarctic distribution. These

R. S. HOFFMANN 205
preliminary conclusions

are based on complete

sequencing of the mitochondrial cytochrome b gene, and

sampling of all species

level taxa in the two

groups, a total of sixtythree, plus five outgroup

taxa (Harrison et al., n.d.).

Table 5/ Number ofShrews, Marmot'mes, and Cray Voles Recognized in Beringia, Mid-twentieth Century

West Beringia only Holarctic East Beringia only

Sorex minutus Sorex caecutiens Sorex vagrans

hawker! araneus Marmota marmota

Spermophilus undulatus

Eothenomys lemminus Microtus agrestis Microtus xanthognathus

gregalis economus

Total: 3 7 2

Cray voles of the genus

Microtus (sensu lato) are widely agreed to be among

the most difficult mammals systematically. A new hypothesis based on fairly complete chromosomal studies at the species level, less complete electrophoresis, and DNA comparisons of a few species, have

been synthesized into a new taxonomic scheme

with relevance for the North Pacific and Beringia. What was previously regarded as a single genus, Microtus, a

very large and heterogeneous taxon, has now been

subdivided into twenty genera or subgenera, of which

several have Holarctic distributions (Zagorodnyuk

1 990; Musser and Carleton 1 992). In this scheme, there

are four major clades of gray voles, one restricted to

the Palearctic, two to the Nearctic, and one in the Holarctic, which contains Beringian species and species

groups. This pattern is similar to what we have already

seen in the Beringian shrews and marmotines, and suggests the possibility of chronological and evolutionary

concordance across the Bering land bridge in the Pleistocene. The groups I have focused on are small to mediumsize mammals, and the general patterns I have described

tend to hold for these size classes. However, Beringian

ungulates and carnivores are mostly large to very

large in size, and a greater proportion of them show

Holarctic distributions. Note, however, that the smallest carnivores—the ermine and weasel—are also Holarctic. This correlation of distributional pattern with

body size and ecological niche probably results from

the fact that such mammals have larger home ranges and greater dispersal ability compared to small mammals, and are thus more likely to have established

amphiberingian ranges at sometime during the Pleistocene (Hoffmann 1 984).

The most recent trend is what has been termed

"phylogeography" (Avise 1 998), the "historical aspects

of the contemporary spatial distributions of gene lineages." Most phylogeographic studies have been

based on sequence data from maternally inherited mitochondrial genes, but other gene markers are rapidly

being developed. At a recent international mammal

congress held in Spain in July 1 998, over forty papers employing the phylogeographic approach were given

(Reig 1 998), a considerable number of them being devoted to mammals of the Beringian region, both large

and small. Thus, this newest application will lead to

explicit hypotheses of animal migrations, and has been

applied to human migrations across Beringia as well

(Schurr and Wallace, this volume).

And the Sea Between

Beringian marine mammals, all large to very large,

require comment at this point. Thirty-one species

currently occur in the cold-temperate to arctic waters

of the North Pacific and Arctic Oceans, linked by the

Bering Sea. Of these, one is the coastal sea otter (Enhydris

lutris); seven are coastal to pelagic seals and sea lions

(including northern fur seal); and twenty-three are

whales, including eight baleen and fifteen toothed

whales. In sharp contrast to the nomenclatural instability described above for Beringian terrestrial mammals, the marine mammal species limits and recog206 PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ NATURAL HISTORY
Table 6/ Total Number ofRecognized Land Mammal Species in Behngia,

End ofTwentieth Century

West Beringia only Holarctic East Beringia only

9 shrews 2 shrews 6 shrews

1 lagomorph 1 lagomorph 2 lagomorphs

1 marmot 1 ground squirrel 2 marmots

1 red-backed vole 1 red-backed vole

4 lemmings 1 lemming 5 lemmings

3 gray voles 1 gray vole 4 gray voles

2 carnivores 8 carnivores 4 carnivores

1 ungulate 3 ungulates 1 ungulate

subtotal: 22 18 24

Total: 40 42

nized names have changed very little in the past century. Only one new species of whale has been described

from this region in the last 100 years; Mesoplodon

carlhubbsi'm 1 963, from the southern edge of the area

in question. Similarly, only one additional seal, Phoca

largha, was recognized in 1977 as a distinct species,

having formerly been considered a subspecies of the common harbor seal, Phoca vitullina.

All of these marine mammals have Holarctic ranges,

not surprising given the virtually continuous coastal and pelagic habitats spanning the rim of the North

Pacific. Only one now extinct Beringian species was

not known to be Holarctic—the Steller seacow,

Hydrodamalis gigas—whose only known range encompassed the Commander Islands off the eastern coast

of the Kamchatka Peninsula. Discovered in 1741 and

exterminated in 1 768, it was strictly coastal in habitat.

Its closest living relative is the dugong of the Indian and Western Pacific Oceans, but more closely related

fossil forms are known from the North Pacific. The extinction of this unique species through indiscriminant

harvest for meat by hunters was a severe loss to the

biological diversity of the Beringian region, since it represented the end of a specialized, highly adapted lineage.

Conserving North Pacific Biological Diversity

Other Beringian species nearly suffered the same fate.

Sea otter populations shrank back from the southern

ends of their large original range, and no longer occur

in northern Japan, southern California, and

northern Mexico. Elsewhere, the population was severely reduced and fragmented, surviving only in small areas of

central California, the outer Aleutian Islands, and the Kurile Islands. Under protection,

the species has now recovered some of

its range, with help from reintroduction,

and is now fairly regular in Kamchatka, the Commander Islands, central and southern

Alaska, and parts of British Columbia.

Many of the baleen whales suffered a similar fate, and their numbers are still depressed, especially the

Eurasian population of gray whale, and all populations

of blue, right, and bowhead whales. There has also been a recent serious decline in the Steller sea lion

population of unknown origin; it is speculated that heavy fishing pressure in the North Pacific and Bering

Sea may be at least part of the cause, by reducing the

sea lion's food base.

Terrestrial mammals have fared better. Populations

of many of the large mammals have been reduced,

and local extinctions are widespread, but overall,

species populations are not endangered. Small and

medium-size mammals are still widespread and often common, but no accurate assessments of population

status exist for most places.

Due to some degree of protection (hunting regulations, preserves, captive breeding, reintroductions, etc.),

the status of some species has improved. In addition

to the sea otter, the musk-ox has benefited from

protection and reintroduction, and is now reestablished

both in Alaska and eastern Siberia. The sable, seriously

over-harvested in the past, has also increased in both

numbers and distribution.

In most, if not all, cases, reduction of biodiversity in

Beringia and the North Pacific, both historically and

up to the present, has been caused by direct human

exploitation. The future challenge is not only to gain

sufficient knowledge of these ecosystems so that human use of biotic resources can be placed on a

R. S. HOFFMANN 207
sustainable basis; but also, it is to conserve enough of

the natural world to ensure that these ecosystems,

both terrestrial and marine, will remain viable. Four major formations encompass terrestrial ecosystems

of the lands bordered by the North Pacific between

about 35° and 75° North latitude. These are arctic and mountain tundra, taiga (boreal forest), and mixed

coniferous/broad-leafed forest, with patches of steppe

inland along the southern margins.

The most threatened of these formations is the mixed forest. In the United States and Canada, this

formation, sometimes called a "temperate rainforest,"

is the focus of an ongoing controversy over what

level of logging is sustainable in these forests, and

what proportion of the old-growth "ancient forests" should be protected. On the Eurasian side, a parallel

controversy focuses on the mixed forest of the Russian Far East, particularly in the drainages of the Amur

and Ussuri River basins, which also includes a significant part of northeastern China (former Manchuria),

and the appended Korean Peninsula. Another country

in this region is Japan, in particular, its two northern

islands, Hokkaido and Honshu. Along the southern

margins of the region, on both sides of the Pacific, much of this unique forest is already cut over. However, the opportunity to manage the mixed forests of

Alaska, western Canada, and the Russian Far East still

exists, and with it the opportunity to preserve their

rich biodiversity, with many unique species. A small sampling includes Siberian tiger, Amur leopard. Lake Evoron vole, three or four species of tree voles, mountain beaver, shrew-moles, Chinese soft-shelled turtle,

giant salamander, Steller's sea eagle, and northern

spotted owl.

With a few conspicuous exceptions, these species

have little or no commercial value. On the other hand,

trees, when reduced to logs, have an immediate commercial value to the people who cut them down, even though the forest ecosystem from which the trees came had an even greater global economic value in

terms of photosynthesis (carbon dioxide absorption from,

oxygen release to, the atmosphere), watershed protection (runoff, erosion control), soil building, and other

ecosystem services.

Past history demonstrates that when individuals or

corporations have the opportunity for short-term profit

by exploiting natural resources (be they sea otters or redwoods), they will usually act to do so. This is especially true if the exploiter does not reside in the eco- system or community that is exploited.

The two keys to sustained utilization of natural

resources from ecosystems are: (1) sufficient knowledge of composition and function of the ecosystem

to make informed decisions concerning exploitation;

and (2) policies controlling exploitation determined by

people residing within the ecosystem, who have a

vital stake in prudent policy-making (of course, good

policy is only as good as its implementation and

enforcement). Here is a vital problem, the solution

to which both natural historians and anthropologists could contribute more effectively if they

worked together rather than separately. It is time

to revive "the method of correlated work" to con- duct research on a wide variety of topics by international teams of scientists in the spirit of the Boasian

synthesis.

That the broad view of field research espoused by

Boas remains alive is seen in the scope of "planetary

biology", a newly coined name for the combined disciplines of biology (both molecular and whole organism)

with palaeontology and geology. One can only wonder what those industrious but almost unknown field

collectors, Buxton and Stone, would make of that.

Notes

1 . We are grateful to Mr. Donald Cunningham

for the information on Buxton's year of birth as

well as his first and second name.

2. N. N. Vorontsov, E. A. Lyapunova, Institute of Developmental Biology, Moscow; R.C. Harrison,

P. W. Sherman, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York,

E. Yensen, Albertson College, Idaho and R. S. Hoffmann, Smithsonian Institution.

208 PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ NATURAL HISTORY
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vol. 41 . Washington, DC: Gov. Printing Office. Musser, Guy G., and Michael D. Carleton

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1998 Abstracts. Euro-American Mammal Congress.

Universidade de Santiago de Compostela.

Stone, Andrew J.

1 900 Some Results of a Natural History Journey to Northern British Columbia, Alaska, and the Northwest

Territory, in the Interest ofthe American Museum of

Natural History. Bulletin ofthe American Museum of

Natural History 1 3:31-62.

Stone, Witmer

1900 Report on the Birds and Mammals Collected by the Mcllhenny Expedition to Pt. Barrow, Alaska. Proceedings ofthe Academy ofNatural Sciences 52:4-

49. Philadelphia.

Wiley, Edward O.

1981 Phylogenetics. The Theory and Practice of

Phylogenetic Systematics. New York: John Wiley and

Sons, Inc. Zagorodnyuk, Igor V. 1990 Kariotipicheskaia izmenchivost' i sistematika serykh polevok (Rodentia, Arvicolini).

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2:26-37. Moscow.

R. S, HOFFMANN 209

*y!ie Languages of the fNjorth pacific j^im,

1 55^7" ' 997> snd the Jesup xpedition

MICHAEL E. KRAUSS

Throughout most of our historical perspective the connection between the "Old World" and the new has been

the Atlantic European expansion westward since 1 492.

This movement has by now almost completely obliterated the aboriginal connection, culminating in the

control of the North Pacific area by distant Moscow

and Washington, and a Cold War which utterly sealed

off that connection for the lifetime of most of us now

living. This period also minimized contact between

scientists on both sides, and greatly intensified the processes that have been destroying what remains of the

indigenous cultures and languages along that entire

North Pacific arc. The understanding of the relationship between

the two hemispheres and its history that the Jesup

Expedition promised only reached its beginning stages.

Except for the Russian Ryabushinski Expedition of

1 909-1 1 across the Aleutian-Kamchatkan arc, the JNPE

remained unique; and all further work was severely limited by the political situation of 1917-90. After this

tragic lapse, the scientific and social issues surrounding the Jesup Expedition remain, and even have devel- oped new importance, including the question of survival of these cultures and languages and their role in

the society of the future.

This paper lists the eighty languages of the North

Pacific rim; describes the texture of that diversity;

summarizes their status from robust viability to extinction during the century 1 897-1 997; the causes of

that situation, including American and Russian politics.

often in contrast; the role of Jesup Expedition field- workers in documenting the diversity; and the issues

of the social responsibility of the scientist. It also deals

with the critically endangered state of most of these

languages today (with twenty already extinct, and all

the rest, except for around three to five, with speakers

of the older generation only), as part of the global

crisis of impending mass language extinction.

Definitions: Jesup Area Languages

I shall here first present my definition of the Jesup

Expedition area for language purposes, as a framework for a quick survey and statistical overview of the

indigenous languages in the North Pacific arc, and of

their viability status then and now. For these purposes,

I shall consider the languages along the coast, on salt

water, from the Columbia River on the American side

to the Ussuri River on the Asian —Astoria to

Vladivostok—and secondarily also the first tier inland

(up to about 500 kilometers).' As we well know, counting languages as opposed

to dialects is often arbitrary and artificial, but in terms

of the mutual intelligibility criterion and according to

the best current statements,^ from the Columbia to

the Ussuri in 1 897 there was up to eighty different

Native languages spoken, or, at least still remembered,

on the coast and first tier inland.

I shall not detail the considerations defining the

languages listed here, but only shall note that my definition of languages is somewhat finer, especially on

2 1 1
the Asian side, than that established in the Russian

literature.^ For example, Ainu is (or was) two languages

(Kurile including Hokkaido, and Sakhalin); Nivkh is two;

Yukagir is (or was) perhaps four; Asiatic Eskimo is (was)

three; Kerek-Koryak-Alyutor is three; Itelmen is (was)

three; and Arman Tungusic is counted separately. On

the other hand, I have been perhaps overgenerous in

retaining the established (Russian) count for Primorski

Tungusic languages, with Negidal, Ulch and Oroch

treated as separate from Evenk and Nanay (following

Doerferl 978), though Kill is not counted here because

it is further inland than Nanay. By some counts, then,

the Asian languages could be a lot fewer; but I am

making a special effort to differentiate evenhandedly

for both sides—a difficult task, where I hope I am not overcompensating for under-differentiation on the Russian side.

Diversity

Though the arc as defined is almost symmetrical

(actually, Vladivostok is about 300 kilometers further

south than Astoria) and the Asian side, at least grossly

viewed, (including Kamchatka and Sakhalin) appears

to have much more coastline than the American, there

are significantly more languages and greater diversity on the American side than on the Asian. Fifty-three of

the eighty area languages are American, and only

twenty-seven are Asian (Tables 7 and 8), even with the

fineness or generosity just allowed for the Asian. (Overlap is eliminated by calling St. Lawrence Island part of

Asia, and by including the Aleut of the Commander

Islands with American Aleut, and Big Diomede Inupiaq

with Little Diomede.) The diversity is, at most, only

slightly greater on the American side, however, in terms

of different genetic language families represented—

a

much deeper measure of diversity: eight families on

the American side (Chinookan, Salishan, Chemakuan,

Wakashan, Tsimshianic, Haida, Athabaskan-EyakTlingit, and Eskimo-Aleut), and six on the Asian (Eskimo-Aleut—due to the presence of three Siberian Yupik

Inguages—also Chukotko-Kamchatkan, Yukagiric,

Tungusic, Nivkh and Ainu). That could, in fact, be made

seven and seven, since it is arguable that Kamchatkan

and Chukotkan are genetically different,'' and that

Tsimshianic is genetically related to Chinookan.^ I think

also that in a global perspective, the density of diversity here is below average for pre-agrarian parts of the world in terms of area, but not per capita, and the

diversity is greater on both sides in the more southerly

latitudes. The diversity is greater along the coast than on the

first inland tier: of the eighty total, fifty-eight are coastal,

and only twenty-two are first tier inland. Most diverse

is the American coast, with thirty-six, followed by the

Asian coast, with twenty-two; then the American inland with seventeen; and last the Asian inland, with

only five (and that by counting Yukagiric in 1 897 as

four languages).

Viability Status 1897

We now come to the issue of viability status and fate of

these North Pacific languages. By viability I mean, most

essentially, that the language is being transmitted by

the traditional natural method of speaking it to the children as their first language.*^ Sheer numbers is a major

factor in language power and language survival; but the language of 1 00 people, including all the children, will probably remain alive longer than the language of

1 00,000, including no children.

In ] 897, most of the eighty North Pacific languages were still viable, learned as a first language by all or most children. (This we can judge from the subsequent

and current situation, by projecting backwards; the accounts of the time seldom make mention of viabilty.) On the Asian side the main exceptions were

South ltelmen^ already very nearly extinct, replaced

by Russian; also probably Omok and Chuvan Yukagiric,

if not already extinct,** replaced by Russian or Chukchi;

and on the American side, two widely separate

Athabaskan languages mainly by near extinction of

the group, Tsetsaut^ and Kwalhioqua,'° and probably

also Chemakum." These six languages must all have

2 1 2 PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ LANGUAGES
been extinct by about 1 935.

Of the remaining seventy-four, about eight more

were by then reduced to such small numbers, and/or were being learned by so few or no children, that they

would have been rather moribund in 1 897: Kurile Ainu

confined on Shikotan Island and languishing;'^ Arman

Tungusic on Siberian mainland;'^ probably alsoPentlatch,

Nooksack and Twana Salishan; and Lower and Cathlamet Chinook in North America.''' All of these became

extinct during the last half of the last century. Northeast Kamchadal probably belongs in this category, but

reports are contradictory, and it could conceivably belong in the next category.'^

By 1897, at least eleven more languages were

entering a precarious state: Kerek"' in dwindling

numbers; Sirenikski Eskimo' ''assimilating to Chaplinski;

TagishAthabaskan'** assimilating to Inland Tlingit; Eyak'^

first assimilating to Tlingit and by 1 897 overwhelmed

by American canneries; and Southern Tsimshian assimilating to Coast Tsimshian. With the death of Valentina

Wye, the last speaker, in February 1997, Sirenikski Eskimo was the sixteenth of the eighty to become

extinct, now leaving sixty-four languages still with us; Eyak and Tagish each have one remaining speaker,

while Kerek and Southern Tsimshian^" reportedly each

have two. The last children taught Ainu on Sakhalin were born about 1 905 (those on Hokkaido not much

later); Sakhalin Ainu is now extinct (Hokkaido very nearly

so). Furthermore in Washington state Lower and Upper

Chehalis, Cowlitz, Quinault, and Quileute were not much

longer to be learned by any children, and all have from

two to five speakers at present.

In 1 897, the other fifty-five may still have appeared

fairly robust, with all or most of the children being raised speaking them. Here, however, we come to a sharp

contrast in conditions on the American side as op- posed to the Russian.^'

Indigenous Language Policy and Results, 1 997

On the American side (Table 7), heavy Euro-American

settlement and development was already advanced.

especially in Washington State and British Columbia,

and generally more advanced than the Russian on the

Asian side. However, the federal Indian language

policy for the school system, a rigid policy already

well established along the entire American coast in

both the United States and Canada, still had more impact on the viability of the languages themselves. The

policy called for strict speaking of English only; children were punished for speaking a Native language.

Though there was still missionary support for using

Native languages (by Russian Orthodox, Moravian, Anglican-Episcopal, Roman Catholic Oblates and Jesuits),

including in written form and printed books, the pro- language mission policy was rapidly losing out to

the mainstream Protestant-led federal policy." The rigid

English-only policy was powerfully reinforced, incidentally, by the assimilationism so urgently needed to deal

with vast hordes of "barely white" immigrants who

now poured in not from Northern or Western Europe,

but from Southern and Eastern Europe.

In contrast, Russian demographic pressure was

minimal on the Asian side, and hardly increasing. It was

so far behind the American that Chukotka, for example, was more American than Russian;" the schools were

generally far fewer if present at all, and were not motivated by any deliberate policy to eliminate indigenous

languages. Ironically, even the influence of the Russian

Orthodox Church was far stronger in Alaska than in

Russia. Orthodox support for Alaskan languages, even

printing materials in four of them and nothing in the Asian languages, provided some significant opposition to the American policy,^'' while on the Asian

side there was no policy to oppose. Such was the

contrasting context on the two sides for the Jesup

Expedition era. We shall return to this after a brief account of development since then.

The American anti-Native language policy reigned

supreme for about sixty years, from 1 9 1 to 1 970,

until generally there were no more Native-speaking

schoolchildren to punish. By 1 970, along the Pacific

coast from California to the Aleutians the only elemenM. E. KRAUSS 2 1 3
tary schools where young children could speak any of

these languages were at Atka (Aleut) and English Bay

(Chugach Alutiiq). Further North, the youngest Native

speakers on the American side are for the central part

of Central Yup'ik, seventeen of sixty-seven villages, and

St. Lawrence Island Yupik, in two villages. Liberalization

of the policy began only in the 1 970s, too late to help in most cases in the United States or Canada."

On the Russian side, the Revolutionary regime took

over the Russian Far East in the 1 920s and established

schools for indigenous communities, reaching most by

the 1 930s, with a policy that was basically favorable

for indigenous languages, for populist-idealistic or cynical reasons, or perhaps both. Languages were more or

less officially recognized and defined, with literary standards for some, often disregarding divergent dialect

or even language-level differences, for practical reasons (e.g., Sakhalin Nivkh, Naukan Yupik). Several languages, or at least parts thereof, were relatively well

served in the printing of school literature from the 1 930s

through the 1 950s; such as Siberian Yupik Eskimo (with

over 100 titles for 1,200 total population, best per

capita, but in Chaplinski Yupik only), or Chukchi (460

titles for 12,000 people), Nanay (217 titles, 10,000

people), Evenk (25,000 people, 400 titles, probably one dialect only). Even (12,000, 190 titles), Koryak

(7, 1 00, 117 titles, Chavchuven dialect only). However,

far less well served were Nivkh (4,000 people, 20 titles, Amur dialect only?)." (West) Itelmen (1 ,200 people) got

only the bare beginnings (1 932 primerand arithmetic),

and for 300 Commander Island Aleut a primer and

dictionary were drafted but not published (in Bering

Atkan language). Several other recognized languages

still spoken by schoolchildren at the time, but with

populations under 1 ,000, got no books: Yukagir, Ulch,

Oroch, Negidal, and Orok. Also, the degree to which

the books were properly distributed or really used is

inconsistent and questionable. In any case, the policy

and practice were favorable enough that the Sovietside languages remained quite generally viable

through the period 1 930-60,^^ the same period when

2 1 4

American parents, now bilingual in English, switched

to speaking English with their children, as instructed. The Soviet literatures in indigenous languages first adapted the Latin alphabet of International Communism, but were Cyrillicized already in 1 937. World War

II, the Great Patriotic War, increased Russian activity

and development in the Far East, along with Russian

nationalism. Finally, and most devastatingly, in about

1 957 came ukrupnenie {WWage consolidation") with the

destruction of the many smaller villages, and above all intematy{hoard'mg schools) in the consolidated villages,

severely restricting children's contact with their parents and following a de facto policy of Russification,^^

in some cases even making a point of burning the

native-language books. ^° The result of this abrupt and

disastrous change in the 1960s and 1970s, ironically

at the same time that American policy began to liberalize, is that now only Chukchi may have a significant

proportion of children speakers in some less settled

groups. Evenk probably also has some young speakers in the Amur-Chita region; Koryak and Even perhaps

also in some pockets; Nanay perhaps a few children somewhere. But for all other Russian-side languages

the youngest speakers are now in their thirties or older.'' There are ironic contrasts in the timing; replacement by English occurred mostly 1930-1960 while

the Russian policy was liberal, then the replacement

by Russian occurred while American policy liberalized. The result is that of the fifty-five languages that might have appeared robust in 1 897 (thirty-six on the American side, nineteen on the Russian), only two may

still be viable or partly so on the American side (Central

Alaskan Yup'ik and St. Lawrence Island Siberian Yupik;

Table 7), only three or four on the Russian have any

children speakers (Chukchi, Evenk, Koryak, perhaps also

Even), and the status of even these most-favored lan- guages is extremely endangered (Table 8). The less endangered Native languages of the North are all quite

distant from the «Jesup arc»: almost all Greenlandic

and East Canadian Inuit; Tundra Nenets, Northern and

Eastern Khanty in Russia; Northern Saami in Scandinavia;

PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ LANGUAGES
and Dogrib or South Slavey in Canada. These are not

to be compared with Sakha (Yakut), which has three

or four times as many speakers as all other Northern

languages combined, placing it in an entirely different

class of languages in this respect.^^

Social Responsibility of the Scientist, and

the Global Language Extinction Issue

What did Boas, Jochelson, Bogoras, and their collegues

think, if anything, about the future of these languages

in 1897? First though, I take 1897 and the Jesup

Expedition merely as symbolic of the larger effort and

careers of these men, in the field from the 1 880s to

the 1920s, right while the fate of the American Native

languages (but not yet that of the Russian) was being

sealed, or prepared. The extent or intensity of their

linguistic fieldwork hardly even peaked during the Jesup

Expedition time; they may have done more before and/

or after it than on it. Second, I need to emphasize that they did not document all of the eighty languages

during their longer career period, and far fewer still

during JNPE surveys, which skipped Alaska altogether,

a huge "keystone" of the North Pacific arc. In fact, coverage was much spottier on the American side,

where two-thirds of the languages are located. How much solid survey-like knowledge the JNPE

team members had of what languages and dialects were in the area in 1897 or 1902 is quite unclear. Whether they were or were not interested in a regional

overview, such an overview was in any case rather

impossible with the transportation facilities of the time

(some of their travel was quite heroic, to achieve what

they did under those circumstances), with limited resources, and with Boas' strict rule over the plans. As

for last-minute salvage of dying languages for linguistic science, in the interest of comparative linguistics or

philology, only Boas appears to have given much priority to that, and during the JNPE even Boas disregarded

that priority, as his interest clearly centered on documenting indigenous life in its oldest "purest" form, while

languages were still alive and fully functioning.

Finally, insofar as the JNPE funding was through a museum, with a natural priority on collecting material

objects, it is indeed remarkable that so much language

work got done, thanks to the interest, linguistic skill, and hard work of these men.

I now come to the question of the social responsibility of the scientist, as a humanist and human being,

then and now. Taking only the central examples I know

of best—Boas, Jochelson, and Bogoras—I am struck, even shocked, that as revolutionaries, discoverers

of cultural relativism, they wrote so little in theirJNPE

contributions to protest or even express regret

about the then very active colonial suppression of

the languages and cultures. They hardly said and

did anything to oppose the decline of the languages

and cultures they were documenting. Perhaps it was

"scientific detachment" above all, or assumption that

the disappearance of those languages and cultures was inevitable, or that there was nothing they themselves could do about it anyway, especially as transient outsiders and foreigners. Or perhaps it was some

combination of the above. I have myself noted little

or no trace of regret: Bogoras did not have much

exposure to American suppression, butjochelson certainly did, in the Aleutians 1 909-1 0, but there is not a word about it even in his correspondence. Boas, likewise, left no written word that I have seen—except

perhaps to his wife about the banning of the KwakiutI

potlatch, or late in life a general thought about culture

loss—about language suppression or loss. Jochelson

had converted fully, from revolutionary to scientist, never

to return. His old friend Bogoras, on the other hand, was ever the revolutionary and activist, and, instead

of fleeing Russia after the October Revolution of 1 9 1 7, he became, among other things, founding director of

the Leningrad Institute for the development of Northern minority languages in education (Institut Narodov

Severa).

On the American side, one thing that Boas and his

colleagues could realistically have done was to have

helped resident pro-language missionaries to develop

M. E. KRAUSS 2 1 5
Table 7/ North American Languages Current Status, Sequenced from the Columbia River toward the Bering Strait

Coastal

Languages

Fam. Status Speakers Total

Pop.

Lower e 1930

Chinook

Lower S >d <5 200

Chehalis

Quinault S >d <6 1 ,500

Lushootseed S <d 60 2,000

Twana S e 1 980 350

Clallam s d <20 3,000?

Quileute Chm >d 3 784

Chemakum Chm e>1928

Makah W c 50? 1 ,000

Nitinaht w >c 20 500?

Nootka w c 500? 5,000?

Northern s <d <30 3,000

Straits

Nooksack s e 1 958 350

Halkomelem s <d/>c ? 50? 7,000

Squamish s d <20 2,300

Pentlatch s e 1 940 55

Sechelt s >c 40 700

Comox s <c 300 1 ,000

Bella Coola s >c 50 700

KwakiutI w c 400? 4,000?

Heiltsuk- w c 300 1 ,500

Oowekyala

Haisia w c 1 00 1 ,000

Southern >d 2 Tsimshian

Coast b-d 500 4,500

Tsimshian

Nass-Gitksan b-d 1 ,000 5,500

Tsimshian

Tsetsuat AET e 1 934 1 Southern D 10 500

Haida

Northern <d 40 1 ,700

Haida

Tlingit AET c-d 575 1 1,000

Eyak AET >d 1 Alutiiq EA b-c 400 3,000

Tanaina AET b-d 75 900

Central EA a-c 10,000 21 ,000

Alaskan Yup'ik

Aleut EA b-d 300 2,200

Inupiaq EA c 500 3,200'

2 1 6

Inland

Languages

Fam ^ La L U J Tnral

Pop.

Kwalhioqua AET e>1923

Cathlamet e 1930

Chinook

Cowlitz S >d 2 200

Upper S >d 2 200

Chehalis

Columbian S C 75 500

Thompson S c <500 3,000

Lillooet S c 300 2,800

Chilcotin AET >b 1,000 2,000

Carrier AET a-c 2,400 5,000

Babine AET B? 200-300? 2,000?

Sekani AET C 100 500

Tahltan AET >c 40 1,200

Tagish >d 1 Southern AET c 200 1,400

Tutchone

Ahtna AET c 80 500

Upper AET >b 40 160

Kuskokwim

Koyukon AET c 300 2,300

PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ LANGUAGES
Table 8/ Northeastern Asian Languages Current Status, Sequenced from the Bering Strait toward the Ussuri River

Coastal

Languages

Fam. Status Speakers Total

Pop.

Naukan Yupik EA c 60 400

Central Siberian EA a-c 1,300 2,300

Yupik

Sirenik Yupik EA e 1997

Chukchi ChK a-b 10,000 1 5,000

Kerek ChK >d 2 400

Koryak ChK a-c 2,500 7,000

Alyutor ChK c 200 2,000

Even T a-c <7,500 17,000

Arman Tungus T e 1960 —

Northeast ChK e? 1950 0' —

Itelmen

South Itelmen ChK e 1910 —

West Itelmen ChK e 1986 70 1,500

Amur Nivkh c-d 100 2,000

Sakhalin Nivkh c 300 2,700

Negidal T c <100 500

Ulch T c <500 3,200

Oroch T c 100 900

Orok T c 35 300

Udegey T c-d 100 1,600'

Kurile Ainu e 1960

Hokkaido- e 1986 3^ Sakhalin Ainu

Inland Fam. Status Speakers Total

Languages Pop.

Chuvan Yukagir e<1900 "1,300'

Omok Yukagir e<1900

Tundra Yukagir c-d 50 600

Kolyma Yukagir d 20 300

Evenk T a-c 9,000 30,000

Nanay T c <2,000- <2,000-

12,000' 12,000'

Abbreviations used in Tables 7 and 8: Status: a all generations including children b parental generation and up

c grandparental generation and up

d small number of very old speakers

e extinct, with approximate date ofextinction < in a situation approaching a particular status > beyond the situation described for a particular status

X- Y Communities within the language area range in status from one status to another.

Footnotes for Tables 7 and 8:

' Seward Peninsula only; Northern Alaska, Canada and Greenland not counted

^ Russia only, China and Mongolia not counted

^ Russia only, China not counted

" Sakhalin only, Hokkaido not counted

Language families: AET Athabaskan-Eyak-Tlingit

EA Eskimo-Aleut

ChK Chukotka-Kamchatkan

Chm Chemakuan

S Salishan T Tungusic

W Wakashan

M. E. KRAUSS 21 7
better orthographies. But Boas evidently had little

use for missionaries of any kind, and they consequently

for him—a lost opportunity.

As for a conclusion, I can only offer my personal

view, which has motivated my whole career. It would

be a tragedy if these Native minority languages

disappear, not just for linguistics, or ethnohistory, or

for science, or for human rights, or for these peoples

themselves; but their loss would be a tragedy, I claim,

for humanity at large. We have come to understand

biologically that our physical survival depends utterly on a certain condition of the biosphere, the ecosys- tem biodiversity, that we need desperately to learn to

preserve and not to destroy. I believe it is the same

with human cultural, linguistic, and intellectual diversity. Diversity itself also constitutes a system of its own, which I call our "logosphere," the web of intellectual life that is our very humanity. We obviously have

the power now to destroy that too, and are doing so at an explosive rate, globally." We must learn

to control the growth of English-, Spanish-, Chinese-,

Russian-, even Yakut-speaking culture, and see it as a supplement, a merely practical enrichment to the

minority indigenous ones. We must prevent this unnecessary destruction of all other languages in the path

of that development, or we destroy the complex and

beautifully diverse system upon which our survival as human beings depends. That is my claim.

Therefore, for us here now, it is our job to document and preserve, but also to protest where still necessary, to intervene, and to help support efforts to

maintain or revitalize this heritage, and to make the work of Jesup Expedition researchers on North Pacific languages a lasting contribution to that.

Notes

1. Compare the maps in Jesup 1897; Boas

1 903, with Krauss 1 988 (reprinted, with some cor- rections in Chaussonnet 1995:109, 1996:108).

Coastal is defined as having territory on salt water, or so by default (no other indigenous group inter- vening, e.g., Udegey).

2. See especially Goddard 1 996 for the Northwest Coast to Alaska, and Krauss 1 997 for Alaska

and the Asian side; also Krasnaia kniga iazykov

narodov Rossii 1 994.

3. See Krauss 1997; Vakhtin 1992:1 3; Al'kor

1 932 (especially pp. 48-5 1 , 54 ff., 84-7, 1 02-3);

Curvich 1985:184; Vdovin 1959:288-91;

Mladopis'mennye iazyki narodov SSSR 1959:12;

Isaev 1977:246-53.

4. See Volodin 1976:17-9, 1997:12-14.

5. See Tarpent 1 996.

6. I have been estimating the number of

speakers of Alaskan since 1961 and, later, Siberian languages; results were published first in Krauss 1973a, 1973b, but only for Alaska (and border

languages, including USSR Eskimo and Aleut), like- wise Krauss 1 974, 1 982 (map); the whole arc map

and table see Krauss 1988 (also Chaussonnet

1995, 1996) and especially Krauss 1997.

7. Patkanov (1912 ill: 915, 920) shows that according to the 1897 census, one man in the

village of Apacha spoke Kamchadal, which, if he was not displaced, would have been Southern

Kamchadal. Jochelson in 1910 (191 1 :1 39) reports

of Southern Kamchadal that "the last old woman

still remembering that dialect, died shortly before

[my] arrival" (no location given). Obviously there was no careful investigation, but it does seem

probable that speakers of Southern Kamchadal

surviving in 1897-1910 were few and scattered. See below for the status of Northeastern Kamchadal,

which may well have been quite different.

8. G.N. Kurilov, personal conversation 1997;

see also Jochelson 1934:150 for Chuvan and

Jochelson 1926:57 for Omok.

9. See Boas and Goddard 1924:1; Krauss

1 973a:91 6-7. The last speaker, Jane Dangeli, died

in approximately 1934.

10. See Krauss 1973a:917-8, 1990:531-2.

One speaker, Tonamal (Melissa or Blizzy Moxlah

or Moxley), was still alive in 1923.

11. See Boas 1892:37, who reported three

speakers in 1890, one of whom, his informant

Louise Webster, was still alive in 1 928 (Elmendorf

1990:440).

12. Torii 1919:3-5, 15-9; Bergman 1 933:

211-7; Murasaki 1 963. Murasaki in 1 962 checked

on seven possible speakers, most of whom probably knew nothing of Kurile Ainu, but general

2 1 8 PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ LANGUAGES
extreme stigma, shame, and reluctance added to the uncertainty.

13. Doerfer 1978:55; Novikova 1960:20,

1968:107, and Sunik 1959:338-9; also Juha

Janhunen personal communication 1993.

14. Thompson and Kinkade 1990:37, 41,

also Kinkade p.c. ca. 1995. The last speaker,

Charles Cultee, died in the 1930s.

15. Patkanov (1912 111:914, 920) shows that according to the 1897 census, 207 of 696

Kamchadals in twelve villages in the Kamchatka

River drainage still spoke (Northeastern) Kamchadal. More precisely, in seven of those twelve

villages no Kamchadals spoke Kamchadal, in two more 5% and 6%, while in the rest, most or all (76%,

84%, 1 00%) did, in no clear geographical pattern.

The Jesup Expedition did not visit the area. Moreover, since Kamchadal was surely low-prestige,

and a choice between Kamchadal and Russian was forced in the 1 897 census, it is probable that the actual 1897 figure was well above 207. It seems that no one really investigated, and I consider it conceivable that someone might still re- member Northeastern Kamchadal even today.

16. See Leont'iev 1983:12-9; Kibrik

(1 991 :263) names three speakers, two at Meynypil'gyn, for 1 989.

17. See Menovshchikov 1964:7-10, and es- pecially Krupnik 1991, which carefully describes

the whole decline and extinction process, far better than I have seen for any other language in the

area, or perhaps in the world.

18. Krauss, 1997: 9. Angela Sidney died in the 1990s, leaving only Lucy Wren (John Ritter, personal communication).

19. Krauss 1997:11-12; Krauss 1982:11-8;

de Laguna, 1990:195-196. The one remaining

speaker, Marie Smith Jones, 80, was still alive in

1 998.

20. Marie-Lucie Tarpent 1997. Southern

Tsimshian is probably the last "language" in the

Jesup area to be "discovered" by John Dunn around

1975; see Dunn 1979:62-3.

21. For the Russian side in 1897, see especially Patkanov 1 91 2, a remarkable and important

source.

22. See, for example, Krauss 1980:18-24,

94-6; also Alton 1998, a dissertation that extensively documents U. S. Federal and Alaska Native

language policy and its effects, for Alaska; and

Levine and Cooper 1976 for British Columbia, an

important source.

23. See, for example Hunt 1975; Krauss

1994:366; Vdovin 1965:258-62.

24. See, for example Krauss 1980:15-7,

1 990:206-1 1 , for Alaska; and Vdovin 1 965:258-

62 for failure of missions to the Chukchi.

25. Krauss 1980:21-4, 95-7; 1997:5-19, 23-

34; Thompson and Kinkade 1990.

26. Vakhtin 1992:13-4; Al'kor 1932, especially pp. 48-9, 56-7, 102-3.

27. These counts were done in large part by

myself, in 1 990, with kind permission from Galina

Sergeevna Mishchenko to enter the stacks at the

Leningrad Public Library annex at Kupchino for ethnic literatures, an official depository for all such

publications, where I simply counted the items

for each language present.

28. See e.g., Savoskul 1978, especially pp. 145-8; Avrorin 1970; Chichio 1985:80.

29. Vakhtin 1992:17-23; Krauss 1980:47-9.

30. G. A. Menovshchikov, L. Aynana, and others, personal communications 1985, 1990; see

also Chichio 1990: 55.

31. Krauss ] 997:] 3-9, 27-34; Krasnaia kniga

iazykov narodov Rossii 1994:69, 32, 70, 37, and

especially personal communications of Toshiro

Tsumagari, Viktor Atknin 1994.

32. For circumpolar overview and viability status of all Northern languages, see Krauss 1997.

33. I have written a number of articles about

the impending global collapse of linguistic diversity, e.g., Krauss 1 992, 1 996.

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1919 Les Ainou des lies Kouriles. Journal ofthe Col- lege ofScience, Tokyo Imperial University 42:] -337,

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1960 Russian Borrowing in Kamchadal. Orbis

9(1):83-109.

M. E. KRAUSS 22 1

54/WaldemarJochelson, Norman Buxton, and Waldemar Bogoras in San Francisco before their departure

for Siberia, spring 1 900. Studio photo (AMNI-i 38343)

223
55/ Norman C. Buxton in Cizhiga, Siberia, flanked by the local Russian officer and his secretary, Spring 1 90

(AMNH 22089)

224
57/ Shestakova, a Koryak winter settlement at Penzhina Bay, Siberia, winter 190i. Norman Buxton,

photographer (AMNH 22065)

225
58/Native dog-teams in Markovo, Anadyr River valley, winter 1901. Norman Buxton,

photographer (AMNH 22053)

59/ The town of Markovo, Anadyr River valley, winter 1901. Norman Buxton, photographer (AMNH

22051)

226
60/ Mr. Nikolai Sokolniliov, commanding officer of the Anadyr District, with Native

children. Markovo, winter 1901. Norman Buxton, photographer (AMNH 22054)

6 1/Dried salmon on the sled, used for both human and dog food. Markovo, winter 1901. Norman Buxton, photographer (AMNH 22065; AMNH 22055)

227
62/A group of Yakut (Sakha) children, 1902. Photographer, WaldemarJochelson (AMNH 1 1015)

228
229
64/ltelmen poet Anatoly Levkovsky, with his wife Tatiana and son Nikolai. Photographer, Nelson Hancock

230
65/Respected Itelmeti elder and educator, Tatiana Petrovna Lukashkina was born

in the village ofSopochnoe. She remembered fondly growing up there under the tutelageofher blind grandmother, Maria Vasil'evna Pavlutskaia. Photographer,

Nelson Hancock
66/ The village ofKovran in 1 994 from across the Kovran River. Photographer, Ingrid Summers

67/Store closed, Verkhne Khairiuzovo, February, 1994. This became an increasingly frequent occurrence. It was sometimes rumored that the store was closed during usual opening hours because ofthe drunkenness ofthe storekeeper. But

it also began to be closed simply because there was nothing to sell. This store owned by the Fishing Cooperative went

entirely out ofbusiness. Photographer, David Koester

mmm

232
68/The remains ofthe Kovran clubhouse (dom kul'turyj. Photographer, David Koester

69/ The village of Verkhne Khairiuzovo, summer of 1 992. Photographer, David Koester

233
234
7 1/ltelmen elders Anastasia (Nadia) Phtchina, Aleksandm Krasnoiarova and Polina Popova from Kovran, at an Itelmen gathering in / 995. Photographer, Nelson Hancock

235
236
73/ The village ofKirganik, on the Kamchatka River in central Kamchatka, is another site that indigenous

peoples are re-inhabiting. Closed in the 1 960s, Kirganik

is now a summer home to a small number of indig- enous Kamchadals, such as Aleksandr Tolman, shown

here in the summer of200 1 . As the regional economy

continues to worsen, some people are choosing to move

permanently to Kirganik, as it provides better access

to fish andgame. Photographer, Nelson Hancock

74/ Afanasii Reshetnikov,

another ofKirganik's elderly

resettlers, in front of his house. 1 997. Photographer,

Nelson Hancock

237
75/Family ofthe Chiefofthe Tundra Yukagirband, winter 1902. Photographer, WaldemarJochelson (AMNH / 754).
Cjcnctlc prehi'stom of Paieoasi'atic-speakin

ropulat,on. of Northeastern S^bena and

their j^eiationships to f\jative /Xmericans

THEODORE G. SCHURR

AND DOUGLAS C. WALLACE

Franz Boas initiated the first systematic exploration of

the population relationships across Bering Strait with

the launch of thejesup North Pacific Expeditions (JNPE)

of 1 897-1 902. Assuming that the ancestral home of

the American Indians was Asia, Boas was eager to

establish the links between aboriginal groups residing

in Siberia and the New World, and to elucidate the

processes by which these relationships developed. To

this end, the JNPE collected an enormous amount of

cultural and linguistic data from populations inhabiting the northern regions of both sides of the North

Pacific, including folk tales, grammars, songs, artifacts, masks, boats, dwellings, and clothing (Crowell 1988;

Fitzhugh 1 988; Curvich 1 988; Krupnik 1 988; Rousselot

et al. 1988). The similarities in folklore, shamanistic

practices, cultural traditions, types of dwellings, decorative motifs, and languages across Bering Strait convinced Boas (1 903, 1 905), Bogoras (1 902), and Jochel- son (1908, 1926) that northeastern Siberians were much closer to American Indians than to other Asian/

Siberian peoples.

Furthermore, Boas believed that the physical

differences between populations would reveal their

relationships in the present, which, in turn, would

refiect their origins and relationships in the past (Boas

1912, 1928). To test these ideas. Boas and his col- leagues took measurements of body and facial features of thousands of individuals from dozens of

ethnic populations within a 10-year span (Boas 1905;

Jantz et al. 1 992; Ousley and Jantz 2001 ). From these

data, they concluded that populations of the North

Pacific constituted a single racial type which originated

from a common cultural and linguistic tradition that was formerly more widespread than at present, en- compassing Northeast Asia, Alaska, and the Northwest

Coast of North America (Boas 1905, 1912, 1928;

Jochelson 1926). However, the exact links between

Siberian and Northwest Coast populations and the Eskimo were less clear, with the Aleut falling some- where in the middle of the two geographic extremes. Based on these findings. Boas proposed that ancient Asians initially migrated across a land bridge to America, and were subsequently cut off for a long

period of time by glaciers, thereby allowing the differentiation of the distinctive and heterogeneous American physical types. Later, when the glaciers retreated,

the land bridge was opened up again and Americans

flowed back into Asia until they met "Mongoloid " populations migrating from the south and west, a concept

which became known as the "Americanoid" theory

(Bogoras 1 902; Jochelson 1908; Boas 1912, 1928). In

this model, the back migration of American cultures from east to west across the North Pacific produced

the Chukchi, Koryak, Kamchadal, Yukagir and Nivkh

(Gilyak) (Boas 1905). The peoples on either side of

the North Pacific were then separated at Bering Strait by the intrusion of the Eskimo, a people who were

culturally and morphologically distinct and purportedly originated in Central Canada (Boas 1 905, 1912),

with further diffusion between northern populations

being prevented by this "Eskimo wedge" (Collins 1 937;

Dumond, this volume).

239
Table 9/ Siberian Populations Analyzed for Genetic Variation

Population N n Field Collection Site(s) Collection

Date(s)

Sample

Collection

Ref

Siberian Yupik 79 79 Anadyr, Providenya, & 1994-5 Sukernik 1 Sireniki; Chukchi Autonomous

District, Magadan Region

Siberian Yupik >102 70 New Chaplino, Uelen, & 1979-82 Sukernik et al. 2, 3

Sireniki; Chukchi Autonomous

District, Magadan Region

Coast Chukchi 66 66 Anadyr, Providenya, & 1994-5 Sukernik 1 Sireniki; Chukchi Autonomous

District, Magadan Region

Reindeer 515 70 Rytkuchi & Amguyema; 1977-9 Sukernik et al. 3, 4

Chukchi Chukchi Autonomous District,

Magadan Region; Middle

Pakhachi & Achayvayam;

Koryak Autonomous District,

Kamchatka Region

Koryak 104 104 Tymlat, Ossora, & Karaga; 1993 Schurr and 5 Koryak Autonomous District, Sukernik

Kamchatka Region

Koryak 51 51 Voyampolka & Kovran; Koryak 1996 Schurr, 5 Autonomous District, Sukernik &

Kamchatka Region Starikovskaya,

Itel'men 47 47 Voyampolka & Kovran; Koryak 1996 Schurr, 5 Autonomous District, Sukernik &

Kamchatka Region Starikovskaya,

Nivkh 57 57 Nekrasovka & Rybnovsk; 1991 Sukernik and 3

Sakhalin Region Starikovskaya

Udegey 45 45 Gvaysugi; Primor'ye Region 1992 Sukernik and 3

Starikovskaya

Uichi/Nanay 87 87 Old and New Bulava; 1997 Sukernik and 6

Khabarovsk Region Starikovskaya

Negidal 14 14 Old Bulava, Vladimirovka; 1996 Sukernik and 6

Khabarovsk Region Starikovskaya

Yukagir 68 27 Andryushkino & Nelemnoye; 1986-7 Sukernik et al. 3 Yakut-Sakha Republic

Even 375 43 Sebyan-Kujhal & Beryozovka; 1990 Sukernik et al. 3. 7

Yakut-Sakha Republic

Nganasan 700 49 Novaya, Ust-Avam, & 1974-5, Sukernik et al. 3. 8. 9

Volochanka; Taymyr 1984

Autonomous District,

Krasnoyarsk Region

Evenk 250 51 Suringa & Polygus; Evenk 1991-2 Sukernik et al. 3

Autonomous District,

Krasnoyarsk Region

Northern Altai 30 28 Suronash, Tuloi, & Artybash; 1 994 Sukernik and 1 Gorno-Altai Republic Starikovskaya

Ket 23 23 Sulamai; Evenk Autonomous 1992 Sukernik et al. 10

District, Krasnoyarsk Region

Selkup 50 - 20 Farkovo; Krasnoyarsk Oblast 1990 Sukernik et al. 3,11

TOTALS 2,663 931

Note; 'N' = original number ofsamples taken during the initial period offield research, and 'n'- number ofsamples

analyzed for mtDNA variation. The 'Field Collection Site(s)' are indicated by village then administrative district and

region. 'Ref = References: I = Starikovskaya et al. (1 998); 2 = Sukernik and Osipova 0982); 3 « Sukernik et al. (1981); 4 = Torroni et al. (1993b): 5 = Schurr et al. (1999); 6 = Schurr et al. (2000); 7 - Posukh et al. (1990); 8 -

Karaphet et al. (1 981); 9 = Osipova and Sukernik (1 983); 1 = Sukernik et al. (1 996); 1 1 - Sukernik et al. (1992).

240 PEOPLES, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ GENETICS
Although not confirmed through systematic statistical analyses until recently, these preliminary findings of the JNPE posed a series of hypotheses about

Siberian and Native American origins and affinities that

have formed the basis of subsequent studies of population relationships in this region. What all of these

later analyses have attempted to explicate are the number of migrations or population expansions which entered the New World and gave rise to Paleoindians;

the timing of these migrations, i.e., how early the Americas were colonized; and from where in Asia or Siberia

the progenitors of these aboriginal peoples originated.

In what follows, we describe how the modern molecular genetic data obtained from aboriginal populations of Siberia, in particular, those from Chukotka and

Kamchatka, may be used to test the hypotheses about

the origins and diversity of eastern Siberians and their

evolutionary relationships with Native Americans that were raised in the JNPE investigations (Figs. 62, 63). Although there is a burgeoning literature on Y-chromo- some variation in indigenous Siberians and Native

Americans, we focus here on mitochondrial DMA

(mtDNA) diversity in these populations.

The body of data brought to bear on these questions derives from a large number of anthropological

genetic studies conducted among various aboriginal

Siberian populations by Dr. Rem I. Sukernik, his colleagues at the Institute of Cytology and Genetics,

Novosibirsk, and his collaborators, over the past twenty

years, including us from Emory University (Table 9). All

of the recent molecular data that are the focus of this paper were obtained from these samples in the laboratory of Dr. Douglas C. Wallace, Center for Molecular

Medicine, Emory University. These samples represent over a dozen different ethnic groups that occupy a wide geographic expanse of northern Asia, with a strong

eastern Siberian emphasis. As such, this data set permits the direct comparison of molecular genetic infor- mation with the craniometric and anthropometric data

that were collected from many of these same populations by members of the JNPE.

Table 1 0/ Haplogroups in Native Siberian and East Asian

Populations

ndpiuy ruupb roiy ii lUi pi 1 r\cbiriLiion ^iicb

AACCD n DD L.*jii-iKNA ' iniergenic y-Dp

eiciion, + 1 DD I / c

V-nu

F -1 2406h/-l 2406o (-9052n/

-9053f), -i-16517e C -h4830n/-(-4831f, +1 0394c,

+ 10397a, -h16517e H -7025a

Y +7933j, -8391e, -t-10394c, -^16517e Z -I-10394C, +10397a, -i-l 1074c,

-H1651 7e

Note.' The polymorphic restriction sites are numbered from

the first nucleotide ofthe recognition sequence according

to the published sequence (Anderson et al. 1981). The

restriaion enzymes used in the analysis are designated by

the following single-letter code: a, Alul; c, Ddel; e, Haelll; f

Hhal; g, Hinfl; h, Hpa/; j, Mbol; n, Haell; o, Hindi. Sites separated by a diagonal line indicate either simultaneous

site gains or site losses for two different enzymes, or a

site gain for one enzyme and a site loss for another be- cause ofa single common nucleotide substitution.

Mitochondrial DNA Variation in

Paleoasiatic-speaking Populations

Among Paleoasiatic-speaking populations, six distinct

haplogroups have been identified' . These include three

of the five haplogroups observed in Native Americans

(A, C, and D), and three additional mtDNA lineages (C,

Y, and Z) which are present in Asian populations (Table

10)^. Each of these haplogroups is defined by both

restriction fragment length polymorphisms (RFLPs) and

control region (CR) sequence polymorphisms (Table 1 1 ),

with several different CR sublineages usually present

within each haplogroup. The haplogroups and their

constituent haplotypes, as well as their associated

CR sublineages, have specific distributions in Native

Siberian and Native American populations that suggest genetic relationships between them.

Chukotkan Populations

The majority of Chukchi and Siberian Yupik (Eskimo)

haplotypes belong to haplogroups A and D (Tables

T. C. SCHURR AND D. C. WALLACE 24 1
Table 1 // CR Sequence Sublimeages in Siberian and Native American Populations

Haplo- group CR Sublineage Polymorphic Nucleotides

1611 IT, 16192T, 16223T, 16290T,

16319A, 16362C

161 1 IT, 1 6223T, 16265G, 16290T,

16319A, 16362C

16223T, 16290T, 16319A, 16362C

1611 IT, 16223T, 16290T, 16319A,

16362C

16223T, 16298C, 16327T, 16519C

16124C, 16223T, 16298C, 16327T,

16519C

16093C, 16189C, 16223C, 16261T,

16288C, 16298C, 16519C

16223T, 16298C, 16325C, 16327T,

16519C

16223T, 16362C

16093C, 16173T, 16223T, 16319A,

16362C

16129A, 16223T, 16271T, 16362C

16223T, 16325C, 16362C

16017C, 16093C, 16129A, 16223T,

16519C

16126C, 16189C, 16231C, 16266T,

16519C

16129A, 16185T, 16223T, 16224C,

16260T, 16298C, 16519C

Note ; The polymorphic nucleotides are reported as nucleotide changes relative to the published reference sequence (Anderson etal. 1981).

I

IV

I

II

IV

I

II

III iV

I

I

12, 1 3). In both Chukotkan populations, the frequencies of haplogroup A haplotypes are found to be

consistent with those observed in the Yupik people

from St. Lawrence Island and southern Alaska, and

are similar to the frequency of this mtDNA lineage in Na-Dene Indians (Haida, Dogrib) and Amerindians

from the Northwest Coast of North America (Bella Coola,

Nuu-Chah-Nulth). Conversely, the Aleut differ from the

Siberian Yupik and Alaskan Alutiiq and Yup'ik in exhibiting haplogroup D mtDNAs at the highest frequency

(Merriwether et al. 1 995; Rubicz et al. 2001 , in press; Derbeneva et al. 2002). In addition, the Chukchi have

haplogroup C, G and Y mtDNAs (Derenko et al. 1 997,

1998; Starikovskaya et al. 1998; Schurr et al. 2001),

which are also present in the Koryak and Itelmen. Based on what is known of Eskimo family histories, the

low frequency of haplogroup C mtDNAs in Siberian Yupik could have been obtained through gene flow

from the Chukchi. However, haplogroup C mtDNAs

are also observed in Alaskan Eskimo populations

(Merriwether et al. 1 995), making it possible that these

haplotypes were part of the genetic stock of ancestral Eskimo, albeit present in low frequencies.

Kamchatkan Populations

Haplogroup A, C, and D encompass around forty-two

percent of Koryak mtDNAs but only twenty percent

of Itelmen mtDNAs, with the remainder belonging to haplogroups C, Y, and Z (Derenko et al. 1997; 1998;

Schurr et al. 1999) aabie 12). Although the Koryak

and Itelmen are more genetically similar to each other

than to any other Siberian population, and share founding haplotypes from haplogroups C, C, Y, and Z, they

also exhibit statistically significant differences in haplogroup frequencies and haplotype distribution, implying some degree of genetic differentiation between

them (Schurr et al. 1 999). The CR sequence data also

reveal recent gene flow between the two Paleoasiaticspeaking populations (Schurr et al. 1 999), confirming

previous observations of population contact between

them (Antropova 1 964a, 1 964b; Krasheninnikov 1 972;

Arutiunov 1 988a; Krushanov 1 993). These results support linguistic and culture evidence which indicates

that Itelmen and Koryak populations arose from temporally distinct expansions into the Kamchatka Peninsula (Vasil'evskii 1971 ; Arutiunov 1 988a; Arutiunov and

Sergeev 1 990; Dikov 1 990).

In contrast, the Reindeer and Coastal Chukchi

gropus show much higher frequencies of haplogroup

A, C, and D mtDNAs (Table 1 3; Torroni et al. 1 993b;

Starikovskaya et al. 1 998; Schurr 1 998). Based on

these data, the three studied Chukchi populations re- semble each other more than any of them do to the

Koryak or Itelmen. Furthermore, the intermediate frequencies of haplogroup A, C, and D mtDNAs in the

Reindeer Chukchi groups relative to the Koryak and

the Coastal Chukchi is consistent with the known historical expansion of Reindeer Chukchi south across

the Koryak Mountain Range, during which local Koryak

tribes were at least partially absorbed (Bogoras 1 904;

242 PEOPLES, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ GENETICS
Jochelson 1908), as well as documented gene flow between the Coast Chukchi and Siberian Yupik (Sukernik

and Osipova 1 982).

Mitochondrial DNA Variation

in Eastern Siberian Populations

Among other Native Siberian groups, mtDNAs belonging to haplogroup C

are found primarily in eastern populations, specifically the Even, Yukagir, and

Nganasan (Table 1 3). These results,

along with the higher frequencies of haplogroup C mtDNAs in the Chukchi,

Koryak, and Itelmen, imply a considerable degree of genetic contact be- tween eastern Siberian and

Paleoasiatic-speaking groups from

Kamchatka and Chukotka. This interpretation is supported by ethnographic evidence of contact, trade,

and conflict among eastern Siberian populations

Cochelson 1 908, Antropova 1 964a; Krushanov 1 993).

By contrast, haplogroup Y mtDNAs are absent in most

eastern Siberian populations, but occurred at a high

frequency in the Nivkh and were present at polymorphic frequencies in the Udegey, Nanay, Ulchi, Negidal,

Korean, Ainu, and Japanese fTorroni et al. 1 993b; Horai

et al. 1 996; Schurr et al. 1 999, 2000).

The remaining "Other" mtDNAs in the Chukchi and

eastern Siberian groups probably belong to haplogroup

Z, with the highest frequency of these mtDNAs occurring in the Even and the Chukchi of the Pakhachi River

group. This interpretation is supported by CR sequence

data from another Even population (Derenko et al.

1 997, 1 998). Because these mtDNAs are also present

at low frequencies in the Nganasan and Yukagir, they

could have originated in Tungusic-speaking populations and then spread to other ethnic groups through

contact in the past several millennia. If correct, this

interpretation would be supported by ethnographic

Table 1 2/ Haplogroup Frequencies in Eastern Pacific Rim Populations

POPULATION n A B C D C Other Ref

Frequency (%) Paleoasiatic: Chukchi 66 68.2 — 10.6 12.1 .9.1 — 1 Eskimo-Aleut:

Siberian Yupik 79 77.2 — 2.5 20.3 — — 1 Savoonga Yupik 49 93.9 — — 2.0 — 4.1 2 Gambell Yupik 50 58.0 — 14.0 26.0 — 2.0 2 Old Harbor Alutiiq 1 1 5 61.7 3.5 — 34.8 — — 2 Ouzinkie Alutiiq 41 73.2 — 4.9 14.6 — 7.3 2

Pribilof Is. Aleut 72 25.0 — 1.4 66.7 — 6.9 2 Na-Dene:

Dogrib 1 54 90.9 2.0 — — 7.1 2 Haida 38 92.1 7.9 — — 3 ndiud o c

C. J 96.0 4.U 4

Amerindians:

Bella Coola 32 78.1 6.3 9.4 6.3 3 Bella Coola 25 60.0 8.0 8.0 20.0 4.0 4

Nuu-chah-nulth 63 44.4 3.2 19.0 22.2 1 1.1 5 Nuu-chah-nulth 15 40.0 6.7 13.3 26.7 13.3 4

Note.- 'Ref = References: / = Staril<ovsl<aya et al. ( 1 998); 2 = Merriwether

et al. (1995); 3 = Ward et al. (1993); 4 = Torroni et al. (1 993a); 5 = Ward et

al. (1991). Other = Other haplotypes, i.e., those which do not belong to the haplogroups identified in the table but may have different lineal affiliations

evidence indicating considerable assimilation of Yukagir

populations by the Even (Arutiunov 1 988c), and cultural and genetic contacts between Even and Koryak

along the northern Sea of Okhotsk coast, due to the expansion of the Even into that region during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries Cochelson 1908;

Antropova 1964a; Arutiunov 1988c).

In this regard, we now know that haplogroup Z

occurs in populations spanning the entire breadth of

northern Eurasia. It is observed as far west as the Saami

of Finland (Sajantila et al., 1 995), also occurs among

the Udmurt, Tatar, Bashkir, and Mari of the Volga-Uralic

region (Meinila et al., 2001; Bermisheva et al., 2002),

and in seen in a number of eastern Siberian populations (Table 1 3). Based on its distribution, haplogroup

Z could possibly have accompanied the expansion of

Neolithic herding cultures throughout Eurasia. Another trend seen in these data is that central

Siberian populations exhibit genetic profiles that are

quite different from those of eastern Siberian groups. Although haplogroup A-D mtDNAs are present at varying frequencies in the Mansi, Ket, Selkup, and Northern

T. C, SCHURR AND D. C. WALLACE 243
Table 1 3/ Haplogroup Distribution in West Pacific Rim and Siberian Populations

Population n B D H J M 0th Ref

Coastal

Chukchi

Reindeer

Chukchi

Amguema

Chukchi

Pakhachi

Chukchi

Koryak*

Reindeer

Koryak

Maritime

Koryak

Itelmen

Nivkh

Udegey

Nanay

Ulchi Negidal Even

Yukagir

Nganasan

Evenk

Tofalar

Tuvan

Buryat

Northern

Altai Ket

Selkup

Korean

Taiwanese

Han

66

70

24

46

1 55

89

54

47

57

45

14

37

13

43

27

49

5127

43

24

28

23

20

13

20

68.2

28.6

37.5

23.9

5.2 5.6

5.6

6.4

2.0

3.9

4.3

Haplogroup Frequencies {%)

7.7 7.7

10.6 12.1 —

21.4 12.6 —

14.9

17.8

7.4 59.3

17.4

9.1

7.0 - — 1.4 25.7

16.7 8.3 _ 16.7 2

10.9 10.9 2.2 30.4 2

1.3 41.3 _ _ 9.7 _ 5.8 _ 3

1.1 _ 43.8 _ _ 7.9 10.1 3

1.9 37.0 14.8 3

68.1 4.3 6.4 3 28.1 5.3 64.9 1 .8 2 8.9 73.3 2 42.9 7.1 14.3 21 .4 10.8 10.8 37.8 1 3.5 23.1 1 5.4 7.7 1 5.4 7.7

7.0 2.3 32.6 2,3 33.3 3.7 3.7 2,3 36.7 4.1 2.0 2.0 12.2 2.0 2,3 9.8 2.0 2 11.1 22.2

23.3 2.3 2.3 1 1.6 2.4

9.1 4.2 25.0 2.3 2.3 14.3 3.6 10.7 7.1 21.4 3.5 34.8 4.3 17.4 60.9 3,5 30.0 35.0 2.3 23.1 1 5.4 23.1 7.7 15.4 6

5.0 10.0 45.0 6

Note.- n = sample size, and 0th = 'Other' haplotypes, i.e., those which do not belong to the haplogroups identified in the

table but may have different lineal affiliations. The asterisk C') indicates that 12 individuals were not certain of their ethnicity in terms ofMaritime versus Reindeer Koryak, but included in the totals for all Koryaks. 'Ref = 'Reference': I = Starikovskaya et al. (1998); 2 = Torroni et al. (1993b); 3 = Schurr (1998); 4 = Schurr et al. (1999); 4 = Sukernik et

al. (1996); 5 = Ballinger et al. (1992).

Altayan, the majority of their haplotypes belong to

other mtDNA lineages (Torroni et al. 1 993b; Sukernik

et al. 1 996; Derbeneva et al. 2002a; Schurr et al. 2003).

These populations also largely lack mtDNAs belonging to haplogroups G, Y, and Z (Torroni et al. 1993b;

Sukernik et al. 1 996; Derbeneva et al. 2002a; Schurr et

al. 2003). In fact, based on their RFLP composition,

most of these haplotypes appear not to be of East

Asian origin (Table 1 3). Instead, all of the central Siberian populations exhibit mtDNAs from West Eurasian

haplogroups H and U (Schurr 1 998; Derbeneva et al. 2002a; Schurr et al. 2003), with the remaining haplotypes belonging to other West Eurasian haplo-groups.

These results clearly indicate that western/central

Siberian populations are distinctive from eastern

Siberian populations, and appear to have mtDNAs of

244 PEOPLES, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ GENETICS
Hapio- Geographic

group Region

BC

D

C

Y

Z

Siberia

America

America

Siberia

America

Siberia

America

Siberia

Siberia

Siberia

botli ancient Eurasian and

Asian origin as part of their

overall genetic composition.

When these differences in haplogroup composition

among Native Siberian populations were statistically analyzed, several distinct population groupings reflecting the

regional differences amongst

them were observed (Fig. 76). These included branches leading to Chukotkan groups, Kamchatkan groups, UralicTungusic groups, and central

Siberian groups. The closeness of the Yukagir to

Tungusic-speaking groups probably reflected the recent assimilation of the former populations by the Even (Arutiunov 1988c), with the Nganasan showing

intermediate position between the Uralic-Tungusic and

central Siberian clusters due to having haplotypes in common with each set of populations. Interestingly,

the Nivkh were positioned away from the rest of the

eastern Siberians, and clustered with the Koreans, who

also had haplogroup D, C, and Y haplotypes (Ballinger

et al. 1992; Horai et al. 1996). Similarly, the Udegey

were something of an outlier relative to other Siberian

populations, and clustered with the Taiwanese Han,

who also had significant frequencies of "other" mtDNAs

with similar mutational characteristics as those present

in the Udegey, although not belonging to the same

exact haplogroups, since most of those present in the Udegey belong to haplogroup M (Torroni et al. 1 993b).

Genetic Discontinuity of Paleoasiatic-speakers

and Native Americans

Given the overall pattern of genetic divergence in Siberia, it was not surprising that a comparison of the

haplotypic diversity of Paleoasiatic-speaking and Native American groups revealed a striking discontinuity

between these populations.

Table 1 4/ Sequence Divergence ofSiberian and Native American Haplogroups

n N Sequence Divergence

Divergence {%) Time (YBP)

10 119 0.0280 12,714 - 9,645

46 189 0.0789 35,550 - 26,969

30 99 0.0391 1 5,205 - 1 1,534

14 123 0.0433 19,686 -14,934

31 72 0.1223 54,009 - 40,972

13 47 0.1115 50,664 - 38,434

16 62 0.0565 25,682 -19,483

1 1 106 0.0239 10,855 - 8,234

7 58 0.0138 6,864 - 5,207

4 12 0.0209 9,495 - 7,203

Note.' n = number of haplotypes, and N = number of individual mtDNAs, for each

haplogroup. The sequence divergence estimates were weighted by the number ofindi- viduals within each haplogroup. Divergence times were calculated by multiplying the haplogroup sequence divergences by the mtDNA evolutionary rate of 2.2-2.9% per

MYR (Torroni et al. 1 994a).

Haplogroup Distribution

Although having a number of haplogroup A, C, and D

haplotypes, the Chukchi, Koryak, and Itelmen, as well

as the Siberian Yupik, are not closely genetically related to Native American populations. In fact, they

actually share only the founding haplotypes from

haplogroups A and C with Amerindian groups, and,

based on CR sequence data, these do not appear to

be identical to comparable mtDNAs from Native American populations. Otherwise, Paleoasiatic-speaking and

North Pacific Rim groups exhibit a number of population- or region-specific haplotypes in each of these

haplogroups, which apparently arose in their ancestral

populations independent of those occurring in Paleoindian groups (Ward et al. 1991, 1993; Torroni et al.

1 992, 1 993b; Shields et al. 1 993; Starikovskaya et al.

1998; Schurr et al. 1999). Therefore, the majority of

these mtDNAs cannot be the same as the founding

haplotype in New World populations, and instead, must

have arisen after the colonization of the New World.

This degree of genetic differentiation of Siberian and Native American populations provides evidence

for at least two major expansions of ancient Beringian

populations into northern North America before and

after the last major period of glaciation, the timing of

which are mirrored by the different divergence values

T. C. SCHURR AND D. C. WALLACE 245
for haplogroup A in Siberia and the Americas (Table

1 4). The estimated sequence divergence for this haplogroup in Siberia is 0.028 percent, a value considerably

less than that for the Americas, 0.079 percent. These

values give correspondingly different divergence times

for Siberia (1 3,000-1 0,000 years before present (YBP)) and the Americas (36,000-27,000 YBP). This apparent

discrepancy is largely attributable to almost exclusively

Chukotkan haplotypes being present in the haplogroup

A estimate for Native Siberians. In fact, the three esti- mates of the genetic divergence of haplogroup A in

Siberian and Native American populations, one for Chukotkan groups (0.029 percent; 1 2,727-9,655 YBP),

Na-Dene Indians (0.021 percent; 9,545-7,241 YBP), and

Amerindians (0.079percent; 35,909-27,241 YBP) (Torroni et al. 1 992; Starikovskaya et al. 1 998; Schurr et al.

1 999), show very clearly the extent of diversity which

has developed between them, not just within the haplogroup itself. Thus, while these divergence estimates

do not give exact times for the ages of specific ethnic

groups, they provide a temporal framework in which

to view the emergence of the ancestral populations

for the three major Native American linguistic divisions.

In addition, haplogroup B mtDNAs are absent in

the Koryak and Itelmen, as well as in the Chukchi and

Siberian Yupik (Torroni et al. 1 993b; Starikovskaya et

al. 1 998; Schurr et al. 1 999). In fact, haplogroup B is

absent in almost all eastern Siberian populations (Shields

et al. 1992; Petrishchev et al. 1993; Torroni et al.

1993b), excepting those inhabiting the southern

margin of Siberia adjacent to Mongolia and northern

China, where low frequencies of deletion haplotypes

appear (Petrishchev et al. 1993; Kolman et al. 1996;

Sukernik et al. 1 996). Conversely, this mtDNA lineage

is present in almost all Amerindian populations at low

to moderate frequencies (Schurr et al. 1990; Ward et

al. 1991, 1993; Torroni et al. 1992, 1993a, 1994a;

Merriwetheretal. 1995; Lorenz and Smith 1994). These

results suggest that haplogroup B was never part of

the ancestral gene pool for Paleoasiatic-speaking populations, and that these groups played no role in the

dispersal of this mtDNA lineage into the New World. Furthermore, the virtual absence of haplogroup B mtDNAs in modern Eskimo, Aleut, and northern Na- Dene Indian populations (Table 11), which represent more recent expansions into North America, implies

that haplogroup B mtDNAs were not present in the

Beringian region after 1 0,000 YBP, when these populations were likely founded.

Regarding the other mtDNA lineages present in

northeastern Siberians, haplogroup C, Y, and Z mtDNAs

have not been observed in either ancient or modern

Native American groups (Schurr et al. 1 990; Torroni et

al. 1 992, 1 993a, 1 994a, b; Stone and Stoneking 1 998; Lorenz and Smith 1 996, 1 997). Therefore, populations

bearing these haplotypes must have spread in northeast Asia after the initial populating of the New World.

Consistent with this hypothesis, the divergence times

of haplogroups G, Y, and Z are shallower than those of

haplogroups A-D in Siberia and the Americas (Table

1 3). Of these Siberian mtDNA lineages, haplogroup G

is the oldest and most diverse, a result paralleled by its

broader distribution within Asia itself (Horai et al. 1 996;

Ballinger et al. 1 992; Torroni et al. 1 993b; Schurr 1 998;

Starikovskaya et al. 1998; Schurr et al. 1999, 2001;

Bermisheva et al. 2001 ; Derbeneva et al. 2002a).

CR Sublineage Distribution

The distribution of CR sublineages in Siberian and

Native Americans further highlights the genetic discontinuities between these populations. To begin with,

the primary sublineages within haplogroups A, C, and

D present in northeastern Siberians differ from those in

Native Americans (Table 1 5). In general, Paleoasiaticspeakers and North Pacific Rim populations share more

of these sublineages than either did with eastern Siberian or Native American populations. Within haplogroup

A, almost every CR sequence from these populations

has the 161 1 IT mutation that delineates "American"

from "Asian" haplotypes from this mtDNA lineage. Since

the founding CR sequence for this haplogroup is the

only mtDNA shared between the Chukchi, Siberian

246 PEOPLES, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ GENETICS
Table 1 5/ Distribution ofhaplogroup A, C and D Sublimages in Sibe- rian and Native American Populations

Haplo- CR Sequence Eastern raieo- N. Pacific Rim Amerindians

group Sublineage Siberians Asiatics Populations

A 1 VA X

II X

III

111 VA

YA

l\ / IV A; YA r 1 X

II X

111 X

IV X

D 1 X

II X X

111 X

IV X

Note; 'Eastern Siberians' include Nivkh, Udegey, and Evenk; Paleoasiatics' include Itelmen, Koryak, and Chukchi; 'North Pacific Rim Populations' include

Siberian andAlaskan Yupik, Alaskan Inuit, and Na-Dene Indians; and 'Amerindians'

include NWCoast and all other Amerindian populations

Yupik, Alaskan Alutiiq and Yup'ik, Na-Dene Indians, and

Amerindians (Ward et al. 1991, 1993; Shields et al.

1 993; Starikovskaya et al. 1 998), it clearly demarcates

the occurrence of the 161 1 1T mutation in haplogroup

A mtDNAs, hence, the initial population expansion which

brought them to the New World.

Several other polymorphic nucleotides identify/ specific sublineages of haplogroup A. The 16192T mutation distinguishes a set of mtDNAs that are found only

in the Koryak, Chukchi, Siberian Yupik, Alaskan Alutiiq

and Yup'ik, Aleut, and Na-Dene Indians (Table 1 4), and,

hence, delineates a "North Pacific Rim" branch of this

haplogroup. These sublineage I mtDNAs comprise sixty

percent of the Chukchi and Siberian Yupik mtDNAs

(Starikovskaya et al. 1998), as well as the majority of CR sequences in Alaskan Athapaskans, Alaskan Alutiiq

and Yup'ik (Shields et al. 1 993) and Aleut (Rubicz et al. 2001 , In Press). Such a distribution implies that these haplogroup A mtDNAs evolved in isolation from similar haplotypes in the Na-Dene Indians and Amerindians

living in the NW Coast, and that they are part of the common genetic stock that gave rise to the Chukchi,

Eskimo-Aleut, and Alaskan Athapaskans.

Within sublineage I, a Na-Dene-specific sub-branch

is also present. This sub-branch is characterized by

the np 16233Cand np 16331Ctransitions, the latter also causing the

Rsal np 16329 site loss which has

been observ/ed in Na-Dene-specific

RFLP haplotypes (Torroni et al. 1 992,

1993a). Haplotypes with this mutation occur in the Dogrib and Tlingit

of Canada, and are also present in

the Navajo and Apache of the United

States Southwest (Torroni et al.

1992, 1993), populations that de- scended from Northern Athapaskans (Haskell 1987). Based on

these data, it appears that this sub- branch of sublineage I arose early in

the differentiation of Athapaskan

populations prior to their dispersal into Alaska and

North America, and was spread to neighboring

Amerindian populations through gene flow.

In addition, all of the CR lineages having the 16265C transition form a distinct cluster that contain

exclusively Eskimoan sequences (Table 14). In fact,

every Eskimo population analyzed for CR sequence

variation exhibits mtDNAs from sublineage II (Shields

et al. 1993; Starikovskaya et al. 1998; Saillard et al.

2000). As a consequence, these mtDNAs appear to have arisen in ancestral Eskimoan populations, and

spread to various circum-arctic regions during the ex- pansion of the ancestors of today's Yupik and Inuit

people during the last several thousand years. In contrast, the third sublineage (III) lacks the 161 1 IT

mutation altogether. These CR sequences appear

largely in East Asian and eastern Siberian populations. Because they lack the 1 61 1 IT mutation, sublineage 111 mtDNAs likely represent the ancestral state for this mtDNA lineage (Table 1 1). Among Paleoasiatic-speakers, the Koryak and Itelmen have haplogroup A CR

sequences from sublineages I and III, whereas the Chukchi and Siberian Yupik lack them altogether.

Recent studies of Aleut populations also indicate

that they have unique haplogroup A sequences (Rubicz

T. C. SCHURR AND D. C. WALLACE 247
Amguyema Chukchi

Coast Chukchi

Siberian Eskimo

L Pakhachi Chukchi

Udegey

Taiwanese Han

Nivkh

Korean

N. Altaian

Ket

'Sel'kup

Nganasan

Yukagir

Evenk

Even

Maritime Koryak

Reindeer Koryak

Itel'men

76/Neighbor-Joining Tree for Aboriginal Siberian and East Asian Populations

The genetic distances used to generate this tree were estimated from RFLP

haplotype data (modified after Schurr et al. 1 999, Fig. 5).

et al. 2001 , In Press). The majority of these sequences

derive from sublineage I, with two distinct subsets also having the 16212A—C (16212C) and 16234C—

(1 6234T) transitions, both of which appear to be Aleutspecific. However, none of the Aleut sequences have

the Eskimo-specific 16265C transition (Shields et al.

1993; Starikovskaya et al. 1998; Saillard et al. 2000),

or the Athapaskan-specific 16331G transition (Shields

et al. 1 993; Torroni et al. 1 993a).

mtDNAs belonging to a fourth sublineage (IV) of

haplogroup A occur exclusively in Native American

populations (Table 1 5). Within this sublineage, the 16129A mutation defines a largely North Amerindian

cluster of haplogroup A mtDNAs which is comprised

of Haida, Nuu-Chah-Nulth, and Bella

Coola CR sequences, and, within this

cluster, a subgroup consisting of only

Nuu-Chah-Nulth mtDNAs is seen

(Shields et al 1993; Starikovskaya et

al. 1998). Another cluster defined

by the 16355T transition contained

only Haida and Bella Coola mtDNAs

(Ward et al. 1991, 1993;

Starikovskaya et al. 1998). The

uniqueness of these Haida

haplogroup A CR sequences, and

the lack of mtDNAs having the NaDene-specific 16331G transition,

explains in large part the genetic

differences previously observed

between the Haida and other Na- Dene Indian populations (Torroni et

al. 1992, 1 993b; Shields etal. 1993).

Overall, these population-specific CR

sublineages may reflect the isolation and re-emergence of remnant

populations occupying biogeographic refugia in Beringiaand southern Alaska, which existed until the end of the last glacial maximum

(Rogers et al. 1991). Moreover,

these findings imply that Amerindian populations

have become genetically differentiated from groups

residing in Arctic and Subarctic regions, and that considerable gene flow has taken place among NW Coast

populations.

Similar trends were observed for the CR sequences

of haplogroups C and D. Two sublineages in haplogroup

C bear a close resemblance to haplogroup C mtDNAs

present in Native American populations (sublineage

IV) by having the 1 6223T-1 6298C-1 6327T sequence

motif characteristic of this mtDNA lineage (Tables

11, 15). Sub-lineage I occurs predominantly in East

Asian and eastern Siberian populations, whereas the

other (II), having the additional 16124Cand 16318T

248 PEOPLES, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ GENETICS
mutations, occurs only in Paleoasiatic groups (II). Amerindian sub-lineage IV differs from these Siberian

sublineages by the presence of the 16325C mutation.

The only populations found to have similar mtDNAs

are Mongolians and Amur River populations (Kolman

et al. 1996; Schurr et al. 2001), suggesting these regions as possible source areas for ancestral Native

Americans. By contrast, the third Siberian sublineage

(III) has a quite different sequence motif than the others, and appears only in Paleoasiatic groups, possibly

reflecting its origins amongst them.

Likewise, haplogroup D has several sublineages

within it (Table 14). The first (I) occurs at very low

frequencies among Paleoasiatic-speaking groups and

Siberian Yupik, and represented the only

haplogroup D mtDNA in the Koryak (SIB40;

Starikovskaya et al. 1 998). The second

sublineage (II) occurs exclusively among

Chukotkan populations, as no similar types

are seen among Native American groups

with high frequencies of haplogroup D (Ward

et al. 1 991 , 1 993; Shields et al. 1 993). The

remaining mtDNAs from East Asian and

eastern Siberian populations formed a

sublineage (III) that had a sequence motif

most similar to haplogroup D haplotypes

in Native American populations (sub-lineage

IV), indicating that sublineage III probably

represents the ancestral state for this mtDNA lineage in Asia and the Americas.

Amerindian sublineage IV mtDNAs were

distinguished from similar Asian haplotypes by the 16325C mutation. Interestingly, the only Asian populations that were

found to possess haplogroup D mtDNAs

with the 1 632 5C mutation are Japanese and

Koreans (Horai et al. 1 996) and Amur River groups (Schurr et al. 2001 ). These findings

suggest that East Asia could be a possible

source area for these haplotypes in New

World populations.

Aleut populations also have unique haplogroup D

sequences (Rubicz et al. 2001 , In Press; Derbeneva et

al. 2002b). These sequences have the 16129A and

1 6271 C transitions defining the D2 subtype described

by Forster et al. (1996), which is defined by the

16223T-16271C-16362C motif. The D2 subtype has

previously been detected in the Chukchi and Siberian Eskimo (Starikovskaya et al. 1 998), as well as a single

Alaskan Athapaskan Indian (Shields et al. 1 993), but is

absent from Greenland Eskimos and Kamchatkan populations (Saillard et al. 2000, Schurr et al. 1999). This

pattern suggests that D2 haplotypes arose in ancestral Aleut and were disseminated to surrounding groups

through gene flow.

Koryaks

Itel'men

Ainu

Japanese

Koreans

Siberians

Yakima

Nuu-Chah-Nulth

Bella Coola

Haida

Eskimos

Chukchi

///Neighbor-joining tree for aboriginal Siberian, East Asian, and

Amerindian populations. The genetic distances used to generate this

tree were estimated from CR sequence data (Schurr et al. 1 999, Fig. 8).

T. C. SCHURR AND D. C. WALLACE 249
The phylogenetic analysis of CR sequence variation

in eastern Siberian, East Asian, and Native American

populations revealed sets of relationships which were

consistent with this assessment (Fig. 77). First, there was an obvious split between the Paleoasiatic-speaking

groups from Chukotka and Kamchatka. The Koryak

and Itelmen showed much closer genetic ties to the Ainu

and East Asian populations, whereas the Chukchi were much closer to the Siberian Yupik, Haida, and North- west Coast Amerindian populations. In addition, the contemporary Korean and Japanese populations

showed close genetic affinities, and the Ainu had genetic similarities to both groups, as seen in Horai et al.

(1996). The latter association was probably attributable to recent admixture between the Ainu and Japanese, rather than these groups having an ancient shared

ancestry.

Certain affinities among Native American populations were also evident in this analysis. All Northwest

Coast Amerindian populations clustered together, and

the Bella Coola and the Haida showed a particularly

close relationship. This close relationship seemed to

imply that the Haida were an Amerindian population

that was linguistically influenced by Na-Dene Indians,

rather than being a Na-Dene Indian group that was genetically influenced by Amerindians. However, further comparisons of genetic diversity in the Haida, Alaskan

Athapaskans, and Northwest Coast Amerindian groups

will be necessary to confirm this hypothesis.

Furthermore, eastern Siberians and the Yakima of Washington state show some degree of similarity to each other. This similarity largely results from the fact

that eastern Siberians contained a number of different

haplotypes from haplogroups A, C, and D, and these had CR sequences that were more similar to those in Amerindian populations than those in Chukotkan and

Kamchatkan populations. As a result, eastern Siberi- ans and Amerindian populations were positioned fairly

close to each other (Fig. 77). In other words, populations located some distance away from the North Pacific Rim on either side of Bering Strait tended to have

more similar CR sequences than those occupying the former Beringian region. However, it should be noted

that all of the Siberian haplotypes differed from comparable Native American haplotypes at the RFLP level.

Hence, both eastern Siberians and Amerindians appear

to have arisen from common ancestral populations,

rather than from those that expanded in this region more recently, such as Paleoasiatic groups, EskimoAleut, and Na-Dene Indians. Concomitantly, those

populations whose ancestors last occupied the former

Beringian region have become genetically differentiated from Siberian and Amerindian groups, and now

resemble each other more closely than to their putative sister groups in northern Asia and the New World. When additional CR sequences from other Native

Siberian populations are used to assess the genetic

affinities of these populations, some of these same

patterns are observed (Fig. 78). Paleoasiatic populations are split into Chukotkan and Kamchatkan groups,

while the Reindeer Koryak show similarities to the Even,

who probably influenced them culturally and genetically. The Koryak and Itelmen also show similarities to Amur River groups, who have significant frequencies

of haplogroup G and Y mtDNAs, and this may reflect

the common origins of these populations. While forming a distinct branch separate from the easternmost

populations, the Tofalar, Evenk, Buryat and Tuvan clustered together within a larger grouping that included

all eastern Siberian peoples. By contrast, the Yakut,

Northern Altayan, Ket, and Selkup clustered at some

distance from eastern Siberian populations, most likely

because of the sizeable portion of Western Eurasian

haplotypes in their mtDNA gene pool (Table 10).

Comparison of Genetic and Anthropometric Data for North Pacific Rim Populations

The results of these studies allowed a direct comparison of the patterns of biological variation among North

Pacific Rim populations based on mtDNA, nuclear DNA,

anthropometric, and craniometric data. The first notable difference between these sets of analyses was

250 PEOPLES, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ GENETICS
the relationship between the Koryak and

Itelmen. Based on mtDNA data, these two

populations show close genetic affinities

(Schurr et al. 1 999), while the principal

components (PC) analysis of JNPE anthro- pometric data shows the Kamchadal

(Itelmen) to be distantly related to other

eastern Siberian groups, including the Koryak (Comuzzie et al. 1 995). In all likelihood, this discrepancy reflects the significant level of admixture between

Itelmen and Russians since the turn of the

eighteenth century (Antropova 1964b;

Murashko 1 994), and mostly that mediated through non-Native male gene flow,

since the mtDNA data clearly show the

Itelmen to have only aboriginal genotypes

amongst them.

There were also shifting patterns of

association amongst the Paleoasiaticspeaking populations of Chukotka and

Kamchatka. Aside from the Koryak-ltelmen

closeness, the mtDNA data show the

Koryak to have some affinities with Chukchi populations, but stronger links with

populations from the Lower Amur River/

Sea of Okhotsk region farther south (Nivkh,

Udegey, Nanay, Ulchi, Negidal, Ainu). The

PC analysis of JNPE anthropometric data also reveal

affinities between the Koryak and the Even and Yukagir

(Comuzzie et al. 1 995; Ousley 1 995), associations that

are reflected in the genetic distance estimates based on mtDNA haplogroup and frequencies and CR se- quence variation in Siberian groups (Figs. 76 and 78).

Third, the relationship of the Nivkh to other eastern

Siberian and circumpolar Arctic populations differs depending on the type of analysis being conducted.

mtDNA studies indicate that the Nivkh are an outlier

relative to most eastern Siberian groups, but do have

links to both Lower Amur River, Sea of Okhotsk, and

Kamchatkan populations. By contrast, the PC analysis

Yakuts

Sel'kups

Kets

Northern Altaians

— Udegeys

Negldals

Nivkhs

Ulchi

Nanai

Itei'men

Koryaks

Reindeer Koryaks

Evens

Tofalars

SEskimos

Chukchi

Venisey Evenks

Buryats Tuvans

78/ Neighbor-Joining tree for Native Siberian and East Asian Populations.

The genetic distances used to generate this tree were based on CR sequence data from these populations (Shields et al. 1 993; Derenko et al. 1 997,

1 998; Starikov-skaya et al. 1 998; Schurr et al. 1 999, 2000,200 1 , 2003)

of JNPE anthropometric data position the Nivkh close

to both the Chukchi and Aleut (Comuzzie et al. 1 995),

or to the Alaskan Athapaskans (Ousley 1995). Al- though having a high frequency of haplogroup D, none

of these Nivkh haplotypes are closely related to those

appearing in Paleoasiatic-speaking populations. These

differences may, thus, reflect the convergence of physical features in the Nivkh and other North Pacific populations, rather than being the consequence of substantial contact and gene flow amongst them.

Fourth, the clustering of Eskimo populations varies according to the type of data being used in the analysis. One PC analysis ofJNPE anthropometric data (Ousley

T. C. SCHURR AND D. C. WALLACE
1995) suggested a link between the Labrador,

MacKenzie Delta, and Siberian Yupik, and affinities between the other Alaskan Yup'ik with Aleut and

Amerindians, whereas another showed the Siberian Yupik to be intermediate between the Koryak and

Chukchi (Comuzzie et al. 1 995). Nuclear genetic data

reveal a different pattern, with most Eskimo populations clustering together, and the Aleut diverging

from Eskimo groups (Harper 1980; Crawford et al.

1981). The mtDNA data also highlight the genetic

similarity among Eskimo populations, both Siberian and

Alaskan, and the relative closeness of Eskimo groups

and Alaskan Athapaskans, as well as the strong ties between Siberian Yupik and Chukchi (Starikovskaya et

al. 1998). These differences imply that regional interactions with eastern Siberian, Aleut, or Athapaskan

populations may have influenced the distribution of

physical features in Eskimo groups.

Fifth, the Aleut also show varying degrees of similarity to North Pacific Rim populations, depending on

the type of data being analyzed. Based on limited mtDNA data for this population, the Aleut appear to

be part of the genetic stock which emerged after the

initial peopling of the New World, although exhibiting

haplogroup A and D frequencies which distinguished

them from other Eskimoan populations. On the other

hand, PC analysis ofJNPE anthropometric data has identified affinities between the Aleut and Alaskan Yup'ik

(Ousley 1 995), or between them and Athapaskans and

Northwest Coast Amerindians (Comuzzie et al. 1 995).

Therefore, the Aleut appear to have biological characteristics that are intermediate between those of a number of populations from the North Pacific Rim, perhaps

as a consequence of their geographic isolation and

later contact with various ethnic groups.

Finally, unlike the Aleut, the Haida show rather

consistent patterns of similarity to North Pacific Rim

populations, irrespective of the type of data being

analyzed. The mtDNA data reveal the Haida to have

affinities with both Athapaskan and NW Coast Amerindian populations, although tending to be closer to

the latter groups. The same pattern is observed in the PC analysis of JNPE anthropometric data (Ousley 1 995)

and previous nuclear genetic data (Field et al. 1 988), as

well as linguistic evidence for this group (Krauss 1 988).

Thus, to a degree not seen for other Arctic populations,

all biological anthropological data for the Haida are generally concordant in revealing mixed AthapaskanAmerindian genetic and cultural influences on the formation of this tribal group, as well as certain unique

features that may have arisen as a consequence of its

geographic isolation.

Overall, these analyses confirm that single locus

genetic systems such as the mtDNA are informative

for delineating the origins and affinities of human populations, in this case, Paleoasiatic-speaking and other

eastern Siberian groups. In addition, they have shown

that certain populations cluster together on the basis

of shared maternally-inherited genetic lineages and their

constituent haplotypes, probably due to their com- mon origins and subsequent regional differentiation. These studies have further demonstrated how the

genetic substructure within these groups can be

used to piece together the population history of northeast Siberia and northern North America. However,

the uncertain relationships among some North Pacific Rim populations revealed by the comparison of mtDNA

data with those from anthropometric, craniometric,

and nuclear genetic studies indicate that data from biparentally inherited genetic systems, as well as the

uniparentally inherited Y-chromosome, are needed to more fully characterize the process of population

differentiation in these regions, and hence, test previous hypothesizes about the genetic prehistory of aboriginal Siberian groups.

Revisiting JNPE Conclusions About Northeastern Siberian Origins

Based on these molecular data, it is possible to make

a number of conclusions about the associations be- tween eastern Siberian and Native American populations, and to determine how well these findings relate

2 52 PEOPLES, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ GENETICS
to the models proposed by Boas and his colleagues at

the turn of the century. First, from a genetic standpoint,

Paleoasiatic-speakers do not appear to be closely related to Native American populations. Although having

haplogroups A, C, and D in common, Paleoasiatic-speaking and Amerindian populations share few, if any,

haplotypes from these mtDNA lineages. Such differences probably reflect the fact that the former populations expanded into northeastern Siberia following the

last glacial maximum, whereas ancestral Amerindians

had entered the New World well before this time. Thus,

from a molecular perspective, Paleoasiatic-speakers

cannot be considered "Americanoids."

Second, the genetic data reveal a dichotomy be- tween Paleoasiatic-speakers from Chukotka and those

from Kamchatka. Based on mtDNA data, the Chukchi

and Siberian Yupik have strong genetic ties with populations located across the Bering Strait from them, such

as Alaskan Eskimo and Na-Dene Indians, as well as

affinities with some northern Amerindian groups. By

contrast, the Koryak and Itelmen have stronger genetic connections with ethnic groups originating in the Lower Amur River/Sea of Okhotsk region, such as the

Nivkh, Udegey, Nanay, Ulchi, Negidal, and Ainu. These

associations suggest that Kamchatkan and Lower Amur

River populations emerged from a common gene pool some 5000-8000 years ago, or perhaps that the

emerging northern Okhotsk cultures that gave rise to

the Koryak and Itelmen subsequently influenced those

evolving from southern Okhotsk cultures. Along the same lines, the molecular data do not

reveal the presence of an "Eskimo wedge" among northeastern Siberians and Native American groups (see also Dumond, this volume). In general, Eskimo groups have

mtDNA haplotypes that are similar to those appearing

in Na-Dene Indians and Chukchi, and hence, appear to have emerged from the last inhabitants of ancient

Beringia before the flooding of the land bridge. The

mtDNA data may also suggest that Eskimo populations evolved in the Bering Sea region, perhaps in southwest Alaska, rather than north-central Canada,

as suggested by the "Eskimo wedge" model. On the

other hand, the Chukchi, Eskimo, Aleut, and Na-Dene

Indians all tend to be genetically distinctive from each

other, implying some degree of geographic isolation amongst them since the occupation of their respective homelands.

Fourth, the molecular data show both the genetic distinctiveness of Tungusic-speaking groups,

and their genetic influence on the Yukagir, Chukchi,

and Koryak. These findings are consistent with both

ethnographic evidence from northeastern Siberian groups, and the analyses of the anthropometric data

collected in this region during the JNPE. In addition,

central Siberian groups, such as the Northern Altayan,

Selkup, and Ket, are not closely linked to eastern Siberian populations, and instead show a distinct genetic

profile that includes both West Eurasian and East Asian

genotypes. These regional differences support previ- ous assertions by Boas and members of the JNPE that northeastern Siberian populations had origins and

affinities distinct from those groups located in the

interior of northern Asia, such as the Mongolian, Buryat,

Tungusic-speakers, and Yakut (Sakha), the later two

sets of populations having entered this region in relatively recent prehistory.

Finally, the mtDNA data have provided a number of

insights into the process of the peopling of the World. To begin with, they suggest a pre-glacial maximum

date (> 18,000 cal BP) for the emergence and expansion of ancestral Paleoindians into the New World (Table

1 3), as also proposed by Boas (1 905). They also suggest the occurrence of multiple population movements

across the Bering Strait during this early period of settle- ment (between 35,000-15,000 cal BP), possibly using

both interior and coastal routes (Torroni et al. 1993a,

b; Starikovskaya et al. 1 998; Schurr et al. 1 999; Schurr

and Wallace 1 999). Furthermore, as noted above, these

data are generally consistent with the glacial barrier model of Rogers et al. (1 99 1 ). According to this model, once ancestral Amerindian populations began settling

in the New World, glacial coalescence cut them off

T. C. SCHURR AND D. C. WALLACE 253
from related groups living farther north on the Beringian

land mass. The resulting ice barriers in Beringia and

North American isolated in glacial refugia the populations that would eventually develop into the EskimoAleut, Na-Dene Indians, and Amerindian populations.

Similar refugia were created within eastern Siberia, with

the concomitant population isolation leading to the linguistic and biological differentiation of the ancestral groups that gave rise to Chukotko-Kamchatkan-,

Yukagir-, Altaic-, and Uralic-speaking, populations. On

a larger scale, these glacial refugia may also have permitted the divergence of "caucasoid" and "mongoloid" populations, thereby influencing the pattern of

genetic variation throughout all of Eurasia.

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Drs. Rem I. Sukernik and Elena B.

Starikovskaya for their participation in a larger study

of Siberian and Native American origins, from which

this paper is contributed. Thanks also to Lorri Griffin and the Clinical Research Center of the Emory University School of Medicine for their assistance in the processing of blood samples, and Drs. Andy Kogelnik and

Sandro Bonatto for their assistance with the statistical

analysis of the mtDNA data. Many thanks are also due

to the hospital staff and doctors in the villages of

Ossora, Karaga, Tymlat, Voyampolka, and Kovran in Kamchatka, Russia for their assistance with this project;

the Koryak and Itelmen people from these villages for

their participation in this research and hospitality during our fieldwork in Kamchatka in 1 993 and 1 996; Dr.

Vladimir V. Slavinskiy of the Providenya hospital for his generous help and assistance with sample collection

in the Chukchi Autonomous Area; and the Chukchi and

Siberian Yupik people for their participation in this research during fieldwork in Chukotka in 1 994. This research was supported by the International Science

Foundation, the J. Worley Brown Fellowship Fund, the Leakey Foundation, the National Institutes of Health,

the National Science Foundation, the Russian Fund for

Basic Research, Sigma Xi, and The Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research.

Notes

1 . A "haplotype" is an individual mtDNA de- fined by a specific set of polymorphisms, whereas

a "haplotype group," or "haplogroup" is a set of

related haplotypes that share the same set of identifying mutations. The term "mtDNA lineage" is used interchangeably with "haplogroup" in the

text, since both denote the same genealogical

associations among mtDNAs.

2. For a description of the methods used to characterize mtDNA variation in Siberian and Native American populations, please refer to the

publications cited in the text and tables.

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1 994 Distribution of the 9-bp Mitochondrial DNA

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1 996 Distribution of Four Founding mtDNA Haplogroups among Native North Americans. American

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2001 Evidence for mtDNA Admixture between

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1989 Variances of the Average Number of Nucleotide Substitutions Within and Between Populations.

Molecular Biology and Evolution 6(3):290-300.

Osipova, Ludmilla P., and Rem I. Sukernik

1 983 Immunoglobulin Allotypes in Aboriginal Populations of the Taimir Peninsula. Journal of Immunogenetics 1 0(1 ):1 1-16. Ousiey, Stephen D.

1 995 Relationships between Eskimos, Amerindians

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1991 Native American Biological Diversity and the Biogeographic Influence of Ice Age Refugia. Journal

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256 PEOPLES, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ GENETICS
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1 998 mtDNA Analysis of a Prehistoric Oneota Population: Implications for the Peopling of the New World. American Journal ofHuman Genetics 62{SyA 1 53-70.

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1991 Extensive Mitochondrial Diversity within a

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258 PEOPLES, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ GENETICS
*]"!ie post-Jesup (3,enturt) of f^esearch o

the preKistory of fNjortheast Liberia

n

SERGEI ARUTIUNOV

The contributions of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition

(1897-1902) marl<ed a giant leap in the accumulation

of knowledge about the cultures and peoples of

Northeast Siberia. To the Russian participants of the

Expedition, their JNPE fieldwork and subsequent publication efforts were formative experiences. It also

helped transform them into professional anthropologists and key figures in the emerging field of the Russian

Siberian/North Pacific/Circumpolar research. It was thus

not surprising that some twenty years later, the former

JNPE members, particularly Waldemar Bogoras (Vladimir

Bogoraz) and Lev Shternberg, became key players in

the development of northern anthropological research

in the former Soviet Union in the 1 920s and in the early

1930s. Many other Russian Siberian anthropologists

who did not participate directly in the JNPE efforts were,

nevertheless, well informed about this venture and its

scientific results, and were deeply influenced by them

(see Krupnik 1998).

The impact of the ideas generated by Franz Boas,

the intellectual and organizational leader of the Jesup

Expedition, on this early development of Soviet/

Russian Siberian anthropology was decisive. The sub- sequent Stalinist purges and the obnoxious ideological control by the Communist Party over all kinds of

humanitarian studies in the former Soviet Union stalled and obscured this impact over almost fifty years. However, the attempts to discredit this influence

as a manifestation of "bourgeois" ideas were reflected

in propaganda statements only. The core of Siberian

anthropological research during the entire Soviet era remained primarily evolutionist in spirit and generally

Boasian in its focus and content. In was not until recently that popular though superficial post-modernist

approaches were established among a portion of

Russian anthropologists during the most-recent postSoviet years.

Three Generations of Researchers

There were several successive cohorts, or generations,

of Russian (Soviet) scholars who were active in the

study of Northeast Asia and the Russian Far East [the

Pacific Coast of Russia—ed.] following Bogoras,

Shternberg, and Jochelson. The first cohort consisted

of people born in the early 1 900s, like Maxim G. Levin,

Georgii F. Debetz, Nikolai N. Cheboksarov, abd Alexei

P. Okladnikov. The second cohort consisted primarily

of the students of this first generation, including Valerii

P. Alekseev, Dorian A. Sergeev, Rudolf F. Its, Nikolai N.

Dikov, Yurii P. Mochanov, Anatolii P. Derev-ianko, and

many others, myself included. Our cohort became active in Russian Siberian/Far East research in the early to

mid- 1 950s. In the 1 970s, the third cohort entered the

scholarly forum, and its members are currently most

active in Russian Siberian research in anthropology and

prehistory.
These three cohorts, or generations, are distinct groups of people. They can be singled out not only in

the studies of Northeast Asia, and not only in the history of Russian anthropology, in general, but perhaps

in the overall history of Soviet (as well as post-Soviet)

science. Many people, who were born between 1910

and 1 926 and who were still young in the 1 940s, were

decimated during World War II. The birth rates at the peak of the Stalinist terror and in the subsequent war

years (i.e., between 1937 and 1945) were relatively

low compared to both the preceding and the following decades. Therefore, the first generation consisted

mostly of people born between 1900 and 1913; the second generation—of those born between 1925 and

1937; and the third generation—of those born in the

late 1940s and during the 1950s, that is, well after

World War II. Perhaps, we can now identify the fourth

cohort that consists of scholars born during the 1 960s

and 1 970s. As a very promising current trend, a growing number of young anthropologists have been trained from among representatives of Native Siberian people,

including a fairly high percentage of women. In absolute numbers they are still few, but the total number of

Native people across Eastern Siberia and the Russian

Far East does not exceed 50,000 [excluding the Sakha/

Yakut people—ed.].

In general, there was a high degree of continuity

between these distinctive generations of scholars

in Siberian anthropology. The general framework of

scholarly approach, laid down by Boas, is highly visible in publications of the key JNPE participants, such

as Waldemar Bogoras, Waldemar Jochelson, and Lev

Shternberg, although the latter was not a direct JNPE

team member. It is still articulated in the subsequent

contributions by Levin, Debetz, Cheboksarov, and

others who either attended classes of some of the

"seniors" of the "Jesup Generation" [mostly courses

taught by Bogoras in Leningrad in the 1920s—ed.]

or at least were influenced by their writings. Apart

from the influence of Franz Boas in the field of cultural anthropology, important intellectual beacons

for all the Russian students in Siberian anthropology had been A. Hrdliaeka in the field of physical

anthropology and V. Cordon Childe in the area of

archaeology.

All the 'senior' scholars have greatly influenced the

next generation of Russian Siberian anthropologists.

The impact was spread not only via theoretical ap- proach, which can be generally characterized as

broadly evolutionist rather than strictly Marxist, but

also by sharing the experience and practices of field- work conducted between the late 1920s and the

1 950s in various areas of Siberia. Among other scholars of the same "post-Bogoras" generation, who were

not directly affiliated with the tradition transmitted by

Bogoras and Shternberg, was Boris O. Dolgikh. Dolgikh was even more deeply immersed in long-term field

studies in Siberia and thus, in a certain sense, he

continued the pattern of fieldwork once determined

by the participants of the Jesup Expedition. Dolgikh's

field experience and methods greatly influenced the

endeavors of his disciples of the following (World

War II) generation, such as Vladimir I. Vasil'iev, Yurii B. Simchenko, Vladilen A. Tugolukov, and others. The Joint efforts of three post-Jesup generations of

Russian Siberian scholars have elevated the status of our knowledge about physical and cultural anthropology as well as the prehistory of Northern Eurasia to a

qualitatively new and higher level compared to that of

the turn of the twentieth century. The general back- ground of this knowledge made it possible also to advance new scenarios of events that have happened

across Siberia and the Northeastern tip of Asia adjacent to North America in the course of the last three or

four millennia. These events resulted in the formation

of the current ethnic and cultural mosaics of the area,

mainly of the Chukotka and Kamchatka Peninsulas, and

the Kolyma River Basin in the interior portion of the

present-day Magadan Province (oblast). The academic

efforts and their results over some seventy years after

the publication of the main JNPE Siberian volumes

were quite impressive. Nevertheless, many questions

260 PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ PREHISTORY
still remain unresolved and many more new issues

have arisen in the course of research and studies

that could not be proposed in the time of the Jesup

Expedition a century ago.

Basic Milestones in Research in the Siberian

Northeast

One of the basic questions in cultural (pre)history of

Northeast Asia is the transition from a mainland (interior) adaptation to a maritime one, that is, when and

how the shift occurred in Arctic subsistence from hunting of inland big-game mammals to the pursuit of the

pinnipeds and the cetaceans on and off shore. So far we can trace only the more or less late stages of maritime adaptation, which undoubtedly had to be preceded by a long initial evolution. On the Russian side, archaeological studies across

the northeast section of Siberia (adjacent to Alaska

and the Bering Strait) began in 1945 by Sergei I. Rudenko. History repeats itself. At the turn of the century, in the time of the Jesup Expedition, the basic anthropological research in Siberia was conducted by

many progressive-minded social activists (often, dedicated revolutionaries), who were exiled to this remote

area by the repressive Czarist government. In the Soviet time, a still more oppressive Stalinist regime once

again exiled hundreds and thousands of liberal-minded

intellectuals and scholars to Siberia. Sergei Rudenko

was one of those exiles. Among the hardships of exile,

he found enough energy to prepare for and to design

a trip around the shores of the Chukchi Peninsula, which

he would realize when released from his exile. In 1 945,

Rudenko finally was able to undertake a long and not

too safe journey, largely in wooden and skin-boats,

with Native crews around the coasts of the Chukchi

Peninsula. All the difficulties notwithstanding, he managed to conduct a broad archaeological reconnaissance survey and also to undertake critical excavations at some sites. The results of his excavations were published in his well-known Russian monograph and were later translated into English by the

Arctic Institute of North America (Rudenko 1947,

1961).

In the mid- 1 950s, Maxim G. Levin, Dorian A. Sergeev,

and Nikolai N. Dikov began organizing numerous Russian expeditions to this area. They contributed a large

amount of archaeological and paleoanthropological

(osteological) materials that were derived from ancient

populations of the Bering Strait area and the adjacent

regions along the shores of the Chukchi Peninsula. This

work is now continued by the members of the next

cohort of scholars, such as Mikhail M. Bronstein, Kirill A.

Dneporvskii, and others.' These materials can be

matched by the data gathered by American and Western European archaeologists in Alaska and Northern

Canada, and viewed against a broader background of

recently accumulated knowledge on the origins and

distribution patterns of prehistoric human populations

in the Northern part of Asia. They have enabled us to

formulate some tentative new hypotheses about the

formation of ancient Eskimo culture(s) in the Bering Strait

area and about its impact on populations of the adjacent territories (cf. summaries in Fitzhugh and Crowell

1 988; Leskov and Muller-Beck 1 993).

The Most Important Archaeological Sites

and Cultures of Northeast Asia

A good compendium of prehistoric sites and cultures

of Northeast Siberia (Northeast Asia) was produced in two volumes by Nikolai Dikov and published more

than twenty years ago (Dikov 1 977, 1 979). One should

also consult the monograph of Ruslan Vasilievskii

(1973), and those of Yurii Mochanov (1977) and

Svetlana Fedoseeva (1980) for the adjacent inland regions, basically in Yakutia (Sakha Republic). As the basic ancient cultures and their most representative sites

across the northeast (Pacific) section of Siberia are concerned, the complex of sites excavated by Nikolai Dikov

at the Ushki Lake on Kamchatka Peninsula should be

ranked among the most important discoveries. Nu- merous cultural layers at the Ushki sites are safely

separated by stripes of volcanic ashes. This provides

S. A. ARUTIUNOV 26 1
reliable absolute and relative dates for a series of Upper Paleolithic and Neolithic cultures, which tentatively

can be compared to, and connected with, some ancestors of Amerindian, Eskaleut, and modern Paleoasiatic populations of this part of Northern Asia and

the adjacent regions in North America.

The discovery by Nikolai Dikov of the Chortov Ovrag

(Devil's Gorge) site on Wrangel Island in the Chukchi

Sea is evidence of an early maritime adaptation in the northernmost regions of Siberia at the beginning of

the 2nd Millennium BC. The excavations at the Chortov

Ovrag site produced a rough but efficient harpoon head

for hunting marine mammals. Sites of the Ust-Belsk

culture in the interior of the Chukchi Peninsula show

definite connections to the ancient residents of the Lena River Basin. The Ust-Belsk sites also indicate an

early penetration of bronze tools into the Siberian

Arctic, which were incorporated into the more or less unchanged pedestrian hunting economy typical of

the preceding cultural stages.

Numerous ancient archaeological sites have been

discovered along the Russian (Siberian) side of the Bering

Strait and in adjacent coastal areas. Of those the most

critical are the Uelen and Ekven cemeteries, excavated

by the Russian teams of Maxim C. Levin, Dorian A.

Sergeev, Sergei A. Arutiunov, and recently by an international group led by Mikhail Bronstein and Kirill

Dneprovskii. These two ancient Eskimo sites provide

infinitely rich material on the evolution of the Okvik,

Old Bering Sea, Punuk, Birnirk, and Thule variations of

the ancient Neo-Eskimo culture (see Arutjunov and Bronshtein 1 993; Bronshtein 1 993; Dumond and Bland 2002).

Non-Archaeological Evidence and Considerations

According to the hypothesis of Christy Turner (1 985,

1 988), which was based on dental features of the

American aboriginal populations, there have been

three major waves of migrations from Asia to (North)

America. One migration took place probably not later than 13,000 BP and is responsible for the ancestry

of the majority of the American Indian populations

(Amerinds), with the exception of the members of the Na-Dene linguistic family (and some related groups).

The second wave represented the ancestors of Na- Dene and can be tentatively dated to around 9000

or 8000 BP. The third wave gave birth to the EskimoAleut (Eskaleut) populations; it may be dated approximately by 4000 or even 6000 BP. From the most general viewpoint, the linguistic

composition of the huge Eurasian continent, with the

exception of its southeastern portion of mainly southern China and Indochina, can be reduced to only two

major linguistic (super-)phyla. This classification is based

upon the most radical current perspectives and concepts in historical comparative linguistics that are advocated by such modern linguists as H. Fleming, Aron

Dolgopolskii, and Sergei Starostin. Those theories literally "lump" several major language families into groups

or phyla, in this case—even in super-phyla. One of these

phyla is known as 'Nostratic' (as named by Illich-Svitych

1971), and the other as 'Sino-Dagestanic' (named by

Starostin 1989). The latter includes North-Caucasian

languages; Burushaski language of the Hindukush Mountains, Sino-Tibetan; Yenisseic (Ket); and possibly Na- Dene language families (the position of the Basque

language remains unclear). The former includes all other

languages of Northern, Central, and Western Eurasia;

its Eastern "sub-phylum" consists of the Dravidic and

Uralo-Altaic. There is some evidence in favor of a hypothesis that all of the so-called Paleo-Asiatic languages

of Siberia and the North Pacific, including the Yukagir,

the Nivkh, Chukchi-Koryak, Itelmen, and also Eskaleut,

and the Ainu, can be placed in a remote connection

with this "Eastern sub-phylum" (Fleming 1 987).

To date, the first Amerinds, who supposedly crossed more than 1 3,000 years ago from Asia to America by

the Bering Land Bridge, could not be traced with any

certainty in any archaeological sites in Siberia. Some of

the analogies that are often proposed—for example,

by Russian archaeologist Yurii Mochanov (1969) and

others—between American and Siberian Paleolithic

262 PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ PREHISTORY

i
industries can seem spectacular. But the actual gap in most cases is too big, both in time and space. iVlost

probably the archaeological traces of the early migrants

from Siberia may now all be buried deep under the

waters of the Bering Sea. Therefore, although there can

be no doubt that the ancestors of the Amerinds once

lived in Asia, so far attempts to find material indications of their Asiatic habitat and connections have been

futile.

After the first wave of Amerind ancestors' migrated

to North America, the Bering Land Bridge had given its

place to the Bering Sea. It can be assumed that the kinsmen of the Amerinds (if any), who might have re- mained in Asia, have been assimilated by another wave

of migrants. The newcomers were probably from the

stock of the Sino-Caucasian speakers. In eastern and

northeastern sections of Asia these were the ancestors of the present Sino-Tibetan, Yenisseic (Ket), and

Na-Dene linguistic families, and, possibly, also bearers

of some intermediate linking languages, which are now

completely extinct. Amerind ancestors were in all probability strongly

oriented towards large inland game hunting, since

nothing seems to indicate that there was any trend towards a maritime adaptation among them. On the

other hand, the second migration wave, that is, the

ancestors of the Na-Dene people, could not use the

land bridge and they had to cross the Bering Strait in some type of sea-going vessels. Therefore, these

people had to be maritime adapted, to some extent. Most of their present westernmost descendants like

the Eyak, Haida, and the Tlingit are among the most

specialized maritime-adapted populations in North

America. The Ket people in Siberia, the only remaining

present-day group of the Yenisseic speakers, also

are predominantly fishing-oriented, although they live thousands of miles away in the inland boreal forest zone of Central Siberia.

It can be assumed that fishing specialization has

deep roots in the Final Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic

cultures of Northern and Eastern Siberia. Hence, the

present-day fishing Siberian populations belonging to

the Nostratic phylum, such as the Khanty of the Ob

River Basin or the Nivkh of the Lower Amur River and

Sakhalin Island, might have acquired some initial fishing skills from the preceding Sino-Caucasians—the

Yenisseic and Proto-Na-Dene (and other related extinct groups) "substratum"—ancient inhabitants of the

Beringian zone. Nikolai Dikov argued more than thirty

years ago (Dikov 1 967) that there were obvious cultural parallels between Paleolithic cultures of Kamchatka

(as illustrated by the Ushki sites) and some prehistoric

cultures of North America. The latter include Palisades,

British Mountain, and Anangula. In Dikov's opinion,

beyond the obvious parallels in stone tools, the shell

beads, red ocher used in burial rituals, and other cultural traits are strong indicators of close cultural similarities between the two prehistoric stocks.

If these analogies are correct, then we can assume

that the early sites in Kamchatka (dated from some- where about 13,000 BP to approximately 10,000 BP

or later) preceded or could well be correlated with the

alleged dates of the Na-Dene migration to North

America. Therefore, not only the linguistic affiliation

of the Ushki site inhabitants can be quite possibly

Na-Dene linked; the creators of the earliest known

maritime cultures in Alaska and the Aleutians, including the Anangula site, are believed to have been early Na-Dene speakers as well, rather than the Eskaleut, as

is often claimed.

The migration of the Na-Dene speakers across the

Bering Strait could have been at least partially caused

by the growing pressure of the later Nostratic migrants

to Siberia. We can logically suppose that this pressure must have been particularly strong between 7000 and

6000 BC, or between 9000 and 8000 BP. This is the

time of the earliest agricultural sites in the Northwestern portion of the Indostan sub-continent, which mark

the hypothetical Nostratic (Dravidian) intrusion into the

continental (northern) portion of South Asia. The move- ment of the early agriculturalists might have been paralleled by a similar intrusion of other Eastern Nostratic

S. A. ARUTIUNOV 263
(Old Uralic) populations from farther north into the

central section of Northern Eurasia. The latter were

not agriculturalists but could still have been technologically well-advanced. A simultaneous start of

these two population shifts can be corroborated by

an alleged greater proximity between proto-Dravidic

and proto-Uralic languages, than with any other

Nostratic proto-languages (Illich-Svitych 1971).

The subsequent millennia, that is 7000 to 4000 BP (5000-2000 BC) in Northern Eurasia, was the era of the

"Neolithic evolution" and of the formation of the many

local Neolithic cultures in Siberia. These were created by the distinct though distantly related ethnic groups

of Nostratic origins, such as the Yukagir, the protoTungus, and the ancestors of the Northeastern

Paleoasiatic populations (such as Chukchi-KoryakItelmen, Nivkh, etc.). They were gradually assimilating,

replacing, and/or ousting out of Asia, across the Bering

Strait, the remains of the preceding Sino-Caucasian

(Yenisseic, Proto-Na-Dene) stock.

This earlier Sino-Caucasian substratum, while being

assimilated, might have been a significant factor in ethnic and linguistic diversification of the incoming

Nostratic migrants. Even more important must have

been their racial (i.e., physical anthropological) impact.

Many physical traits of these new populations, including typically Mongoloid features, began to prevail due

to earlier processes of climatic biological adaptation.

Let us now consider the question of the position

of the Eskaleut ethno-linguistic group in this complex

formation of the modern native populations of Northeast Siberia. The exact data that can help answer this

question are rather scarce, and any speculations on

this subject can only be tentative and hypothetical.

Still, an attempt at a broad integrating hypothesis can

be made, according to the data of physical anthropology (cf. Alexeev 1 993). On the one hand, the Eskimo

as well as the Aleut and the Chukchi demonstrate definite features of the Arctic local race. This reflects their

millennia-long adaptation to the extreme climatic conditions of the Arctic. On the other hand, their relatively

dark pigmentation suggests that they belong to the

Pacific branch of the Mongoloid race and that initially

they were formed in more southern latitudes than their

current habitat. While Asiatic Eskimo display certain

evidences of recent admixture of Central Siberian populations, the Aleut show some "Europeoid" (Caucasoid)

deviations from the basic Mongoloid type which cannot be reduced to the late European (mostly Russian)

admixture only.

There are also important archaic ethnographic

parallels between ancient Eskimo and Nivkh (Cilyak)

cultures (Arutiunov et al. 1972) as well as between

the Nivkh and the Aleut. There is also some evidence

of an early and even historical Eskaleut habitation in Kamchatka (cf. Vdovin 1972). Finally, Nikolai Dikov,

who insisted upon some obvious Amerind parallels in one of the Ushki sites in Kamchatka, argued that

there were definite Eskaleut (Eskimo) parallels at another, later Ushki site.

The Cultural Peak of the North Pacific Maritime Adaptation in Siberia

The cultures that can be considered the highest

achievements of the Arctic maritime adaptation in

Northeast Siberia were the classic forms of the Old

Bering Sea and Punuk cultures of the Bering Strait area.

Surprisingly, their basic cultural features first appeared

in sites of almost three millennia ago in a practically

ready-made form. From its known beginnings, these

cultures demonstrate an astonishingly high number of

features which are almost identical to the modern stage

of cultural development identified by the ethnographic

data. The features that differentiate the modern culture from the culture of nearly three millennia ago are

rather less important and minor. Probably, nowhere in

the world can we observe such a high degree of cultural continuity, with so little change in the course of

millennia.

This may signif/ that the sea animal hunting adaptation of the Bering Strait Eskimo people has reached

the maximum level of its possible development in a

264 PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ PREHISTORY
pre-industrial context. We may speculate that this highly

sophisticated culture was not imported to the Bering

Strait area from some other territories in a ready-made

form. Rather, it was assembled and developed to

Its utmost perfection here from a number of mutually

adjusted cultural "details." Many of those "details" might

have been introduced from some other areas in which

they had originally developed.

We may hypothetically single out two main directions of such cultural diffusions. One venue of critical

cultural influence came from the shores of the Arctic

Ocean, from the mouths of the great Siberian rivers. The other input came most probably from the south,

from the Sea of Okhotsk shores, mainly from the areas

to the north of the Amur River. Here it received some

important influences from the more southerly regions.

The first stream clearly can be traced via ancient traditions of Eskimo decorative ornamentation. It introduced

the exquisite technique of engraved straight and punctuated lines, points and circles that are visible already

in the bone industry of the Burulgino site of the para- Ymyyakhtakh cultural affiliation in the present-day

Yakutia (Sakha Republic). The second stream, probably

having its origins somewhere near the Sea of Japan,

brought with it the rich curvilinear designs, t'ao-t'iehlike images, and fantastic faces. The harpoon technol- ogy was most probably developed independently in

both of these two cultural traditions. It reached its high

level of perfection in the Bering Strait area. The late Old Bering Sea and the subsequent Punuk

cultural traditions seem to have been the peak of

artistic, social, and food-obtaining efficiency of the

maritime-adapted cultures at the Bering Strait "Crossroads." It was probably the Little Ice Age of AD 1 500-

1 700 that brought about a relative deterioration of

the environmental abundance. Consequently, the relative artistic, social, and cultural impoverishment of the

coastal population occurred. This same environmental

trend, however, triggered the rise of a Native reindeerbreeding economy in the interior regions of Siberia

(Krupnik 1 993). Thus, around AD 1 500-1 700, a critical

and partly regressive transition took place, with a

significant portion of the formerly sedentary coastal

population moving inland and becoming nomadic. Its

results are well observed in the historically documented

diversity of Native cultures and economies in Northeast Siberia (cf. Krupnik 1 988).

Conclusion

The current destiny and the future of the sea-mammal

hunting culture of Northeast Asia are currently even

less clear than its remote past. The Native maritime

hunting economy in Siberia has been able somehow

to endure, although in a very deformed and distorted

condition, under the artificial paternalism of the Soviet

system. Now, under the stress of transition to a market economy, the prospects for its continuity are very

dim. On the other hand, the beauty and sophistication

of technical and artistic achievements of the ancient

Eskimo and their Siberian neighbors may become and,

in fact, is currently emerging as a new source of inspiration, pride, and cultural reassertion of identity for their modern descendants

Acknowledgements

The author expresses his gratitude to the Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies in Washington, DC,

which partly sponsored his work on this paper.

Notes

1. See the most recent summary of the current Russian archaeological research on the Chukchi

Peninsula and in the adjacent areas of the North

Pacific in several papers published in Dumond and

Bland 2002

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S. A. ARUTIUNOV 267

Life in Lost SjsWa^CS: Mome, Land, Memort) and tli<

Senses of Loss in fost-Jesup Ivamciiatka

DAVID KOESTER

This paper is about social absence, that is, about the absence of irreducibly social aspects of experience. It

is about the contemporary significance of closed and

dying Native villages in Kamchatka, in the Russian Far

East. To suggest a metaphor for my strategy here, one

might think of the following analysis as an inquiry into what would happen to the fabric of social life if some

force were to snip threads throughout the weave, leaving behind a set of connections that seem random

without their previous supports. This is not to ask

what would happen if certain roles were not filled

or specific reciprocal obligations were not met; such

occurs regularly when individuals in a community

leave or die. Rather, it is about what happens when,

for example, the possibilities for maintaining obligations, fulfilling plans and expectations have dis- appeared, when a rupture has occurred in the continuing process of re-establishing familial ties through

the daily experience of places where memories are generated or when the skills and understandings one has learned no longer contribute to one's relationships in one's community.

In examining social relations and loss, I will not

present a culturological vision of society in which all components of the socio-cultural system fit together

in a functioning whole, only to point out the subse- quent gaps. My aim is, rather, to examine the nature and formation of durable interconnections in social life. My argument is that specific features of the social

understanding of loss help to make sense of the relative success and failure at current efforts in cultural

revitalization among the Native peoples in Siberia whose ancestors were surveyed by the teams of the

Jesup Expedition one hundred years ago. The phenomena of social absence that I will describe are familiar to anthropologists. An historical example, well known in the North Pacific, is the banning of the potlatch on the Canadian Northwest Coast,

against which Franz Boas and others protested vigorously (Stocking 1974:307; Boas 1 974[1 899]: 1 06; Cole and Chaikin 1990:130-1). Boas had argued

that the potlatch was part of the Indian economic

system, a public paying of debts that was at the same time an investment in one's future. It obligated recipients to repay at a later time and thereby

encouraged the giver to give freely so as to have more to receive:

The sudden abolition of this system. . . destroys therefore all the accumulated

capital of the Indians. It undoes the carefully

planned life-work of the present generation,

exposes them to need in their old age, and

leaves the orphans unprovided for (Boas

1974[1899]:106).

Boas' argument implied that even with perfor- mances banned, the social effectiveness, the obligations still existed as long as people remembered them

and remembered the status that went along with giving and receiving. He remarked, in his polemic to protect the tradition, that we should not be surprised that

abolition was resisted by what he called "the best

269
class" of Indians, "only the lazy should support it, because it relieves them of the duty of paying their debts"

(Boas 1974[1899]:106). Political goals aside, Boas's

point was that the silencing of the practice opened a gap in the set of relations by which people interacted and lived. The rapid decline of indigenous populations and

the curtailing of traditionally held practices by external cultural and economic influences and governmental authorities led anthropologists to undertake

major salvage operations. The Jesup Expedition, with

its variety of salvage activities, became a founding

and exemplary model. The aims of salvage ethnol- ogy and linguistics in the U.S. were to establish an account of how Native American cultures varied

geographically and to inscribe in a durable representative form as much as possible of languages,

customs, practices and general information concerning the lives the various peoples led and the stories

they would tell before those ways of life and stories passed away. This recording was done, as Bernard Cohn has pointed out, by stripping away the

obvious signs of White influence and focusing on

features that seemed peculiarly Native (Cohn 1 968).

The task was to record as much as possible, before

the last generation that could tell of the prior way of

life disappeared.

Today's cultural revival movements across the

North Pacific, with their attention on preserving lan- guage and tradition, sometimes resemble salvage

anthropology. For the most part, however, they are much more attuned to specific sentiments of loss and contemporary needs of economic development

(e.g., Abryutina 1996; Stroganova 1997; Fondahl

1998: 89-131).' I focus here not on the practical

issues of cultural restoration or the salvaging act of

preserving in writing and other media that which was passed down through emulation, imitation and

teaching. Instead, I examine the meaning of the loss

of that which was taken away or displaced by gov- ernment policy.

To explain what it means to lose one's village, I

present here descriptions of three senses of the idea

of life in a "lost village." These descriptions are based on published texts, songs, poetry and narratives I

recorded during fieldwork in indigenous communities

in Kamchatka during the early-mid 1 990s. The first sense

is a past-oriented sentiment toward life in the villages

lost when resettlement was forced by Soviet economic

policies of the 1950s and 1960s.^ These closed villages still today constitute "original homelands," places

of personal and familial identification. Many people,

including young people, say that they are descendant

from Utkholok or descendant from Sopochnoe, villages

that no longer exist. These settlements were "closed"

(that is, abandoned under government pressure) some thirty or even fifty years ago. The youngest

who claim to be descendant from them may never even have seen them. An important second sense

of loss is that people now feel that, because of the

post-Soviet rupture in communication, funding, and

delivery of social services they are living in villages

that are "lost" to the outside world. They recognize

that the governmental responsibility that once supported rural Soviet village life has disintegrated and

feel that no one cares about their plight. Contemporary life for them now is life in a "lost village." And

finally, a third sense of life in lost villages is the at- tempt of various groups of people to live in villages once closed, to actually establish, or reestablish, life

in these lost villages.^

Village Ties Expressed in Poetry

In a general discussion of the experience of place

Keith Basso has written that, "Relationships to places

may. . . find expression through the agencies of myth,

prayer, music, dance, art, architecture, and in many communities, recurrent forms of religious and political ritual"

(Basso 1 996:57). The various ways for place to be experienced and articulated includes the meaning of

village life as it is and has been expressed in poetry,

both written and in song. The four poems examined

2 70 PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ LOST VILLAGES
here issue from differing points of view. All of indig- enous Kamchatkan origin, two of the authors still live

in the villages of which they write and the other two

live in Kamchatka's capital city, Petropavlovsk. For one

of them her natal village no longer exists. The first example is a song by a young Itelmen composerAnatoly Levkovsky(Levkovskii), born in 1 962

(Fig. 64). It was his first song and he composed it

while he was in Moscow, missing his home village of

Kovran on the western shore of Kamchatka.'' It is entitled simply, "My Village" and the melody is simple

and straightforward as are the ideas. In the following

translation I have cut out repetitions, in part melodically motivated, that emphasize that he loves and will

never leave his village.

My little village is set out by the sea. My beloved native home.

I'll never leave it behind,

it's dear to me.

Our people are unpretentious,

I'll never leave it behind,

indeed they are talented craftspeople

My family lives here and my many relatives. We all love you village.

There is no limit to our love.^

(Levkovsky 1997)

For Levkovsky, his family, his relatives, his people

share the affection they feel toward the village and

that shared affection is his affection. He loves Kovran

as his home, as the place of his people. His appreciation for the village also derives from the practical way

in which people make their lives there.^ Levkovsky is director of cultural activities for the

village of Kovran and he still lives there, in the place of

his birth.

Tatiana Evstropovna Cutorova, a published author —renowned for her singing voice—was also born in

Kovran. She now lives with her children and grandchildren in the city of Petropavlovsk. In 1994, at a

gathering of Itelmens and Kamchadals' in the hot

spring area of Upper Paratunka, she sang a song

in Itelmen that she had composed specially for

the occasion. Addressed to her sister, her song was a doleful lament, performed in the style of

the Itelmen traditional khodila^ and composed

about the village and the relatives whom she

misses. It echoes the same theme of love for the

village associated with its inhabitants.

Swans took flight at dawn

Their cries resounded

as if they were weeping

At once my heart yearned

they're flying past Kovran

My village, my Kovran

I cannot forget

As if some evil demon is holding me

I cannot break loose

The geese are going to fly over Kovran

They will circle over my village

I send warm greetings

I miss my fellow Kovraners Cod give me wings

I will fly to my village

My soul will be calmed among my kin

I'll walk throughout the village

(Recorded by the author, 3 July

1994, in Itelmen)''

Tatiana Evstropovna herself explained in Russian

the meaning of the poem to me from which the

translation here. With the village of her birth still in

existence her song evokes ties to the village through

kin and through the experience of its topography.

In the images of circling over and walking throughout the village (particularly in contrast to being held,

unable to break loose) her feeling of loss and of

attachment to the place is expressed as memory

and desire. The poem sets in opposition the far away

D. KOESTER
distance to the village, marked by flight and the grounded contact of walking through the village.

These two songs about ties to Kovran through its

landscape and people can be contrasted with a poetic cycle of verses about the town of Milkovo, the

hometown of Kamchadal poet, Nina BerezhkovaPorotova. Milkovo, in central Kamchatka, is much

larger than Kovran and its present-day population is

predominantly of Russian origin. Many of its indigenous

Kamchadals have been active in local cultural revitalization and have established a Kamchadal Club. Less

tied to people-in-the-place, the opening lines and much

of the remaining ten verses of Berezhkova-Porotova's

poem extoll natural beauty, the permanent features of

the landscape, dramatic changes of season and the

familiar, relatively unchanging characteristics of plant

and animal life. Rather than writing of people in the

environment, she humanizes the landscape:

Milkovo in a valley cradle Was hidden under a down-coat of snow

The mountains put on a snowy malakhai

[hood in Itelmen]

they hid a grey tress in ravines

(Berezhkova-Porotova 1993:1 1-2)

As in the two songs above, Berezhkova-Porotova's

sentiments toward the place are linked to an elder

relative. The title verse, "I've been panged by Milkovo

since childhood" reflects on the tale of the author's grandmother, who sought to defend the village church

when Soviet officials came to take away its bell. Other

verses recall childhood, and give vignettes of traditional life, sprinkled with Itelmen words (BerezhkovaPorotova 1993:7-15). This poem, about a relatively

urbanized village, contrasts with the two about rural, predominantly Itelmen Kovran in its greater emphasis on the aesthetic features of the natural environment

and more specific focus on a single close relative in

relation to a single historical event. '° Her tie to a relative-in-the-place is less participatory than that expressed by Levkovsky or Cutorova, yet is nevertheless

an important aspect of her nostalgia.

Itelmen poet Nelia Suzdalova (born in 1937) similarly included a poem about her native village

Sopochnoe in a prominent place in her first published

poetic collection (1 993). It followed the opening poem

"Dog Teams" from which the entire collection gets its name, "Those dog teams sped away." The image of a dog team disappearing in the distance metonymically

and symbolically refers to the loss of traditional cultural life. Soviet government-enforced resettlements

of Itelmen villagers for the purposes of consolidating

the labor force and economizing on delivery of services began in 1956 (Starkova 1976:32). The next poem in the collection, entitled simply, "Sopochnoe"

reflects the feelings from that period and Suzdalova's

sense of loss with the closing of her village.

We have grown up and died on our land And expected always to live here...

At the whispers of the forest, we stood still in happiness.

There was no time to grieve.

But the time arrived—bad news.

The river became a mere legend.

In a foreign region, in a cold place

Centuries came to a halt.

Farewell warmth, goodbye, mountains.

And you too, moon, above our homeland,

An evil alien pushed a button. And the strand broke.

(Suzdalova 1993:3-4)

Suzdalova emphasizes the continuity of ancestry at her homeland, affirmed by life and death on

the land. The warmth and happiness associated

with this continuity contrast with the mechanical

coldness that replaced them and, as in Cutorova's

song, an arbitrary, unhindered power has caused

their loss.

272 PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ LOST VILLAGES
In all of these odes to villages the tie to the homeland is through people and relationships to those

people, especially ancestral. Such sentiments seen and

heard expressed in these examples of published and

performed poetry, were also echoed in remembrances

that I recorded on various occasions. A respected

Itelmen elder, teacher and cultural expert, Yakov Lvovich

Zhirkov, for example, also spoke of life in the village of Sopochnoe at a presentation for children. He spoke on the occasion of Itelmen language week in the village school:

In childhood I lived with my grandfathers

{dedy- male elders). There were many elders

there, grandmothers {babushki- female

elders), my parents. And I had to live in the

forest and out fishing. They brought me

everywhere with them, when it turned spring.

When I was little they took me fishing,

hunting, though I never really hunted and did not become a hunter. I walked and wandered but did not hunt. Everything around me gave me pleasure. I looked at this nature, at the richness that we had. Now

there is no village (Zhirkov 1 994).

It is important to note in this statement how the

relations with his elders tied him to the natural environ- ment. His memory, the lost experience that he sought

to convey to today's children, was that of living and

working in the forest and on the tundra with kin and

fellow villagers. Another elder from Sopochnoe, Tatiana

Petrovna Lukashkina (born in 1918; Fig. 65), who lost her parents in the Stalinist repressions, has similarly

focused much of her reminiscence of childhood on

the elder who raised her, her blind grandmother. Both

Tatiana Petrovna and Yakov Lvovich placed value

not on just the relative alone or just the place, but

primarily on their experiences of and with their relatives in the village and its environs. The focus on recollections of family and village life tied to the land is

reminiscent of sentiments about places recorded in

other parts of the world. Writing of Wamirans in Papua

New Guinea, Kahn notes that for them, places in the landscape "resonate . . . deeply about the importance

of social relations and obligations based on feeding,

sharing and caring for one another" (1 996: 1 76; cf. also Rosaldo 1980).

Lost Villages I: Living in the Past

With Suzdalova's poem and the recountings by Zhirkov

and Lukashkina we have come to sentiments about a

village closed several decades ago by a Soviet policy

decision. As we move to consideration of the signifi- cance of such closed villages it is important to keep in mind that people's recollections represent complex

images overlain by the profound effects of Soviet eco- nomic and cultural programs. Attuned to effecting a change of consciousness, much of the former Soviet

policy sought specifically to patch and replace ele- ments of the social-economic fabric it was destroying.

For Itelmen in Kamchatka, increasingly year-round settle- ments replaced summer/winter seasonal habitation and

state-run boarding schools (internaty) replaced local

schools. State-supported and managed clubhouse

("house of culture") activities, including the celebration

of holidays, came to replace both church attendance

and festivities associated with winter visiting. Brigade

work (organized production teams) replaced family-,

friendship- and need-determined cooperative production, and so on (Starkova 1 976). In the wake of these

transformations, what seems consistent in recollections and laments about the past is the sense of loss of community tied to a place and associated with practical activity over time.

Despite socially engineered, "progressive" replacements for various aspects of social life, most people

remember the closing of the villages as a devastating

blow." Over and over again, elders have said to me

that life was hard in earlier days, but it was better; we

"lived amicably" (zMf/ruzAj/io), they say. They acknowledge that their fond memories are somewhat gilded

by the flow of time.'-^ They speak of how laborious

subsistence was, that they did not have readily available flour, bread and tea as appeared later. Yet they

nevertheless maintain that this time was happy, and

D. KOESTER 273
they associate this lost happier life with the move from

the villages.

Bruce Grant found loss of Native villages on Sakhalin

Island (another area covered by the Jesup Expedition)

to be comparably significant. The primary difference was that the village closings in Sakhalin during the 19505 and 1960s took place on a much larger scale

there than in Kamchatka. He writes that Soviet intentions to improve economic prospects in villages by

consolidating labor in efficient administrative centers proved vain hopes:

Rather than strengthening and internationalizing, the resettlements produced a spirit of

absence felt on economic, social, and

personal levels. Rather

than moving forward,

they generated a retro- spective force that pulled many back (Grant

1993:244).

The closed villages came to

represent a longed-for, lost way

of life in Sakhalin, as they did in Kamchatka. Moreover, Grant found that the lost way of life

has been understood to be traditional. It is in part because of

this understood traditionality

that the closed villages have

become an object of interest

for cultural revivalists. Grant

cites the example of the lone

brigadier who, having refused

to leave when the resettlements took place, now stands as symbol and metonymic

sign of traditional life (Grant 1995:134).

Itelmen people who today live in the villages of

Kovran, Verkhne Khairiuzovo, Tigil, Sedanka and even

in the city of Petropavlovsk (Fig. 79) still inhabit these

lost villages in their memories. Experiences on a daily

basis ranging from negative ones such as family tension, drunkenness, and economic hardship to more

positive ones of family celebration, collective singing

Sea of Okhotsk

79/ Location of Lost Villages on Kamchatka

Peninsula, Russia, discussed in the paper

and dancing all evoke memories of contrasting and

comparable experiences in the old villages. Elders commonly remark, for example, that there was no

drunkenness in their childhood villages. People drank,

they acknowledge, and enjoyed doing so, but the alcoholic kind of public drunkenness now common was,

they say, unknown.

The experiences of entering new village life after

forced resettlement contributed greatly to the memories that create today's sense of loss. Soviet planners'

aim was not, in the initial move, to create (or recreate)

a village, but to provide a place for workers to live. When resettled villagers arrived in Kovran in 1 960, they

found that promised housing was not yet constructed and

they were placed in temporary

housing (barracks). Life was, from all descriptions, difficult.

Local administrators moved

quickly to establish work as

the basis for social relations in

the relocated community. Strategically, their mission was to

replace older village social values with the value of work for

the greater society. The effectiveness of this effort is articulated in the first memories that

resettled villagers recount

self-worth and status among

peers were to be linked to diligent labor and productivity.'^

Prestige was granted to those who worked hard,

achievements in production were recognized on a public honor roll and prizes were awarded. Several Itelmen

elders recounted to me the thrill of a family member

receiving a "premium"—sometimes extra rations of flour, and sugar and in one case I heard of, a new rifle. But,

although there were individual rewards, the differentiation that took place is now also remembered in intergroup terms. One woman told me repeatedly, when

Pacific Ocean

'etropavlovsk

274 PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ LOST VILLAGES
recollecting her resettlement to Kovran, that the people

from her native village of Sopochnoe knew how to

work. She also said, however, that they had unfairly

been accused by Kovraners of being slackers. Neither

an ideology nor merely a command, this shaping of

relations by means of instilling a competitive work ethic was given added moral weight, founded in praxis, when

internally segmented others were perceived in comparative, competitive terms. Public support was given

to intergroup competition by the publication of village, kolkhoz (common Russian abbreviation for 'collective farm'-ed.) and brigade production rankings.

This value of competitive work continues today

even in non-wage labor contexts. When I joined groups

of people traveling with kolkhoz tractors (the kolkhoz was defunct but still alive in name) out to gather the

local "wild garlic," cheremsha, on what seemed in many

respects to be a community outing, some families

talked distinctly in productive terms. For these families much of the conversation focused on how much

they could gather and how quickly. The emphasis on

productivity, whether constructed as competition

among siblings or among members of a work brigade,

refers back in time to the larger Soviet social economic

project in which rationalized, quantifiable production

aims were the goal. This focus on time-intensified pro- duction contrasts starkly with the image of life in Sopochnoe portrayed by Yakov Lvovich Zhirkov, however nostalgically embellished. His description of wandering and working in the forests, composing songs in response to the beauty of nature, lacked any sense of

urgency or competitiveness.

It would not, however, be right to say that the work ethic was introduced with the forced migrations

in the 1 950s and 1 960s. Collectivization in Kamchatka,

including in remote Native communities, had already

occurred in the 1930s (Starkova 1976:30) and many

elders' recollections of productive activities rehearse

quantitative competitive notions. Moreover, the

instilling of competition did not constitute the introduction of the idea, or the valuing, of hard work. Tatiana

Petrovna Lukashkina, who participated actively in the

Soviet project to modernize the lives of the Native

peoples of Kamchatka, has written that the Itelmen were always a work-loving people (trudoliubivye).

Whether before or after resettlement, the social

relation created in the Soviet-inspired world of work was not to the community but to the productive apparatus. Though it would be too hasty to conclude

that social valuation by competitive work was entirely

introduced by the Soviet government, this value, nevertheless, contrasts with the image given by Yakov

Lvovich Zhirkov. In his remembrance of a young boy

being dragged along to work in the forests and on the

river, "work" created ties to people he deeply respected,

the memories of whom tie him to his homeland. The

competitive work relations, in contrast, while giving

many a sense of self-worth, divided people and provided no sense of ties to a place.

When elders say that they lived more amicably in

the past it reflects this difference in productive relations. Whereas in the past subsistence activity tied people to places through collective efforts with elders, after resettlement, productive effort was purposefully generated by prestige stratification. Status was conferred individually and collectively and articulated in recollections as inter- and intra-village group

difference. The social absence mentioned in the introduction is sensed, I would suggest, largely in this transition from affective relations created through cooperative work to social differentiation created in statecontrolled labor.

Lost Villages II: Lost in Today's World

The second sense of loss emerges from the collapse

of support for Soviet village infrastructure during the

1990s, especially between 1991 and 1997. Many of

the factors of loss present in Itelmen villages in Kamchatka have been discussed in the literature on more general economic and social problems facing

Siberian indigenous people in post-Soviet Russia (Pika

and Grant 1999; Ryvkina et al. 1996; Zaidfudim et al.

D. KOESTER 275
1994). Kamchatka was spared the worst of the

catastrophic environmental damage that took place

during the Soviet period in Siberia, such as that which occurred in the West Siberian oil and gas fields,

devastating landscapes and curtailing subsistence

based on natural resources (Trumbull 1 995; Wiget and

Balalaeva 1997; Feshbach and Friendly 1992:137-8).

On the other hand, significant environmental degradation due to industrialization and localized overpopulation has taken place in Kamchatka. These days, people

need to make day-long trips to gather berries, fire- wood is increasingly difficult to obtain and fewer and

fewer salmon are coming up river. Thus, it is important

to enumerate some of the consequences of withdrawal of governmental support.

During the 1 950s and 1 960s, the Soviet govern- ment orchestrated the construction of new villages

for Native people in Kamchatka consisting of small wooden houses that required firewood for heating

or larger apartment buildings that required coal in

the winter. As electrification came, in the form of fuel-dependent diesel generator stations, all households became equipped with stoves and utensils for

cooking with electricity. Radio was brought in by cable and telephone along with it. Stores were supplied

with basic foodstuffs, including flour, pasta, tea, sugar,

cereal grains, and pickled and canned fruits and vegetables. The village of Kovran (Fig. 66) had its own

dairy, bakery, public bathhouse, post office and club- house where movies were shown and people came

to meet. Helicopters regularly flew from village to village and it was often possible for villagers to hitchhike

for travel to school, work or even just to visit relatives. Ground transportation from the nearby airport in UstKhairiuzovo was organized by the kolkhoz to meet

scheduled flights from Petropavlovsk. The end of the

Soviet Union meant that collapse of these government

services. In the five-year period from 1 992-7, except

for the houses, and occasional and unreliable service from the telephones, the bathhouse and the post office, virtually everything I have listed has fallen away.

Village electricity was cut to three hours a day, the bakery died fitfully from shortages of firewood, the

dairy's cows either died or were sold for meat or

private use, the clubhouse which burned down just

before this period was not to be restored (Fig. 68)

and the store, by 1996, sold little more than tea, confections and vodka (Fig. 67). Travel became very difficult as helicopters began to fly only commercial and

emergency traffic, allowing fewer and eventually no

hitchhikers, and the regular "bus" from Ust-Khairiuzovo

became increasingly unreliable and eventually ceased

to run altogether. All of this would clearly give anyone

a sense of material loss.'" The social sense of loss that I want to describe is, however, a deeper feeling of isolation and helplessness. I have written elsewhere about villagers' decision in 1993 to write a letter to the U.N. to ask for

assistance (Koester n.d.). The letter came out of a meeting of school teachers with Itelmen Cultural Restoration Council'"^ leaders to discuss the annual festival

Alkhalalalai. The topic of conversation constantly

turned from the festival to problems in the village. As

village leaders described their futile attempts to get

help from both the regional and the district administrations, those attending the meeting increasingly be- gan to talk about being forgotten. They complained

of the difficulties of reaching ever-absent bureaucrats

over correspondingly unreliable phone lines, and the

impossible expense and time required to fly to the

regional capital town of Palana, some 270 km to the

north. Finally, as the idea to write to the U.N. emerged

one person said, "Our government has no use for us."

This summarized the collective sentiment and much

of the sense of lostness.

Kovran, like so many other Native Siberian communities (Fig. 69), was for decades economically de- pendent on supplies from outside and along with this,

after many years of hearing of "the proud feeling of

belonging in the one great Soviet Homeland" (Moiseev

1989:16), the sentiment developed that relationships

and reciprocal obligations built up in the construction

2 76 PEOPLE, ANflMALS, AND LAND/ LOST VILLAGES
of these Soviet villages were to the country and to the government. Thus, the villagers did not just feel cut

off, they felt cast aside; their effort in living and working in the village no longer brought reciprocation from

the state and no longer contributed to a "feeling of

belonging" to the country as a whole.

Lost Villages III: Living in Closed Villages

From the time of the founding in 1989 of the first

Native organization in Kamchatka, the Itelmen Cultural

Restoration Council Tkhsanom, the longing for home

villages that I described in Part I played a significant

role in plans for restoration. People had persistent

dreams of re-establishing their lives on the sites of the

closed villages. The village of Sopochnoe figured prominently in these plans. It was the southernmost village

in which the Itelmen language was spoken when

Waldemar Jochelson visited the west coast of Kamchatka in 1910 0ochelson n.d.:2). It consisted of about

fourteen households in the 1 930s and remained pre- dominantly Itelmen speaking. A school was created

in Sopochnoe in 1924 when virtually no one in the

village spoke Russian. Then, in the 1 930s, school policy was changed from encouraging Native languages to banning of them on school grounds and at that point

the changeover took place very rapidly. Sopochnoe

is of particular significance because its descendants

have played such a prominent role in Native cultural

life in Kamchatka of the twentieth century. Tatiana

Petrovna Lukashkina, who was born in Sopochnoe, was

the first Itelmen woman to receive a higher education

(1934-8) and she was involved in the transformation

of Kamchatkan dance to forms appropriate for per- formance on stage (Lukashkina 1991 :53^). After her

return from the Institute of Peoples of the North in

Leningrad in 1938, she spent the rest of her life as an

educator in outposts and small villages of the Kamchatkan north (Fig. 70). Sopochnoe was also the home

village of the first president of the Restoration Council,

Klavdia Nikolaevna Khaloimova (born in 1934) and of

others who were active in the beginnings of the cultural restoration movement, including Boris Zhirkov

(born in 1 946), a noted dancer and local folklorist.

At the third annual Itelmen cultural revival conference in 1989 a decision was taken to support

resettlement at Sopochnoe. In March of 1991 a

Native fishing artel (cooperative) named "Itelmen" was officially registered with the regional administration. They received a fishing quota and began work at

the former village site of Sopochnoe in the summer. The fishing went well by most accounts but the whole

venture ended badly. The artel got a low price for its

fish in Petropavlovsk so that there was very little return

for the workers. In the meantime, they had alienated

the local fish processing factory, whose fishing limit

they had usurped, by sending the fish to Petropavlovsk

rather than to it. And while the workers received very

little for their efforts, the director of the artel, brother of

the new Cultural Restoration Council head, received a new snowmobile. This failure to pay the workers and

the new snowmobile was bannered in the local papers as a sign of corruption or at least greed, and

with considerable innuendo, the Council head was

blamed (Kravchuk 1992). There were hard feelings

in the village, but the bad press was worse. The newspaper coverage posed restoration as a ruse, a means

by which one Itelmen family could acquire access to

resources and this slant proved a deft move in interethnic politicking. The articles were written as exposes, and supported and generated anti-restoration senti- ment and exacerbated divisions within the Itelmen community.'*' Fondahl has written that similar reports describing ethnically based mismanagement had been

published in a newspaper concerning an Even Native

association with similar results (Fondahl 1 995).

Despite the failure of the artel, some families lasted

there for a while. The most valiant effort in this early

attempt was probably that of the son and daughterin-law of a revitalization activist. They built a home in Sopochnoe and with two young children moved from

Kovran to live there on a full-time, and potentially per- manent basis. The difficulties were tremendous. It

D. KOESTER 277
was not simply that there was no electricity, radio or

other conveniences of village life. Sopochnoe is over

1 00 kilometers—a minimum four days walk—from the

nearest village. Though most food, building materials and firewood could be obtained in the area, any other

necessities had to be hauled and planned for well in

advance. It was particularly hard on the mother of the

household, who, for the children, felt the necessity of

maintaining a home on roughly a village standard of

living. After almost a year, and with relatively few regrets, they gave up and moved back to Kovran. In comparison to the past, life in the village was too isolated. It was not a village with others on whom one

might depend for assistance and comradery (Fig. 71). And despite the existence of modern transport, there was less interchange between the village site and other

places. The nearest neighboring village Moroshechnoe was also closed, meaning that the density of people

in the area was so light that even with shorter travel

times made possible by mechanized transport, the

value of making the trip was too slight. Thus, all families eventually left.'^

For the purpose of this analysis, what is striking in

the story of this failed attempt to revive village life in Sopochnoe is the Soviet nature of the original organizational plan. The villagers began by creating a work

brigade for the purpose of producing a certain amount

of fish that would then be delivered to a centralized

processing unit. Instead of returning to the village with an understanding of living as they had in the past, their

return was predicated on industrially modeled production that, they thought, would allow them to survive in

today's world market. High hopes for the resettle- ment were dashed on the shoals of the commercial

fisheries business. Much greater success has been obtained in the

reinhabiting of the area associated with another

"closed" Itelmen village, Moroshechnoe, located sixty

kilometers north of Sopochnoe (Fig. 72). Yuri [a pseudonym] was born in the village of Sopochnoe and spoke

Russian as his first language. At a very young age,

however, he moved with his family to Moroshechnoe

where the entire community was Itelmen speaking.

The village then consisted of about nineteen households strung along a sharp bend in the Moroshechnaya

River, over fifty kilometers upstream from the Sea of

Okhotsk. Like Sopochnoe, Moroshechnoe has produced

a number of people active in trying to revitalize Itelmen

cultural life in the 1990s. Yuri was not, however, particularly active in this movement. He and his wife spent

most of their working lives in a central Kamchatkan

village where they had moved to alleviate their young

son's extreme case of asthma. Yuri worked as a professional hunter, working mostly with Russian hunters

from the area. During his years there he often dreamed

of having his own hunting cabin in the woods, back

where he had grown up. It was not, however, his

intention to try to rebuild his lost village.

His father had been a brigadier, in charge of the

fishing brigade of Moroshechnoe's old kolkhoz "International." The fishing brigade worked at a fishing

encampment twelve kilometers upstream from the village of Moroshechnoe itself. Yuri spent his summers

there, playing, working and swimming when young

and gradually taking on more responsibilities as he got

older. Not long after he learned to write he took on

the job of recording the kolkho^s catch and eventually keeping the fish camp's books. He became good

at math and was eventually offered the possibility to

study in Moscow. One summer in the 1940s, however, while they were stationed at the fishing site, his

father became ill and died. This, of course, had a profound impact on the family, and each member, that is,

all of Yuri's siblings, have told me about the suddenness of their father's death at this place (e.g., in

Petrasheva and Koester 1 997:1 0). One of the implications was that Yuri decided to stay behind to work

with his family rather than go to the Russian West for

further education.

Several years ago, during the winter, Yuri was hunting with his son, Volodya, and they stopped their snowmobiles near this fishing site. He recognized it as the

278 PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ LOST VILLAGES
place where they used to fish during the summer and

the place where his father had died. There is a small

spring there that never freezes over and it is thus a good source of fresh water; they decided to camp for

the night. During the night Yuri dreamt that his father came to him. When he awoke he remembered the

night's vision and decided that he would realize his

lifetime dream and have his hunting cabin at this

site. With the help of the Cultural Restoration Council, he obtained rights to hunting territory in the vicinity and built a small cabin. As conditions wors- ened in his home village of Kovran, he and his family

began to see the site as more than a hunting cabin

and actually an economically viable refuge. They

built another structure to be their home, converted

the original cabin into a steam bathhouse {banya)

and constructed a storage shed {ambar) and green- house as well. They now have a garden and an

ordinary outhouse in convenient proximity. The hunting territory and the river make possible a reasonable living at the site. With three horses to take care

of, they now have someone living there—Yuri or one

or more of his younger male descendants or relatives

all year. This is necessary both to take care of the

horses and garden and to prevent theft from the store- house and household.

In its fifth year (at the writing of this text) this relative success story was in part made possible by the abysmal conditions in the village of Kovran. The loss

of infrastructure there, including electricity, regular tele- phone service, pay for employment, etc. has meant

that life at an extremely isolated encampment, two

days walk from the nearest village, can be better than

in their home village. Socially this means that the

infrastructural relations founded on institutionalized wage-labor and monetary consumption, collective

activity in the village clubhouse and home life that was increasingly centered around entertainment by

electronic media have, for this extended family, been

replaced. Much stronger familial connections and ties

have reemerged through the use and sharing of local

natural resources. One of the connections that has

been "revitalized" with this return settlement is the tie

to the place of predecessors; loss is being replaced by

reconnection to a place where elder relatives had lived.

For Yuri and all of his siblings it is very important that

he has come to live in this place where his father died.

In late July, 1 994 I returned to Kovran from visiting

my friends at this settlement in Moroshechnoe. Kovraners were of course curious about my impressions

but their overwhelming reaction was to reminisce

about their own villages. I came across one group of women standing on the stoop to their apartment building. Each in turn reflected on her own former village.

One asked me if I had been to her village of Belogolovoe

(closed in 1 972), upstream from Moroschechnoe. I had and she looked up rapturously and said "Oh how

I would like to see it again ... to go there." She asked

if I thought it was beautiful. I said I thought it was.

Conclusion

In setting out to discuss the three different perspectives on life in lost villages that I have presented, it was

not my initial intention to try to bring them all together

with a final unifying conclusion. It seemed to me sufficient to describe the sensibilities people have toward

villages long closed, toward the villages in which they

live, and toward villages in which they have tried once

again to live. It has become clear to me, however, that

there is a connection among these differing feelings of

loss and sensibilities of absence. The Itelmen people

with whom I have talked have articulated a strong

sense of being connected to places through the past

and continuing inhabitance of elder kin and fellow villagers in those places. Their feelings for villages and

the natural environs that surround them are intimately

tied to elder relatives and friends with whom they

walked, hunted, fished, gathered berries, sang, danced,

loved and laughed. All three components—people, engaging in activities with those people, and the landscape—are interlinked in creating social, material bonds

to homelands. The connections were riven by the reD. KOESTER 279
settlements in the 1950s and 1960s. As the Soviet

government encouraged and forced people to reorient their productive relations from kin and fellow villagers to the kolkhoz, village and national (Soviet) effort, one of the primary means by which villagers felt

attachment to their natural surroundings as homeland was pushed aside. Soviet forms of social life organized on the basis of dedication to work and productivity

did not, however, come to replace these sentiments.

The attachments have been maintained, rather, in both

the memories of elders and practiced in weekend outings by small family groups. Village restoration seems

to be succeeding on a small scale where ties to family

history have been realized (Figs. 73, 74).

I want to end with a song by Itelmen composer

Anatoly Levkovsky, a lullaby for his son, that explains

all of these ideas of ties to people in places and of ties

to the land through the experience of living and producing in it with kin.

Lullaby

Sleep my son,

sleep dear boy,

Lying comfortably on your cradleboard,

sleep gives strength.

Then you'll see, my boy,

you'll see your homeland

Where we were born along with you, where you will live.

All our grandfathers and fathers

lived here from time immemorial,

Caught fish for food

and hunted sea animals.

And you, son, when you grow,

you'll learn these things.

You'll take this all in hand

and know how to use it.

Indeed, though our homeland is rich,

there are still limits to everything.

Your father will tell you where and how,

so that you can pass it on

for your grandchildren

Sleep quickly my son,

sleep quickly my dear boy

Lying comfortably on your cradleboard,

sleep gives strength.

(Levkovsky 1997)

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank the people of the villages of

Kovran, Verkhne-Khairiuzovo and Ust-Khairiuzovo for

their hospitality and kind assistance, and especially the

people mentioned in this paper (pseudonymously and

otherwise) and especially Elena D'iakonova, NinaTolman

and Ceorgi Zaporotsky. I would also like to thank

Viktoria Petrasheva for a long collaboration and kind

friendship and her Institute, the Pacific Ocean Division

of the Department of Geography of the Russian Academy of Sciences (formerly the Kamchatka Institute of

Ecology and Nature Management), Robert Moiseev,

Director.

Notes

1. This paper was written for the Jesup

Expedition's centennial conference in 1997. Since

that time, numerous ethnographic accounts of

post-Soviet life that report relevant comparable

and contrasting experiences in the Russian Far East have appeared in print or been completed as dis- sertations. Because of space limitations I cannot

expand this paper to include reference to them

all.

2. Referring to the destruction in people's lives that took place, Petra Rethmann (1997) has noted

the euphemistic quality of this notion of merely

"closing" villages.

3. The fieldwork on which this article is based was conducted primarily in the villages of Kovran,

Verkhne-Khairiuzovo, Ust-Khairiuzovo and the city

of Petropavlovsk, with subsequent work in the

280 PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND LAND/ LOST VILLAGES
villages of Tigil, Tilichiki, and short visits to other

places in Kamchatka.

4. The population of Kovran has declined over

the past decade from nearly 500 in 1993 to less than 400 in 2002.

5. Unless otherwise noted, the texts quoted here

are my translations from Russian.

6. Literally, the song says that the people of

Kovran have "golden hands" {zolotye ruki) which means more than just crafts, as I have translated. They can do what needs to be done to make a

living and do it well.

7. The terms "Itelmen" and "Kamchadal" are over- lapping ethnic designations for indigenous

peoples of Kamchatka. "Kamchadal" was the term

used historically by Russians for the Native inhabitants of Kamchatka. The term "Itelmen" was eventually formally recognized by the Soviet government as the Native self-designation of the

people(s) who occupied the central part of

Kamchatka in 1927 (Murashko 1997:181).

"Kamchadal" has gradually come to be used specifically to mean indigenous Kamchatkans of

mixed Native and Russian (that is, Slavic Russian,

including Cossack, Ukrainian, etc.) ancestry. Some

of today's "Itelmen" are happy to be called

"Kamchadal" and some "Kamchadals" from village

of Tigil and the city of Petropavlovsk find "Itelmen"

acceptable. A detailed analysis of the history and

use of the terms can be found in: Murashko 1 996,

1997.

8. The Itelmen khodlla is a kind of chanting song,

usually mournful in tone, sometimes with meaningless syllables in the place of lyrics. Communities

were known to have their own particular styles (melodic and rhythmic). KhodilysNeie sung while along

traveling, hunting, gathering and walking in the

woods or composed to be performed for others at gatherings. They often expressed the emotional

state of the singer in relation to observations of

nature (there is an example in Steller 1996

[1774]:234). The khodily (<p\.) I recorded in 1993-

1996 sounded remarkably like khodily recorded by

Jochelson on the Ryabushinski Expedition in 1910.

There are no more than four or five Itelmen today who

still know, and even fewer who perform, these songs.

9. Tatiana Evstropovna herself explained in Russian the meaning of the poem to me from which

the translation here.

10. Close ties to nature have often been noted

as features of nostalgic remembrances in modern

society (Frykman 1986; Burgos 1996) and would

make an interesting point of comparison more

generally to remembrances of Soviet modernity

(Creuziger 1 996).

1 1 . Boris Chichio tells similarly of the devastating affects of Asiatic Eskimo (Yupik) village clos- ings (Chichio 1 981).

12. Interpreting this period and these recollec- tions is also complicated by Russian idealizations

of childhood that pervade pedagogical and popular literature and local understandings (Creuziger

1996; Wachtel 1990).

1 3. An intensive dedication to work was characteristic of many of the public personas involved in the development of the Soviet North. Writing in the 1930s after travels through the Soviet Arctic Ruth

Cruber described the energy of local party leaders who in the pursuit of their duties regularly went with

only four hours' sleep per night (Cruber 1 939).

14. Since 1997 there has been improvement in some area and loss in others. Lack of fuel has

caused villagers to tear down uninhabited housing to burn in their stoves. Electricity was restored

for a time with the connecting of a high power

inter-tie from the village of Ust-Khairiuzovo, but

that quickly fell into disrepair. The most signifi- cant bright spot has been the phenomenal development and popularity of the village's dance

troupe Elvel. They have performed in Berlin, Paris,

Moscow, San Francisco and numerous other

places as well as around much of Russia and

Kamchatka. Though they make relatively little money for their performances, their travel and

small income have had a significant economic

impact in the village as a whole.

15. "Sovet Vozrozhdeniia Itelmenskoi Kultury"

{Council for Revival of the Itelmen Culture) was

founded in 1 989. It was at the time a governmentsanctioned organization. It has since become the primary representative organization of the Itelmen

people and is affiliated with the Russian Association of Indigenous Peoples of the North (RAIPON).

16. Fondahl has written that similar reports describing ethnically based mismanagement had been

published in a newspaper concerning an Even native association with similar results (Fondahl 1995).

1 7. Since that attempt however, with the house

D. KOESTER 281
built, Klavdia N. Khaloimova has returned to the

village site for extended periods and was once accompanied by her elder aunt, Tatiana P. Lukashkina. Additionally, one man originally from the

village, has taken up more or less year-round resi- dence alone, with visiting relatives to help out.

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D. KOESTER 283
8 1/King Island Impiat dancers perform in the Rotunda of the Smithsonian National Museum ofNatural History at the opening ofthe "Crossroads ofContinents" exhibit, September 1988. Photographer, Jeffrey Tinsley
CURATORS, COLLECTORS, AND CONSUMERS
8 1/ The Russian-American "Crossroads of Continents" exhibit team examines the Northwest Coast collections at

the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography in St. Petersburg (then Leningrad), Russia. Left to right: William Sturtevant (Smithsonian Institution), an unidentified Russian curator, Sergei Serov (1940-1992, Institute of Eth- nography, Moscow), James VanStone ( 1 925-200 1

, Field Museum), and Bill Holm (Burke Museum). Photographer,

Jean-Loup Rousellot (ASC collection).

286
Meritage /\nthropologLj in the "Jesup-Z^^ ra:

Exploring [\|orth f acific (^uitures through (^ooper^^tive [Research

WILLIAM W. FITZHUCH

In the late 1 970s the Smithsonian's National IVIuseum

of Natural History and the Russian (then Soviet) Academy of Science's Institute of Ethnography began discussions that would lead to a new type of scholarly

collaboration between anthropologists and museum

researchers from the United States and the Soviet Union.

This new approach followed decades of stagnant

scholarly exchange and the first partially-successful

re-start of Russian-American cooperation pioneered

by field exchanges led by Alexei P. Okladnikov and

William S. Laughlin in the Aleutian Islands in 1974

and in 1975 at Lake Baikal (Laughlin 1985). Focused on the politically sensitive lands on either side of Bering

Strait, these discussions sought to advance Soviet- American scholarship on and knowledge of cultures and history, not only of the Beringian area, but of the

larger relationships and cultural patterns of the entire

Greater North Pacific Region (CNPR), the circum-North

Pacific Rim, extending from the Island of Hokkaido in

Asia to the Columbia River in North America.

Although the years preceding our efforts of the

late 1 970s had produced advances in anthropological knowledge of this region as a result of scholarly

exchanges sponsored by the International Research

and Exchange Board (IREX) (see Michael 1979; Michael

and VanStone 1983), political difficulties with access

to field opportunities and research collections required

another venue if cooperation was to continue. The

decision to proceed with studies of museum collections, whose trans-Beringian histories themselves required collaborative Soviet, Canadian, and American

scholarship, eventually lead to a major exhibition. Crossroads ofContinents: Cultures ofSiberia andAlasl<a

(1988-92), and a series of related publications. It also

offered a plausible option for the political stalemate

that had developed in the 1 970s during this final phase

of the Cold War era over access for American researchers to field locations in northeastern Siberia, and for

Soviet researchers in North America.

In the twenty years that followed the birth of the

Crossroads of Continents project, a number of institutional and international initiatives were undertaken that provided momentum toward the Jesup Expedition

Centennial years of 1997-2002. In addition to

strengthening the exchange of information and researchers, and conducting joint projects of the sort

pioneered by Franz Boas, these initiatives included museum collection study, traveling exhibits, media

programs, and museum training. Perhaps even more

important than scholarly development and public

education needed for a strategically and economically

important part of the world that was remarkably

poorly known, was the engagement of Native

peoples themselves in the research and public pro- grams. By the end of the twentieth century it had

become clear that Native involvement at all levels

of the new cycle of research, collecting, archiving

of cultural resources, and education was the essential new dimension of the jesup Centennial era. Very early in the project we envisioned the Cross- roads of Continents exhibit and catalog as an effort

to partially answer the scholarly need for the final 287
"summary" volume of the Jesup Expedition publication series—a volume that Boas and his colleagues never produced (cf. Fitzhugh and Crowell 1 988: 1 5). The exhibit was also planned as a platform for a new cycle of comparative cultural studies and public programs that emerged from the Crossroads

project to become the new Jesup 2 program an- nounced by the Arctic Studies Center in 1 992 (Fitzhugh

and Krupnik 1993, 1994, 2001; Fitzhugh 1996). In

addition to new research and publications, Jesup 2

called for making museum ethnographic collections and other cultural resources more widely available

in Alaska (and, where possible, also in Siberia and

the Russian Far East). It also advocated promoting

traveling exhibits and Native participation in museumbased research and education through workshops and

training programs. The prospects and circumstances of Jesup 2 are

vastly different from those originally proposed for

the original Jesup Expedition (or Jesup /) venture. The primary goal of theJNPE was to build museum

collections and conduct research on the origins and

relationships of North Pacific peoples and cultures.

While these goals are still important, an additional

target for the next century must be the preservation of and shared access to cultural and linguistic

heritage. As in the Jesup-era, museums must have a prominent role in this work, and values other than

strictly academic ones must be promoted. It is for

this reason that the focus of this paper is the past

and future role of museums as trustees of the North

Pacific heritage and cultural legacies. Museums whose

roles have been confined previously to research and

being trustees of cultural treasures must also become

pro-active agents in the re-connection of "lost cultural

treasures" with Native peoples in their homelands.

The Jesup North Pacific Expedition

The century since the Jesup North Pacific Expedition

(1897-2002) has seen profound change to the cultures and peoples of the North Pacific region. On both

sides of Bering Strait political, economic, and technological change has transformed Native lives, brought

massive influxes of outsiders into previously autono- mous ethnic territories, and imposed alien national structures on a diverse group of traditional societies. By the middle of the twentieth century, schools, hospitals,

industrialization, militarism, and new ideologies had affected every Native person along the North Pacific Rim,

from the Columbia River to Bering Strait to Hokkaido.

North Pacific peoples had much to lose in this encounter, which arrived in an overwhelming onslaught. On the Asian side. Native groups had been in

contact with Europeans, directly or indirectly, since

the early 1600s and with complex East Asian societies for many hundreds of years earlier. On the

American side, contact with Europeans began

abruptly in the mid-eighteenth century. Yet by 1 900,

peoples in both regions had undergone massive

transformations that reached into almost every aspect

of their cultures, from technology to ideology.

The discovery of these cultures and rich new lands amazed early explorers and propelled naturalists and

anthropologists to seek answers about the origins and

relationships between Alaskan and Siberian animals

and peoples. The idea of studying Beringian relationships was not new to natural science. Biologists had

expressed interest in the similarities and differences between American and Asian biota, and these questions had been a principal stimulus of the surveys organized by the Smithsonian's Spencer Baird in northwestern Canada and Alaska between 1 857 and

1887 (Rivinus and Youssef 1 992:81-97). Boas' para- digm of cross-field regional survey and synthesis

marked a major advance over the descriptive sci- ence that had characterized research in this area previously (Fitzhugh 1982, 1994; Krupnik and

Vakhtin, this volume). Although JNPE results failed to

attain the theoretical goals of Boas' grand design, it produced masses of information about a crucial, previously unknown region, and its museum collections were a priceless benchmark and treasure-house for un288 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ CROSSROADS EXHIBITS
derstanding GNPR cultures and heritage.

The Boasian paradigm laid the foundation for the development of anthropological science in North

America and remains important today. Implicit was

the belief that cultures could be understood by trained

observers, and that their components (ethnology,

language, archaeology, folklore, and human biology),

separately and together, could be analyzed to pro- duce an objective representation of cultures, history,

and relationships. Although this view is still seen as the

basis for much modern anthropology, post-modernist

anthropology views this paradigm as partly flawed

by Western-observer bias and adherence to a unified

theory of culture. Today's anthropology, while anchored

in empirical science, has been strengthened by multidimensional theory. Native science, and participation

of indigenous peoples.

Boas and the Post-Jesup Research Agenda

The scholarly output of the JNPE appeared as a series of volumes and research papers for over four

decades between 1898-1940 (see reviews in Krupnik

and Fitzhugh 2001 ; Krupnik 1 998, 2001 ). The principal and most substantive results were descriptive eth- nographies and linguistic works. These volumes soon became the primary research documents on the cultures they described. For the non-Russian reading

scholars of many Native Siberian groups they re- mained the only detailed scientific reports available on these peoples throughout most of the twentieth century. Even in North America, the reports pro- duced under the Jesup Expedition banner by Boas,

Teit, Swanton, and others remain the primary eth- nographies for these Northwest Coast groups to this

day. However, when one examines the origins of the JNPE venture, one confronts a clear disconnect between

the theoretical problem focus of Boas' JNPE plan and

its scholarly antecedents. The questions of transBeringian origins and relationships raised by Boas were not to be found in the descriptive earlier works

of the 1800s, such as that of Veniaminov, Zagoskin,

and Edward Nelson in Alaska, and they are barely

detectable in the less anthropological but nevertheless significant monographs by Krasheninnikov, Steller, and other naturalists and explorers of Siberia of the

1 700s. While this is not the place for a detailed critique of the Jesup Expedition's accomplishments, it

is worth noting that the genius of the Jesup program was in its conception as a research plan, in its detailed ethnography, and in its field collecting program, as

reported elsewhere in this volume.

However, as an anthropological synthesis, JNPE also had serious shortcomings. For instance, by neglecting

to incorporate results from the extensive earlier or contemporary research in Alaska that was con- ducted by Edward W. Nelson, Lucien Turner, George

T. Emmons, John Murdoch, and others working for the

Smithsonian, the cursory and relatively unsubstantiated

attempts made by Boas to synthesize Jesup

Expedition's results (Boas 1 903, 1 905, 1 933) produced some glaring deficiencies. The most prominent was

the re-affirmation of Boas' earlier pre-Jesup idea that Eskimo had been late arrivals on the North Pacific

cultural scene from the Central Canadian Arctic (the

so-called "Eskimo wedge" hypothesis - see Dumond,

this volume).

Even though Boas and his collaborators failed to

fulfill the interpretive potential of their project, the results of the JNPE stimulated further research on the North

Pacific Native cultures and had a huge positive effect on the development of the twin fields of "Eskimology"

and circumpolar studies. Throughout most of the

twentieth century anthropologists and folklorists used JNPE data for studies of North Pacific, circumpolar, and hemispheric culture relationships. "Jesup cultures" were an important source of data for Hatt's (1914)

studies of circumpolar clothing styles. Folklorists such

as Hallowell (1926), Hatt (1949), and others utilized JNPE data for studies of comparative religion, mythology, and folklore. Jesup Expedition experiences and

personal contacts encouraged Waldemar Jochelson to undertake later field research in the Aleutian Islands

W.W, FITZHUGH 289
and Kamchatka Oochelson 1925,1928,1933). It led another Jesup team-member, Waldemar Bogoras

(1929) to write an important paper on circumpolar

culture theory; and it led eventually to studies such as

Sergei V. Ivanov's (1954) on Siberian representational

art and Tamara Mitlyanskaya's (1996) on Chukchi

folk art traditions. From the archaeological perspective, it triggered a

host of comparative archaeological work (Quimby

1 947; de Laguna 1 932, 1 940) on Beringian prehistory,

culminating with Leroi-Courhan's (1946) ambitious

study of North Pacific technology. The latter attempted

to advance JNPE historical goals by a synthesis of ethnographic and archaeological evidence but only

succeeded in demonstrating the inadequacy of uncontrolled archaeological data. During this period more

productive results in archaeology were being made

by Collins (1937), Cjessing (1944), Spaulding (1946),

Heizer (1956), Rudenko (1947/1961), Arutiunov and

Sergeev (1969, 1975), and others who used detailed

excavation techniques. It was here that real progress on the goals of Jesup Expedition were achieved, even though the results were painfully slow, due in part to

the nature of archaeological research but primarily

because of increasing political differences.

Fortunately, the other major legacy of the JNPE, the

collections of objects, photographs, sound recordings,

and ethnographic notes of the expedition, were being

carefully maintained, primarily by the American Museum

of Natural History in New York. Smaller "duplicate" collections of the materials that were gathered by

Jochelson and Borogas were also shared with the Mu- seum of Anthropology and Ethnology (MAE) in St.

Petersburg, which already had a North Pacific collection of its own, with special strength in Russian America.

Exhibiting North Pacific Cultures

In Paris, Berlin, and Copenhagen, North Pacific eth- nographic materials had been displayed to the public

for nearly two hundred years prior to the JNPE, but the

resources were thin and documentation was poor.

More substantial North Pacific collections existed in

St. Petersburg at the MAE (Dzeniskevich and

Pavlinskaya 1 988). Among these were the collections from Russian America made by Lavrentii Zagoskin and

ll'ia Voznesenskii in the mid- 1 800s. The latter was of

special value because a museum scientist who was

attentive to careful documentation secured it. Arctic

cultures had been displayed at the Smithsonian since

the 1870s; but it was not until the 1890s that they

began to be presented in depth (Fitzhugh 1997).

The American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York had few Northwest Coast or Alaskan collections and no large Siberian materials before 1 890.

The arrival of huge JNPE collections gave the American Museum a truly comprehensive resource for exhibiting North Pacific cultures (Kendall et al. 1997).

Unfortunately, like Boas' JNPE science plan, the

Jesup Expedition collections never found a comprehensive exhibit outlet at the American Museum. Boas oversaw the installation of his famous "Northwest

Coast Hall," but he and his successors never at- tempted to produce the exhibit of North Pacific peoples that should have been the logical outcome

of the AMNH-financed JNPE program. The AMNH

exhibition program remained locked into the schema

of museum science that called for cultures to be

displayed in their traditional hemispheric blocks: the Chukchi and Koryak were "Asian" peoples and were

therefore exhibited with the Asian groups; while the Eskimo and Northwest Coast Indians were matched

with other North American groups even though, in many ways, they were more 'Asian' than 'American.' Despite Boas' interest in trans-Beringian comparisons, Bering Strait remained the dividing point

rather than the hinge for cultures of Asia and the

Americas, conforming to the pre-existing geographically-based classification system of anthropological museums. Of course. Boas' departure from the American Museum in 1905 to take a position at Columbia

University made his contribution to these matters moot

at best.

290 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ CROSSROADS EXHIBITS
Science, Natives, and the American Public

Throughout most of the twentieth century, museum

science followed the Boasian tradition. As personnel

and financial support grew, Russian and North American researchers returned to the unfinished work of the

JNPE, attempting to clarify the history of North Pacific

cultures through archaeological, linguistic, and

ethnohistorical studies. In this effort Native peoples

became informants, field team-members, guides and

navigators, and in a few cases joined the ranks of

researchers or curators. During this period a culture

of academic and museum science prevailed in northern research that divided Native communities in Siberia and North America from pursuit of cultural research

in their own countries. Until the 1 960s, scholars rarely

consulted communities about research projects to be

undertaken. Similarly, they rarely presented their results

to local sponsors or made any special efforts to

disseminate project materials among local audiences

in ways that made it possible for Native people to

study or use anthropological data that was collected by scientists. Research occurred mostly apart from

community interests, and scientists rarely addressed

local media and school or community meetings as venues for outreach, information sharing, and community participation.

In some cases alienation resulted from the growing commercial trade in antiquities. Archaeologists

who had once purchased prize specimens from local collectors began to condemn "pot-hunting" and

commercial digging, even after Native claim settle- ments had given Native people legal title to these

resources. During the 1970s through 1990s, St. Lawrence Island became a prime location for the

commercial market in artifacts, but other locations

in the Beringian region also participated in the antiquities trade. Many sites were damaged or destroyed; those in Cambell, St Lawrence Island, were

so devastated that they eventually were removed

from the U.S. National Register of Historic Sites. Social damage was also caused by drugs and alcohol that

came with the ivory and artifact trade. And with a

relaxation of border control after 1 990, digging for

profit became a new quasi-condoned economy in

Chukotka, and the lucrative Japanese and Euro-American art market resulted in smuggling through Nome

and Cambell.

On the American side, the alienation of Native and

non-Native northerners was rooted in a long tradition

of top-down government policy-making. Examples

abound: the BIA schooling system which denied Native language and culture; Aleut removal from Aleutian homelands in World War II; the 'near miss' of a

"peaceful" atomic blast at Cape Thompson near Point Hope in northern Alaska in 1 959 (O'Neil 1 994); nuclear

detonations on Amchitka Island in the late 1 960s and

early 1970s; loss of lands and resources to state and

federal land-taking, etc. The passage of the Alaska

Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) in 1971 provided a measure of local control; but it was not until

the 1 980s and 1 990s that legal mechanisms, govern- ment decentralization, and co-management strategies

began to turn the tide, and scholars adopted formal

ethical standards for social science research.

Culture offered one possible avenue for Native selfdetermination, but in anthropology and museum studies the system continued to be strongly stacked

against Native interests. In Alaska, the collection of

objects that had begun during the period of early

exploring expeditions accelerated rapidly when

Smithsonian Institution's naturalists began to take up

residence after 1867. By the 1880s European collectors like Adrian Holmberg and James Lowther (Earl

Lonsdale) were complaining that all of the choice

material had already been collected and what re- mained was of poor quality and not fit for museums.

The "rush" for the Northwest Coast collections has been

well documented (Cole 1985). By 1900 most of the

old objects from Alaska and the Northwest Coast were

no longer in Native hands but in museum collections in

Washington, New York, Chicago, Victoria, or in Europe.

But there were some notable exceptions. Reverend

W.W. FITZHUCH
Sheldon Jackson built a local collection of Alaska

artifacts during the decades after 1 900 in Sitka, and

a good regional collection grew following the establishment of the College (later, University of Alaska)

in Fairbanks in the 1920s.

The situation was roughly similar in eastern Siberia, where systematic collecting began a bit later than in Alaska, during the 1890s, when Nikolai

Condatti made an excellent collection for the MAE

from the Chukchi (Dzeniskevich and Pavlinskaya

1 988). Only in a few instances were regional collections gathered and kept locally, for instance, by

Vladimir K. Arseniev in the 1910s, in Khabarovsk

and Vladivostok. However, most ethnographic and

archaeological objects were sent back west to scientific centers far from their home territories. It was

not until the 1970s that local voices began to be

heard calling for the retention or return of cultural

properties and the creation of local museums and

culture centers. Of course, throughout much of the

twentieth century both in Siberia and northwestern

North America it was not the loss of collections

that was the principal concern of Native peoples.

Rather it was the loss of language, traditional religion, and economic and political independence that was the more direct threat to the existence of ethnic nationalities. In both cases these losses were

different and had different causes and effects.

Soviet Cultural Policy

Many of these problems also existed in the Soviet Far

East where, after the Russian Revolution in 1917,

Native cultural policy was more codified (Slezkine 1 994)

than in the laissez-faire North American political and

economic system. For the early Soviet social planners,

which included Waldemar Bogoras, who became a

powerful leader of the "Committee for the North," the

preservation of culture, which was believed to be an

essential element of ethnic nationality, was a high

priority of the Socialist state. However, Native culture was far more often condemned as "primitive"

and illiterate—something to be exploited and replaced

by modern social progress. For instance, incentives were put in place to encourage vegetable farming in

Native communities in the 1 930s and fox farming during the 1950s. Cultural education was taken on as a

socialist task conducted through the so-called "Red

Yaranga" system [a traveling educational and political

team, using a Native skin-tent, yaranga, as its mobile

headquaters—ed.]. As the Soviet system transformed itself into a more

rigid authoritarian regime. Native cultural heritage be- came a state-defined and state-managed commodity, and its roots in local societies were severed. Small

Native groups lost all hope of preserving their cultural

traditions (Arutiunov and Vasiliev 1994; Sokolova

1994). Here, unlike in Alaska, language, culture, and

history were offered in schools, but content was

planned to support state-determined goals concerning the nature and content of new "socialist culture."

Native dance companies were instructed to present

traditional themes with formulaic Soviet music and

choreography; Native writers whose work expressed

Soviet political goals were promoted, and Native

mythology was reduced to the quaint "fairy-tales"

familiar in Russian literature. Shamanism and other Native religions were officially repressed, considered being as socially dangerous as private ownership of reindeer by big herd- owners (kulaks). But in marked contrast to the theoretically "freer" political atmosphere in Alaska, which

was, in fact, deadly to Native religious traditions; under the Soviet system, which was repressive to

religion in general, traditional Native religious beliefs continued either underground or as a folk genre. Whereas Alaskan and Northwest Coast Native culture and religion were actively stamped out by entrepreneurial capitalism and the missionizing frenzy

of the 1870s-90s in an effort to recast ethnic

peoples into a Euro-American mold, Siberian Native

"culture" was elevated in an attempt to create Soviet

nationalities out of some tribal groups. This stands as

292 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ CROSSROADS EXHIBITS
one of the defining distinctions between the two political systems in their relations with their respective

ethnic populations.

Full Circle: CrossroadsAl the "Crossroads"

My personal journey to the Beringian crossroads be- gan in the mid-1970s, when my studies of culture history and prehistoric human-environmental interactions

in Labrador broadened into cross-cultural work on

northern maritime cultures. As organizer of a symposium on "Prehistoric Maritime Adaptations of the Cir- cumpolar Zone" for the 9th International Congress of

Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences in Chicago

in 1973, and editor of the ensuing volume (Fitzhugh

1 975), I met some of the Russian archaeologists working in the North Pacific, including Sergei Arutiunov, Valerii

Alexeev, and Ruslan Vasil'evskii, as well as many American scholars working in Alaska, including Don Dumond,

Christy Turner, Robert Ackerman, Allen McCartney, and

others. Shortly afterwards, as Arctic curator at the National Museum of Natural History, I became intrigued

by the potential of the Smithsonian's large, under-utilized Arctic ethnographic collections for research and

public education. Working with Susan Kaplan, then on

a post-doctoral position at the Smithsonian, I explored

the phenomenal collections from Western Alaska acquired by Edward W. Nelson in 1 877-81 . This resulted

in our joint exhibit and catalog, Inua: Spirit World of tine

Bering Sea Es/c/mo (Fitzhugh and Kaplan 1 982), for which

Ron Senungetuk, an liiupiat artist from Wales, Alaska,

provided assistance. Later, to reach the rural audience

in Alaska, I also assembled a smaller ('mini-lnua') traveling version which traveled to villages in Alaska, Canada,

and Greenland in 1 983-87 (Fitzhugh and Kaplan 1 983).

Susan Rowley later organized an USIA-sponsored version of this exhibit ('Euro-lnua') which toured to Eastern and Northern Europe in 1 988. The experience with these

projects revealed a strong and growing interest among

Alaskans to be reconnected with their "lost heritage"

that had been squirreled away in the Smithsonian's

attic for more than a century. It was obvious that more

was needed than simply re-issuing modern reprints of Edward Nelson's and John Murdoch's old ethnographies (Nelson 1983; Murdoch 1988); Native communities were looking for a more palpable connection with

the material and archival remains of their ancestors. An opportunity to expand this program of 'heritage re-connection' appeared most unexpectedly when

William C. Sturtevant and I began to take part in cultural exchanges between American and Russian anthropologists being organized by the International Research and Exchanges Board (IREX) during the

1 970s. Initially these exchanges had been planned to

familiarize scholars with research data resulting from a

generation of anthropological studies on both sides

of Bering Strait. Some of these projects had produced

revolutionary results, especially in archaeology

(Arutiunov and Sergeev 1969, 1975; Collins 1937,

1951; Larsen and Rainey 1948; Ciddings 1967;

Rudenko 1961). Intense interest also existed in areas

of physical anthropology, linguistics, ethnology, and

folklore. After a few years during which several symposia were arranged by IREX (Michael 1 979; Michael

and VanStone 1 983), frustration had begun to grow

due to the lack of progress on the one goal that eluded

researchers from both sides: inability to gain permission to visit field sites and Native-populated regions

across what had by this time become a heavily militarized frontier. The only positive results had been a series of exchanges led by A. P. Okladnikov and W. S.

Laughlin that unfortunately were extremely limited in

scope (Laughlin 1985).

In 1978 the author and William C. Sturtevant pro- posed a new approach to the late Julian Bromley, then

Director of the Soviet Institute of Ethnography. Why

not develop, we suggested to the Russians, a type of

Beringia-focused collaboration that would not be so

politically sensitive? Such a program might foster

joint studies of ethnographic and cultural materials

that would have institutional goals that were broader

than the scholarly objectives of individual anthropologists. Why not design and produce a major joint

W.W. FITZHUGH 293
Soviet-American museum exhibition featuring traditional cultures of the Native peoples on both sides of

the North Pacific? Such a study would incorporate the

interests of Soviet and American scholars in gaining

access to previously unstudied collections with a specific, highly visible outcome. The Russians, who were

then eager for travel and research opportunities in North

America, could study the early collections of Siberian

peoples gathered by the Jesup Expedition and housed

in the American Museum of Natural History in New

York. The Americans, in return, could gain experience

with Soviet anthropology and study the large collections of Alaskan and Russian-American objects that

dated several decades earlier than any other systematic collections available from these regions in Western museums. After the many deadlocked disputes over

field access, the Russians found this idea a most wel- come shift of focus.

For the next nine years (1 978-87), teams of Soviet and American scholars met periodically under the

auspices of IREX to plan a project that in the best

meaning of cultural exchange accomplished much

more than create an exhibition. In reality, "Crossroads

of Continents" proved to be an effective research and

education venture that served as an ideal bridge during the difficult transitional period in Soviet American

relations in the last phase of the Cold War, from the

late 1970s to 1990. In addition to providing for the

continuation of scholarly exchanges, it highlighted the achievements and shared history of Native cultures in

portions of North America and Eurasia that had been

engaged in contacts and exchanges for thousands of

years, beginning with the peopling of the New World.

It also happened that the project content had a

highly symbolic political message as our respective

countries were groping toward rapprochement.

For this reason, although we were careful to keep

the exhibition from straying into dangerous political

waters, the planning of the exhibition nevertheless was

a political process, including the acceptance of its

title. From the North American side, Americans and

Canadians immediately accepted "Crossroads" as the

central theme. On the Soviet side, however, there was some concern that the use of a title that implied open borders until the twentieth century would

only accentuate the darker realities of the Soviet

period.

A further concern of Soviet officialdom was the

desire of American and Canadian curators to include

the Ainu people of Sakhalin, the Kuriles, and Hokkaido

to the list of Native cultures of the North Pacific to be

exhibited. Yes, all parties agreed that the Ainu were to be considered as culturally affiliated to North Pacific indigenous peoples; nevertheless the Russian side refused to condone their inclusion as this would

lead to "political problems" connected with the

Soviet expulsion of the Ainu from Sakhalin in 1946

and the taking of the southern Kurile Islands from

japan in 1945. As the Soviet side expressed it, the

Ainu were "barely touched" by the Jesup Expedition,

and since the JNPE had become the historical bedrock

for Crossroads, it was not appropriate to include the

Ainu. Faced with adamant opposition, we retreated,

realizing also that our officially bilateral project, though

operationally trilateral due to Canadian collaboration,

could not accommodate further organizational complexity with the inclusion of Japanese partners. As it happened, we were able to fill the cultural gap in our coverage of North Pacific peoples in "Crossroads"

several years later by organizing a special Ainu exhibition and catalog (Fitzhugh and Dubreuil 1999).

With these hurdles crossed, in 1979 William

Sturtevant and I prepared a proposal that outlined the

exhibition project and themes. Initially, the plan was

received positively by the Russian Academy of Science, but in 1980, discussions broke off for a year

during the period of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. New proposals were submitted in 1981 and in

the fall of 1 982 a delegation of ethnologists from the

Institute of Ethnography including Sergei Arutiunov,

Vladimir Vasil'ev, and llya Curvich came to inspect Siberian collections at the Smithsonian and the Jesup

294 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ CROSSROADS EXHIBITS
Expedition collections and archives at the American

Museum of Natural History. This was followed in 1 983

by a reciprocal visit of North American curators including William Sturtevant, Bill Holm, George and Joan

MacDonald, William Fitzhugh, and James VanStone (Figs.

81,82, and 87), to study collections in Moscow and

Leningrad. It was at this time that George

MacDonald, then Director of the Canadian Museum

of Civilization in Ottawa, suggested we title the exhibition "Crossroads of Continents."

The Russian team made two more visits to the

States in 1984 and during the second meeting in December 1984 made a careful evaluation of the

AMNH Siberian collections. This institution turned out

to be steadfast partner as these exchanges unfolded. The legacy of thejesup Expedition could not have been more unstintingly fulfilled by the AMNH administration,

curators, collections, and archival staff (and eventually,

their exhibition and educational programs) as we be- gan the hard work of resurrecting the Jesup collections from storage and presenting them for research and to

the public'

During the Crossroads project these exchanges, on both sides, were funded for the duration of the

project by IREX and were managed by Dr. Wesley Fisher and his staff. We also began to receive grants from the

Smithsonian's Special Exhibition Fund and in 1986 a

formal protocol agreement was signed by both sides

that stipulated that the Smithsonian's National Museum

of Natural History would mount the show and the

Smithsonian's Traveling Exhibition Service (SITES) would

travel it to five venues in North America. April 1986

found the exhibition team and conservator Vera

Espinola in the Soviet Union to make the final selections of objects, all of which were to come from the

collections at the Museum of Anthropology and Eth- nography (Kunstkamera) in Leningrad, then the part

of the Academy of Sciences' Institute of Ethnography structure. Aron Crowell and Valerie Chaussonnet

Joined the American curatorial team, and the late

Russian Americanist, Sergei Serov (1940-92), was

designated Crossroads project coordinator for the

Soviet side (Fig. 86). Sergei Arutiunov and I were

the respective project directors for the Soviet and

North American teams.

In the fall of 1 986 the Soviet group returned to the

United States to make the selection of objects from

the Siberian collections at AMNH. The final hurdle in

securing Soviet permission so that their artifacts could come to North America was a serious disagreement

that developed over the issue of reciprocity. During

the project's development it had always been un- derstood that the exhibit would be produced in Washington and after the North American tour would

travel to the Soviet Union. However, at the last minute

Soviet authorities disavowed this understanding and

declared that there could be no Soviet tour because

the Russian Ministry of Culture, whose museums were

the only possible sites for exhibiting Crossroads, had

not participated in the project's development, and

resented the opportunities garnered by the Russian

Academy of Sciences in this process. At the last

minute, in mid-1 987 the impasse was bridged by highlevel American diplomacy with the-then Soviet chief

leader Mikhail Gorbachev, that required the Soviet

Ministry of Culture and Russian Academy of Sciences

to come to an agreement on budgets, space, and

scholarly travel. With these hurdles cleared—at least on paper—the production of a catalog began, the MAE collections were sent to the Smithsonian, and

plans were made for a major scholarly symposium to

take place at the time of the opening.

Crossroads of Continents: Cultures of Siberia and

Alaska opened on September 18th, 1988, at the

Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History in Washington, DC (Fig. 80). Emphasizing cultural diversity but also featuring historical trends and comparisons, the exhibition succeeded in demonstrating

the long history and complex developments across

this continental divide. It educated North Americans

about the Native peoples of a part of the world that was hardly known to them, and it demonstrated

W.W. FITZHUGH 295
both the shared history of its peoples and the need for

scientific collaboration in its modern anthropological

study. It also conveyed the message that the political

barriers that had been erected at Bering Strait during

the twentieth century were anomalous in the longer

history of cultural contacts across this crossroads region. After the Smithsonian venue, the exhibition traveled for four years to the American Museum of Natural

History in New York City, the Seattle Center, the Anchorage Museum of History and Art, the Eideljorg Mu- seum in Indianapolis, the Roy Rogers Museum in Los

Angeles, and the Canadian Museum of Civilization in

Ottawa, ending in 1992 (Fig. 85). Hundreds of thousands of visitors saw the exhibition, and more than

100,000 catalogs were distributed.

During the course of the tour, a large number of

Russian scholars visited the United States and Canada

where they lectured, instructed docents, and conducted

research. Many of these venues organized scholarly

symposia, which were attended by Russians and American scientists. Although the exhibit had been devel- oped primarily by ethnologists from the Institute of

Ethnography's Moscow headquarters, a number of curators from the venerable Museum of Anthropology

and Ethnology (Peter the Great Museum, or Kunstkamera) in St. Petersburg were able to visit North America. Many Americans met the first Russians they ever knew through these exchanges and

formed new impressions about Russians that were

quite different from the image of the Cold War Soviets derived from the American Government and

media.

"Big" ("Bolshof) Crossroads was a product of the

central institutes and museums, and their scholars

and curators. Sergei Arutiunov and Sergei Serov (Fig.

86) from the Institute of Ethnography directed the

Soviet component from Moscow. The St. Petersburg

(then Leningrad) MAE supplied collections but took

a smaller role in planning although its curators participated in the catalog and the North American tour.

For many unfortunate reasons (timing, place, politics, etc.), Native participation in the curatorial work

and exchanges on both sides was almost nil. When the Soviet system collapsed in 1991-2, our

plan for a reciprocal tour in Russia met the same fate

as the Soviet government. The administration of the

Institute of Ethnography and its parent Academy of

Sciences had no financial resources for supporting the

tour, especially given the uncooperative attitude of

the Ministry of Culture. Not having benefited from the

planning phase and the U.S. tour, the new Russian Ministry of Culture (the heir of the former Soviet Ministry)

had no interest in providing an internal platform in Russia for an exhibit organized by a bureaucratic rival, the Academy of Sciences. Corporate sponsors were no- where to be found, and costs of transport and security within the new Russia had become prohibitive.

SITES and the Smithsonian concluded that the exhibition could not be sent to Russia. IREX was unwilling to honor the agreements we had signed with the old

Soviet authorities, and the reciprocal opportunities for

research and scholarly exchange that Americans had

hoped to reap from the reciprocal tour of the exhibition in Russia were irrevocably lost . Although this was

a painful development, most people agreed that the

benefits of the North American tour had been considerable and that much good had come from the extensive contacts with Russian scholars in America. The

project officially ended in 1992 and the Russian objects were shipped back to Russia after the exhibit's

last venue in Ottawa.

"Mim-Crossroaif^' in Alaska and Siberia

The collapse of the Russian tour made it impossible for

us to gain national exposure for our joint efforts in

Russia. But it did not diminish our interest in having the

'Crossroads' message heard there, especially in the

Russian Far East. Our previous experience touring a

small version of the Inua exhibit in Alaska during the

1 980s suggested that a "mini-Crossroads" exhibit might

also be feasible in the Russian Far East. For this project we intended to rectify two glaring omissions of the

296 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ CROSSROADS EXHIBITS
"Big Crossroads" project: failure to involve Native

collaborators and to have the show presented in local museums in Native North Pacific homelands.

Crossroads Siberia/Alaska (or 'Mini-Crossroads,'

as we generally called this new project) was

launched for the special purpose of presenting

"Crossroads" themes of cultural interactions and

mutual influences across the North Pacific to local

audiences in Alaska and the Russian Far East. As

such, it carried forward the project begun by Boas and thejesup North Pacific Expedition, bringing jesup

and subsequent results on North Pacific cultural heritage back to the peoples of this region. Unfortunately, the task of bringing Native people into the

dialog about preservation, origins, and enhancement

of their cultures had never been on the original

expedition's agenda, framed as it was under the

paradigms of "salvage museum anthropology" of the

late 1 800s. In keeping with this declared goal of the new project, several Alaskan scholars and Native cultural experts were invited to write sections of a new

exhibit catalog featuring Alaska Native cultures (see

Chaussonnet 1 995). The list of contributors included Jana Harcharek from Barrow, Rachael Craig from

Kotzebue, Larry Kairaiuak and Darlene Orr from

Nome, Gordon Pullarand Richard Knechtfrom Kodiak

and Anchorage, Barbara Svarny Carlson from the

Aleutians, Melinda Chase, Miranda Wright, and Bernice

Joseph from interior Alaska, and Nora Marks Dauenhauer

and Richard Dauenhauer from Juneau. In addition to

objects selected from the Smithsonian, we also chose

collections from local Alaskan museums. Incorporation

of Russian Far East materials and curators was more

complex and was accomplished by a tour of regional museums in the Russian Far East during March of 1 990,

funded by the Smithsonian, the Alaska Humanities Fo- rum, and the Alaska State Council on the Arts. The

research team that visited the Russian Far East included

Valerie Chaussonnet, William Fitzhugh, the late Richard

Jordan, James Dixon, Roger Powers, and Darlene Orr

(Fitzhugh 1995:6-7; Fig. 89).

This amazing trip from the Bering Strait to Vladivostok took place during a time of glasnost and

perestroika during the last years of the old Soviet Union

and was organized by Valerii Shubin of the Sakhalin

Regional Museum in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk. Much of its

cost was borne by that institution and others along

our route. The tour gave us a first-hand look at regional museums and their collections in Provideniya, Anadyr,

Khabarovsk, Vladivostok, Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, Novosibirsk, and Magadan. We were the first Western anthropologists to visit some of these museums, and

Vladivostok was then still a closed city to outsiders.

Typically, we met curators, cultural experts, and local

officials, but few Native people. We found every institution willing to loan objects and expertise and willing

to take part in the 'mini-Crossroads' Far Eastern tour.

Valerii Shubin and his museum's Director, Vladislav M.

Latyshev, offered to coordinate the planning and as- semble Siberian collections.

In the end, Provideniya, Anadyr, and Novosibirsk were unable to participate in the mini-Crossroads'

project; but collections were assembled from local museums in Magadan, Petropavlovsk, Khabarovsk,

Vladivostok, and Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk. Two years later

the late Nikolai N. Dikov of the Magadan Northeast

Research Institute brought these materials to Alaska.,

in his hand luggage, considering it prudent—indeed,

'customary by Russian standards—not to inform U.S. Customs. The American collections were assembled

from the University of Alaska Museum in Fairbanks, the Kodiak Area Native Association in Kodiak, and the

Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History and

National Museum of the American Indian. The Smithsonian, NSF, NEH, National Park Service, and other organizations financed the traveling exhibition. The exhibit was curated magnificently by Valerie Chaussonnet in 1994 and toured to fifteen regional museums and culture centers in Alaska under the guid- ance of local organizer Jean Flanagan Carlo between

1 994-6. These museums included almost every regional

center in Alaska, such as Barrow, Nome, Bethel, Sitka,

W.W, FITZHUGH 297
Kodiak, Juneau, Fairbanks, Anchorage, Homer,

Ketchikan, and others. A beautiful catalog was also

issued (Chaussonnet 1 995). The exhibit itself had a huge

impact on Native Alaska. During various phases of

production and the Alaskan tour we hosted several

Russian colleagues in Washington and in Alaska. The lessons of Crossroads Alaska were evident in

the tremendous response given to this exhibit as it

traveled from town to town in Alaska. In the decade

since the 'mini-lnua' tour of the 1980s we had learned more about how to package small traveling shows,

especially about the need for curricula development,

school tours, tours for children given by elders, education resource kits, and the importance of visual resources

like photographic albums and videos. The energy of a

local tour coordinator was crucial for raising local and national funding for education components and

for local coordination. Terry Dickey, Wanda Chin, Leonard

Kammerling, and other staff of the University of Alaska

Museum in Fairbanks assisted us masterfully in these

areas. We also learned that small exhibits (if one can call

twenty-five large bright purple crates a small exhibit

package!) could safely be shipped around Alaska in any season if the artifacts are selected for this task, are

permanently installed in climatically-buffered cases, and

are given careful conservation monitoring). There is no

reason why such traveling exhibits cannot safely be

presented in any place in the North. Given careful planning, issues of object security can be met even under

rigorous conditions of northern environments. Unfortunately we also discovered that touring small exhibits in this manner is also very expensive: Cross- roads Alaska/Siberia cost more than $500,000 to produce and circulate in Alaska alone. Reports of

this tour are found in various issues of the Arctic

Studies Center Newsletter for the years 1 994 to 1 997.

With this experience in Alaska the Arctic Studies

Center organized the next 'mini-Crossroads' tour—^this

time in the Russian Far East, in 1 996-7. This project was undertaken by Igor Krupnik, who began the

planning effort with the Russian Institute for the Cultural and Natural Heritage in Moscow through the generous assistance of its Director, Yurii Vedenin, and Assistance Director, Pavel Shulgin. However, following a

highly successful planning meeting of regional museum

directors in early 1 997 in Khabarovsk, hosted by Nikolai

Ruban, Director of the Khabarovsk Regional Museum,

the tour quickly became an Arctic Studies Center-Russian Far East enterprise, with venues planned at Khabarovsk, Blagoveshchensk, Vladivostok, and

Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk. Krupnik directed the primary organizing group with assistance from Deborah Hull-Walski and Greta Hansen of the Smithsonian's Anthropology

collection staff, and the Arctic Studies Center's Anne

Stone. The primary collaborators on the Russian Far

East side included Nikolai Ruban (assisted by Dr. Anna

Ponomareva, Khabarovsk Museum chief Ethnography

Curator) and Vladislav Latyshev, Director of the YuzhnoSakhalinsk Regional Museum. Olga Shubina, of this latter museum, took on the extremely important and difficult role of Russian tour coordinator, and performed

miracles to ensure the safety of the collections.This

project, which to my knowledge was the first traveling exhibition to tour in the Russian Far East, quickly

revealed the great potential as well as the pitfalls of a

regional approach to exhibition sharing and museumbased education in this region. The problems were

many. Besides the obvious lack of funds, there was a

critical shortage of Native participation and 'Native

voice' in the Russian tour planning and in public

education and museum programs. A Native-based

cultural agenda was much less important in the local museums' agendas than appealing to the general

Russian public, and the exhibit was often presented

with only token involvement of local Native cultural

leaders, limited to the opening public ceremonies.

Whereas our local Russian partners were not always

able to match the full scale of educational programming plan we had mounted in Alaska, the 'mini-Crossroads' experience implanted models for future devel- opment of these concepts. Perhaps most importantly,

298 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ CROSSROADS EXHIBITS
the exhibition familiarized Russian museum curators

with conservation requirements, installation technology, and educational programming that will be useful

in future efforts (Figs. 90, 91 ). Our Russian partners did

a masterful job protecting and traveling the exhibit

and, not the least, raising local funds for its transport

and care. Other than the crucial payment of the

exhibition's insurance bill by the Russian Ministry of

Culture, the entire tour was locally supported.

Our part, to get the exhibition cases and objects

to Russia and to get the North American collections home cost a mere $50,000! Igor Krupnik deserves

great credit for editing the Russian language version

of the catalog (Krupnik 1 996), for courting the support

of the Russian Ministry of Culture, for successfully arranging for the catalog's printing by the United States

Information Agency, and for managing the entire tour

process by phone and fax. Among Krupnik's contributions was his success in securing Russian Native authors for the Russian language catalog, including

Vladimir Etylen and Tatyana Achirgina-Arsyak from

Anadyr, Valentina Dedyk-lvkavav from Palana, Tasyan

Tein from Magadan, Lyudmila Ainanafrom Provideniya,

Anatoly Alexeev from Yakutsk, Nadezhda Laigun from

Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, Nadezhda Kimonko, Antonina Kile,

Valentina Samar, and Valentina Fedorova-Diatala from

Khabarovsk and the Amur River region. This was the

first time—at least, to my knowledge—that Native

people from both sides of the North Pacific were able

to present their respective cultures under one cover and with a similar format. Looking back one can

truly say that accomplishing the Russian Far East

tour was a minor miracle, to the great credit of Olga

Shubina and her colleagues, Igor Krupnik, and the Smithsonian staff.

Siberian Museums and Native Peoples

In addition to its role in regional cultural education.

Crossroads Alaska/Siberia provided curators from Siberia and Alaska with opportunities to exchange

visits, meet Native groups, study collections, and

learn each others' museums. As mentioned above, the

process started in 1990 when a team of American

curators was able to visit several Russian Siberian mu- seums from Provideniya to Vladivostok to Novosibirsk.

This trip gave us a glimpse of provincial Russian museums at an historic turning point in Soviet/Russian

history, and we found them, like the rest of Russia at

that time, in the midst of self-examination and renewal. Most of the old system and institutional architecture prevailed, but curators and directors were

searching for new directions. All were interested in

collaborating with a traveling version of Crossroads even though few people in these areas of Russia

had ever heard of the larger Crossroads show or seen its catalog. Most important, the regional museum system at

that time was still part of the bigger cultural program

of the Soviet State. Unlike Alaska and the Northwest

Coast, where museums functioned in more diverse, informal, entrepreneurial ways, Soviet regional museums

received state support and were seen as important

educational institutions that purveyed state-sanctioned knowledge. Budgets were modest but assured, and

directors and curators concentrated on collecting and

archiving cultural materials, conducting research, and

producing exhibits, local publications, and education

pamphlets. Regional museums always had three internal departments with three corresponding exhibit sections: natural science, pre-Soviet history, and Soviet

history. Since ethnography and archaeology were

always relegated to the "pre-Soviet" history. Native

culture, as far as museums were concerned, officially was not a part of modern life or of its museum displays. Russian Far East regional museums sponsored

substantial archaeological and ethnographic research

in their local areas and were often the designated

repositories for these projects. Over time local Siberian museums came to possess important research

collections. As progressive as this structure was compared to

the United States Government's seemingly dedicated

W.W. FITZHUCH 299
aversion to cultural education, Soviet Native people were rarely appointed to positions of authority in

Soviet regional museums. During the Soviet era regional museums usually followed policies deter- mined by the local Communist Party line. Even during the Clasnost times, the situation we observed was largely the same as that described for the previous Soviet period in the Russian Far East. Museums

had opened exhibits on the atrocities of the old regime, but Native voices were almost non-existent, and

exhibits of Native culture were exhibits of Native culture rather than exhibits by or with Native people. These

observations of the 1 990 tour may be now obsolete,

as by the time Laurel Kendall and Alexia Bloch visited some of the same museums in 1998, local conditions

had changed markedly (Kendall and Bloch n.d.). Budgets were cut significantly and money was scarce everywhere; but many programs were blooming with

local support.

Overall, one might say that during the past century Native cultures maintained themselves at roughly comparable levels across the North Pacific

Region. While North American Natives never experienced Stalin's murderous purges and police state

repression, they suffered greatly from official neglect

and from loss of lands and subsistence resources. They found their cultures and languages ridiculed and repressed by the dominant majority, and in many

places they often occupied a comparable position

with their Siberian counterparts at the bottom of

the local economic and social ladder. Where Soviet

Native peoples had their cultures artificially controlled and were forced into Soviet modes of behavior, American Natives had their cultures trampled by private

industry and government, and lost much to disease,

alcohol, and poverty, as also was the case in Siberia. Thus, by 1990, Native cultures in the Russian

Far East suffered both the continued repression of the

Soviet past as well as the crushing weight of a struggling economy, in which local people were frequently

impoverished outsiders. Unfortunately, Soviet museum

policy did nothing to help Native people maintain

their culture anymore than the government helped

them maintain a voice in local affairs. By this time in

Alaska, cultural programming and revitalization had

surged forward during the twenty years since the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act had opened

the way toward more intensive resource development and Native "corporate" independence. Al- though Native Alaskan cultural life and its museum

expressions then, as today, was far from being a

"bed of roses," significant strides had been made in

self-determination and economic independence.

Fortunately, there are indications that the situation

in Siberia is now also improving for its Native people,

at least as far as the preservation and documentation of their cultures is concerned.

Heritage Anthropology: Past and Future

Over the past twenty-five years, since the Arctic

Studies Center began producing museum-based outreach programs, the importance of reconnecting cultural heritage materials gathered and preserved in museums with ongoing living traditions has become a

surprising new and revitalizing force in museum anthropology. Institutions whose raison d'etre since

their founding more than one hundred years ago had

been to collect vanishing cultures and educate or

entertain the public have had their missions deeply

transformed. Academic scholars and museum curators have discovered that the world [out there] has

dimensions not conceived of by the founders who

charted anthropological and museum research for the

past century. The discovery that these collections could

be useful for more than simply preserving the remains

of cultures being absorbed into the mainstream of society or for scientific studies of human history has been

a surprising revelation to a field that has prided itself on understanding and serving its constituents and its

audience.

For years that audience has consisted of mu- seum visitors and other scholars who used museum

300 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ CROSSROADS EXHIBITS
collections and archival materials for generally altruistic goals of entertainment, appreciation, research, and

erudition. Now, within the span of little more than a

decade, a new pulsing vein of culture and tradition has

become evident, arising not in the sometimes dowdy

halls of museums and curators' stalls but in the reconnection between museum objects and records and

the people from whom they originated. Somehow,

most of the societies and cultures that had become

the targets of salvage anthropology—at least, in

the North—have survived the twentieth century and

have emerged with a passion to re-invigorate their

heritage and to learn from or absorb parts of their

past into their modern lives. The history of anthropology and museum collecting in the North Pacific during the past century

provides a striking panorama of the forces that have

shaped cultural studies and the use of cultural materials. Unlike most other areas of the world where

complex societies had already heavily impacted traditional life, cultures of the North Pacific in the late

nineteenth century were still largely intact. Here the

past 100 years of change has been paralleled by a remarkable record of anthropological and museumbased documentation. Few areas of the world are

so well represented in terms of material cultural and

historical records.

During the century since the Jesup Expedition teams

surveyed the North Pacific, anthropology and museum

studies have come full-circle, with Native peoples

emerging to reclaim their stake in their heritage and in

this process. This transition went through several stages: from the "salvage documentation" of the vestiges of

traditional cultures for purely historical and academic

reasons (as practiced by Boas); to the "pro-activist eth- nography and cultural construction" by governmentemployed scholars of the early Soviet era (initiated

by Bogoras); to the purely scientific investigations

of cultural origins as practiced by scholars like Henry

Collins, Frederica de Laguna, and Sergei Rudenko;

to the more reflexive museum and publication

projects of the late 1 900s, like Inua: Spirit World of the

Bering Sea Eskimo, Crossroads of Continents and its

'mini-Crossroads' versions. Chiefly Feasts: The Enduring KwakiutI Potlatch (Jonaitis 1 991 ), The Living Tradition of Yup'ik Masks: Agayuliyararput — Our Way of

Making Prayers (Fienup-Riordan 1 996), and Looking

Both Ways: l-ieritage and Identity of the Alutiiq People

(Crowell, Steffian, and Pullar 200 1 ). Today the peoples

of these regions, as elsewhere, are rediscovering their

past and are finding materials that inspire their future.

This is the real and lasting legacy of the Jesup Expedition. The re-establishment of the connection between

culture-bearers and their museum and archival heritage

is emerging as a powerful new force that re-purposes museums and opens new responsibilities for curators and their new local constituencies.

Facing a paradigm shift that also includes the politics of repatriation, museum workers need to reassess

their goals and methods of operation. While the out- comes are not clear, new technologies, especially the

Internet, imaging, and information technologies offer

powerful new tools for bringing museum treasures out

of the archives and back into the mainstream of Native life and to the many other audiences seeking enrichment with cultural heritage materials. Programs of

this new era, like the evolving permutations of the

"Crossroads of Continents" program, have helped rechart the route and find new partners. The original Jesup

Expedition was instrumental in this effort, and I imagine Boas might not have been displeased to see the

results of this new kind of museum anthropology that

brings collections and Native peoples together again

across Bering Strait after having drifted so far apart

during the intervening century.

Notes

1 . As it turned out, AMNH support for Russian

and Native Siberian researchers who were studying

these collections was to extend many years into the future, culminating in efforts that lead to the Jesup Expedition Centennial conference of 1 997 and

this publication.

W.W. FITZHUCH
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82/Jim VanStone's "method" for selecting ethnographic objects for the Crossroads of Continents exhibit—in this case, a Tlingit war helmet from the MAE collection. Museum ofAnthropology and Ethnography (KunstWammer), St. Petersburg, Russia. 1983. Photographer, Jean-Loup Rousselot (ASC Collection)

W.W. FITZHUCH 305
83/Aleut laborers working for the Jochelsons excavate the whalebone walls of an ancient

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presented by WaldemarJochelson to the Department ofAnthropology of the National Mu- seum (also jochelson 1925:32)

306
yA^ieut /\rcliaeoiogtj and (^Luitura! ["jeritage:

T"^^- L'Sgact) of the ^'esup f\|orth facific r'xp edition

STEPHEN LORING

AND DOUGLAS W. VELTRE

As the far-reaching goals of the Jesup North Pacific

Expedition ONPE) of 1897-1902 developed, their initial scope narrowed to the extent that the research

venture had eventually only a marginal presence in southwestern Alaska. Nevertheless, subsequent research in this area owes a considerable intellectual debt

to the foundations laid by JNPE researchers and to its

overall scholarly paradigm. In particular, Waldemar

Jochelson and Dina Jochelson-Brodsky, who have had

extensive Siberian experience and had worked with

the JNPE, brought the broad anthropological approach

of the Jesup Expedition program to the Aleutians in 1909-10 (Fig. 83).

In this paper, we first examine archaeological

research in the Aleut region preceding that of the

Jochelsons. Next we discuss the specific efforts of the

Jochelsons, whose Aleut-Kamchatka Expedition of

1909-11 addressed a number of themes that have

figured significantly in subsequent Aleutian research. These include the nature and timing of human colonization of the region; the nature of human maritime

adaptations; and the cultural, linguistic and biological

relationships and continuities between the past and

the present. Third, we look at archaeological research done between that of the Jochelsons and about 1 970.

Finally, we review work done since 1 970, in particular

exploring the significant ways in which the contributions of the Jochelsons and other early researchers

have combined with recent legislative developments

to influence contemporary archaeological and cultural

heritage efforts in the Aleut region and to help shape

Aleut identity in the modern world. The Aleut region is that area of southwestern Alaska

that was the traditional home of the Aleut people (a name which is discussed below). It includes the tip of

the Alaska Peninsula from Port Moller westward, the Shumagin Islands group south of the Alaska Peninsula,

and the entire Aleutian Islands archipelago, some

seventy islands extending 1 ,600 km from the end of

the Alaska Peninsula westward towards the Kamchatka

Peninsula (see map Fig. 5). This area comprises a dynamic landscape shaped by glacial and tectonic processes, including volcanism, earthquake activity, and

sea-level changes (McCartney and Veltre 1 999). At

the junction of the North Pacific Ocean and the Bering

Sea, where marine upwelling provides nutrient-rich

water, the Aleutian Islands ecosystem hosts one of

the world's most productive fisheries and highest concentrations of pelagic birds and marine mammals. The

bountiful marine resources available to human hunters

and gatherers figured significantly in the early colonization of the archipelago and continue to shape regional social, political, and economic agendas.

Archaeological, biological, and ethnographic data

show a cultural continuity in this region for at least the

last 4000 years (cf Laughlin 1963, 1980; McCartney

1 977, 1 984). Aleut oral tradition also suggests that

the Pribilof Islands, north of the Aleutian chain in the

Bering Sea, were known to the Aleut people prior to

the islands' discovery by the Russians in 1 786 and

307
1 787. However, the limited archaeological research

to date there has found no evidence of utilization of

these islands by anyone prior to the Russian period,

when they were settled by the Aleut (Vettre and Veltre

1986; Veltre and McCartney 1994, 2002).

At the time of contact in the mid-1 700s, the Aleut

population likely numbered some 1 2-1 5,000 (Lantis

1984:163). The traditional economy was focused on

the sea as the provider of nearly all food and raw materials, with marine mammals, ocean and anadromous

fish, marine invertebrates, birds, and eggs providing at

least ninety-five percent of the diet (Laughlin 1 980:49).

Larger winter settlements and smaller seasonal camps

were along the coast. Extended families, possibly organized according to principles of matrilineal kinship

(Lantis 1 970), lived in semi-subterranean houses.

In contemplating the legacy of the JNPE as it pertains to the Aleut region, we focus our remarks on the

history of archaeological research in the Aleutians,

mentioning only briefly the wider sphere of anthropological issues embraced by the Boasian school. Archaeology in the Aleutians began in the 1 870s with the

pioneering work of William Dall and Alphonse Pinart.

Their revelations on the antiquity of Aleut occupations

stimulated interest in the Aleutians as a possible gateway for people entering the New World and greatly

influenced Franz Boas' (1 905:91 ) statement of thejesup

Expedition goals: "one of the great problems of ethnological science is the relation of the American race

to the races of the other continents" to be revealed through the comparative study of contemporary Native people, physical anthropology, and archaeology.

While in Boas' original conception of thejesup Expedition research program the Aleutians were scheduled for attention in 1901 (see Fig. 4, p. 17), that survey never materialized.

The Beginning of Archaeological Research in the Aleutians

Anthropology and geography were the pre-eminent

intellectual bases of eighteenth and nineteenth centuries' expanding Western colonial enterprises. The discipline of archaeology has, until recently, been a

peculiar and exclusionary system of knowledge that

has served to extend Western intellectual hegemony

over the past and has, for the most part, failed to capture the imagination and interest of people in northern communities. Nevertheless, by extending

perceptions of the viability and existence of social

(tribal, ethnic) institutions into the past, archaeology can play an important role in the preservation,

formation, and interpretation of social identities. The

Boasian anthropologists were much closer in time to

the pre-contact past with their notions of traditional,

static culture, and they expected archaeology to confirm ancient land tenure and perceptions shaped by

ethnography. While Aleut community members have

always been involved in the interpretation of their past

(as guides, interpreters, informants, field-workers), it is

only recently, as anthropologists have begun to surrender their position of authority and control, that they

have taken a more active role in the construction of

their past. Archaeology in the Aleutians arguably begins with

the collecting activities of the French ethnologist

Alphonse Pinart who carted off a collection of remarkable wooden masks and associated objects from a

burial cave on Unga Island in the Shumagins in 1 871

(Pinart 1875). Knowledge of the Unga discoveries

quickly spread and piqued the interest of William Dall,

captain of a U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey vessel

in charge of a Smithsonian-sponsored scientific sur- vey of the Aleutians from 1 871 to 1 874 (Dall 1 875a,

1875b, 1878).

Dall was the epitome of a systematic naturalist.

Trained by Louis Agassiz, he first came to Alaska in

1 865 (when he was twenty-one) to work with and

eventually lead the Western Union International Tele- graph Expedition (Merriam 1 927; Dall 1 870). Dall was

a splendid exemplar of the intellectual eclecticism

of nineteenth century naturalists. While primarily a

specialist on shells, his Alaska research also included

308 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ALEUTIANS
publications on birds, fish, mammals,

cetacean parasites, and meteorology,

all's archaeological investigations, conducted sporadically as bad weather and

logistics constrained his official survey

work, pioneered the systematic excavation of shell middens (Dall 1873, 1877).

His deep cuts in stratified midden deposits suggested a significant antiquity of the

region.

In the Aleutians the question of the

origins of the Aleut people structured

early research, with the possibility that

the earliest colonizers crossed from Kamchatka Peninsula to the Aleutian Islands

via the Commander Islands. While Dall did

not believe in the Asian colonization of

the Aleutians, the intense debate surrounding the issue of the origin of humans in

the New World and their possible migration routes figured significantly in Aleutian

research prior to World War II. There is an interesting aside to Dall's

research. In 1 872 he arranged to adopt

a fifteen-year old orphan from lliuliuk

(present-day Unalaska), George Tsaroff

(Fig. 84), who returned with Dall from Alaska

in 1 873. Impressed byTsarofF s cleverness, Dall arranged

for him to be educated at the University of Michigan.

In 1 878, Tsaroff came to Washington as an "assistant" where he was placed in charge of the Smithsonian's

ethnological hall. There he served as a guide to the

collections: "himself forming an extremely interesting

exhibit—that of a native Indian, well educated and instructed, and able to explain the special objects and

applications of many articles manufactured and used

in his own country" (Baird 1 881 :69).

Tragically, Tsaroff contracted consumption and

died in 1 880. His tenure as a museum guide and livinglink between ethnography and museum collections pre- cedes by twenty-three years the celebrated case of

Fig. 84/ George Tsaroff, soon after starting to work at the Smithsonian

Institution, ca. 1 878 (NAA-SI 80-1 3437)

Ishi, the "last" of the Yahi Indians, who was befriended

by Theodora and Alfred Kroeber and who performed

a similar function at the University of California Mu- seum of Anthropology at Berkeley (Kroeber 1 961 ).

Initiated by Dall, anthropological interest by the

Smithsonian in the Aleutians was furthered by the

collecting activities of Lucien M. Turner, an employee

of the U. S. Army Signal Service who was stationed in

the Aleutians in 1874-5 and again in 1879-81. He

established meteorological stations on Atka and Attu

Islands. Continuing in the broad natural science

collecting tradition of Dall, Turner made large important collections of birds, fish, mammals, insects, and

plants for the Smithsonian. His anthropological

S. LORING AND D W. VELTRE 309
contributions included the acquisition of large archaeological and ethnological collections and Aleut

vocabularies (Baird 1 883). While Turner's collections have never been systematically analyzed or even

described, they form a very valuable legacy for the

insight they provide on Aleut culture in the Western

Aleutians.

Another component of the Smithsonian interest

in the Aleutians was the work of the pioneering

naturalist Leonhard Stejneger (1 85 1 -1 943), whose

research on the extinct fauna of the Aleutians, in- cluding Steller's sea-cow and Pallas' cormorant

(Stejneger and Lucas 1 889), presaged interest in the consequences of human hunting and foraging practices on Aleutian ecosystems.

The Fieldwork of Waldemar Jochelson and

Dina Jochelson-Brodsky

In preparing for the work of the JNPE, Boas traveled

to Europe in 1 898, where he was introduced to Waldemar Jochelson (Vakhtin 2001:80-2). While

somewhat of a political liability, Jochelson was an

extraordinarily gifted and experienced Russian eth- nographer. He had worked with northern peoples

of Siberia while in exile (between 1886-95) and in

residence in Yakutsk (1895-7) prior to Joining the

Jesup Expedition research program. While on his JNPE

assignment, Jochelson was accompanied by his wife,

Dina Jochelson-Brodsky who had trained in medicine

at the University of Zurich and who took responsibility

for the expedition's health as well as for the acquisition of anthropometric and biological data. Dina

Jochelson-Brodsky also produced a portion of the

photographic record of the expedition's travels in Siberia. The Jochelsons were in Siberia from the summer

of 1 900 through the summer of 1 902 working among

the Koryak, Even (Tungus), Yukagir, and Sakha (Yakut)

peoples (Boas 1 903:1 02-9; Jochelson 1908, 1926).

Their collections were primarily ethnological but also included physical anthropology (plaster casts of

faces and measurements), photography, folklore and

musical recordings, human skeletal remains and archaeological materials acquired from graves and recently abandoned villages, zoological specimens (including a 220 lb mammoth tusk!), and meteorological

observations Oochelson, in Boas 1903:109).

The Jochelsons' experiences with the JNPE led

directly to their involvement with the Ryabushinski

Aleut-Kamchatka Expedition of 1909-11, modeled

closely on the Jesup Expedition protocol (Jochelson

1912). The Ryabushinski Expedition was under the

auspices of the Imperial Russian Geographical Society

(Fig. 92) and was financed by the Russian banker

Feodore P. Ryabushinski (Theodore Riabouschinsky). It sought to pick up where the JNPE had left off in resolving the historical, cultural, and biological relations among

Aleut, Eskimo, and Asian peoples. Foremost in its research agenda was a determination of Aleut origins in which the role of archaeology featured prominently.

The Jochelsons arrived in Unalaska injanuary 1 909. They

conducted archaeological investigations on Attu and

Atka Islands during the following summer, and then

spent the next winter at Nikolski village on Umnak

Island conducting linguistic research and collecting phonographic recordings of traditional Aleut myths and

stories Oochelson 1912; Bergsland and Dirks 1990; Korsun et al. 2001 ). In the spring of 1 91 they made a

brief visit to the Pribilof Islands before returning to Unalaska and thence to Kamchatka, where they spent

a year conducting archaeological excavations

Oochelson 1928).

During their Aleutian fieldwork the Jochelsons were

assisted by Alexei M. Yachmenev, the "Aleut chief of

Unalaska, " and other Aleut elders (making them the

first to acknowledge the role of elders in the production of knowledge). Two volumes based on the

Aleutian fieldwork were forthcoming, one on the history, ethnology, and anthropology Oochelson 1933),

the other on the results of their archaeological research Oochelson 1 92 5). The Aleutian fieldwork, following the broad Boasian agenda established by the JNPE researchers, included archaeological excavations,

3 1 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ALEUTIANS
ethnological observations and collections, anthropometric measurements, and the collection of Aleut mythology, oral traditions, language, and music (Figs. 93

and 94).

Smithsonian Redux

For a decade beginning in the late 1920s, the

Smithsonian's indomitable Ales Hrdlicka made annual

archaeological expeditions to Alaska. Hrdlicka was interested in the problems of racial history and origins,

especially as they were applicable to finding the

origins of human occupation of the New World, the

origin of Eskimo cultures in Alaska, and the nature of

prehistoric exchange, interaction, and migration.

Hrdlicka worked in the central and western Aleutians

during three successive field seasons in 1936, 1937,

and 1938 (Hrdlicka 1945). He dug at a number of

ancient Aleut sites and conducted physical anthropological and biometrical observations in Aleut

communities, especially those in the Near Islands group

of the western Aleutian Islands and in the Commander

Islands in Soviet territory.

Due to his zeal for recovering human skeletal remains, Hrdlicka never had a very good reputation

among Native Alaskans. This research, regardless of

the valid scientific questions the "data" sought to

address, was conducted with little regard for Native concerns (Loring and Prokopec 1994). His enthusi- asm also resulted in archaeological procedures that were far from satisfactory, even by the standards of

his day. To his credit, however, Hrdlicka did retain much

of the faunal material exposed during his midden excavations.

Research from World War II to 1970

The pioneering work of Dall, the broad-based JNPEinspired investigations of the Jochelsons, and the expeditions of Hrdlicka were mostly undertaken without

substantial Aleut involvement, except for the significant role of local people in sharing their cultural expertise and providing oral recordings for the

S. LORING AND D. W. VELTRE

Jochelsons (Bergsland and Dirks 1 990:1 0-1 5). Likewise,

the archaeological research methodologies of these

early researchers often left much to be desired by

modern standards. Nevertheless, the groundwork laid

by these scholars set the stage for a wide range of

anthropological research in the post-World War II years.

It also left an important legacy for recently emergent

efforts at perpetuating Aleut cultural heritage.

The World War II years and the years following have

arguably witnessed more changes in Aleut culture than

any period since the early Russian era (cf. Veltre 1 990,

1 999). In 1 942, Aleuts from far-western Attu Island were taken as prisoners by the Japanese, and all other Aleuts from St. Paul and St. George in the Pribilof

Islands and from villages west of the Alaska Peninsula- some 881 individuals—were taken by the U. S. military

to internment camps in southeastern Alaska for the

duration of the war (Kohlhoff 1 990; Veltre 1 992). This was a period of severe deprivation and hardship,

keeping the Aleut people away from their homes for

several years, even long after the Japanese threat had

been eliminated. Following the war, several Aleut

villages were never reoccupied, while many of those

to which the Aleut did return saw substantial changes

in communication, education, economy, and the ethnic makeup of their communities. Although the Aleut

returned to villages where pursuit of traditional lifestyles was increasingly difficult and where, in some cases,

they were on the verge of becoming ethnic minorities

in their own communities, they nevertheless emerged

from wartime internment with new knowledge and

skills stemming from their contacts with the people,

economy, and politics outside of the Aleut region.

For the first twenty-five years following World War

II, Aleuts in many communities became more and more

assimilated into the larger world. In the Pribilof Islands,

the fur seal industry continued to be the mainstay of economic life, while in the villages along the Alaska

Peninsula and the Aleutian Islands seasonal cash employment in the growing fishing industry mixed with

traditional subsistence pursuits sustained the widely

3 1 1
dispersed population. During this time before 1 970, a few small archaeological research projects were undertaken throughout the region. In addition, two larger

efforts were begun—a long-term and multidisciplinary

series of investigations in and around the village of

Nikolski on Umnak Island by William Laughlin and his

colleagues beginning in 1 948, (cf. Laughlin 1 975), and

a program of archaeological surveys and excavations on Amchitka Island conducted as part of the U.S. Atomic

Energy Commission's underground nuclear testing pro- gram from 1 964-72 (Sense and Turner 1 970; Turner

1970; Desautels et al. 1971; Cook et al. 1972). Al- though undertaken with the knowledge and general

support of the Aleut people, these projects were initiated and conducted almost entirely without direct Aleut

consultation and involvement.

Research Since 1970

It was not until the 1 970s that the Aleut people were

able to exercise meaningful influence and control over

archaeological research in their region, and it has been

only in very recent years that they have begun to take

a more proactive role in determining the direction of

such research efforts. These changes have come about

largely due to the passage of several pieces of federal

legislation.

The Alaska Native Claims SettlementAct. The most

significant of this recent legislation is the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) of 1971, a law

having direct relevance to cultural heritage in at least two main areas. First, ANCSA established regional and

local Native for-profit corporations. As elsewhere in

the state, legal title to certain lands in the Aleut region was given to the regional for-profit Aleut Corporation,

while title to other lands went to each of thirteen local Aleut village for-profit corporations. The Aleut

Corporation's lands are distributed throughout much

of the region, while each village corporation's lands

are for the most part immediately surrounding that

village. Because these regional and village lands in- cluded the archaeological sites on them, Aleuts for

the first time owned outright a significant portion of

their cultural heritage. Thus, while prior to the passage

of ANCSA archaeologists needed only to obtain a federal Antiquities Act permit to pursue their work in most

of the Aleut region, now archaeologists wanting to conduct research on regional or village lands were required only to go to the Aleut landowners to obtain

permission, the details and conditions of which would

be up to the parties to negotiate.

While archaeological projects on Aleut lands have

been undertaken with the explicit permission of local and regional Aleut entities since 1971, few have in- volved the Aleut people directly in the planning,

field, or analytical stages of work. This is primarily be- cause the Aleut have historically not had extensive

participation in the educational and research traditions

of the universities and government agencies that typically sponsor such efforts. Also, real-life practical difficulties faced by residents of the region, who might

have to decide, for example, whether to forego sum- mer employment or subsistence pursuits to spend

weeks or months away from home at a remote archaeological field camp, have made participation difficult.Over the last few decades, however, this situation

has changed somewhat, as Aleut entities have begun

to see how archaeology can be of service to them.

The first regional Aleut Corporation-sponsored archaeological project (Frohlich and Kopjanski 1975)

occurred in 1 974, shortly after passage of ANCSA,

when archaeologists were funded to conduct site

surveys in the central and western Aleutian Islands

as part of efforts to apply for 1 4(h)(l ) sites (see below). Since then, several additional—and mostly small- scale—archaeological and ethnohistorical projects have

been initiated and underwritten by the regional corporation to address other questions it deemed significant. These included, for example, research into historical Aleut land use patterns on Attu Island, done as

part of World War II restitution (Veltre 1 988), and an

archaeological survey to examine the condition of

3 1 2 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ALEUTIANS
possibly vandalized archaeological properties on Adak

Island (Veltre 1 997a).

Likewise, some Aleut village non-profit and for-profit

entities—like the St. Paul TDX Corporation, the Ounalashka in Unalaska Corporation, and the former Unalaska

Aleut Development Corporation—have supported archaeological investigations in their communities as part

of their emerging interests in local history. One example

of this was a project in historical archaeology and

ethnohistory on St. Paul Island (Fig. 96). An initial

archaeological survey of Russian and American period settlements on the island in 1 994 (Veltre and

McCartney 1 994, 2002) was followed by excavations

at one former village in 2000 and 2001 . Archaeological efforts were combined with recording oral histories from community residents (Veltre and McCartney

2000, 2001). Instigated and underwritten in large part

by the people of that community, this project served

their dual desires to understand better their island's

history as well as to determine if archaeological resources could somehow be incorporated into their economically important tourism industry.

Other projects which have done a great deal to

further the goals of Aleut-initiated archaeology have

taken place at several sites in the City of Unalaska

under the guidance of Richard Knecht, Director of the Museum of the Aleutians. Working with the cooperation of both the City and the Aleut village corporation,

the Ounalashka Corporation, which owns the land on

which many of the sites are located, professionals and

volunteers are able to balance archaeological pursuits

with their work and family commitments (Fig. 95). Such

broad-based support, combined with logistical ease,

has enabled Knecht to undertake large-scale excavations at a number of sites over the last seven years

(Knecht and Davis 2001; Knecht 2003). Like the St.

Paul survey and excavations described above for the Ounalashka Corporation, such research efforts further

not only cultural heritage goals but strategic ones as

well, since the sites have been located in prime areas

for future economic development.

ANCSA Section 14(h)(1). The second way in which

ANCSA has affected Aleut cultural heritage is in its

provision that title to culturally important lands not

otherwise included within village or regional land

selections could be transferred to the regional Aleut

Corporation. This was accomplished through the

Act's Section 1 4(h)(l ), a relatively minor feature of the

overall legislation, but a major force in matters of con- temporary cultural heritage throughout Alaska from

the mid-1 970s to today.

Section 1 4(h)(l ) of ANCSA provides for the transfer

of title to regional Native corporations of archaeological and other historical sites not otherwise selected

by local or regional Native corporations. By the filing

deadline in the late 1 970s, the Aleut Corporation had

submitted approximately 400 individual claims for archaeological sites, the vast majority of which had never been investigated archaeologically. Importantly, the work of the early archaeologists in the region was

critical to the Aleut Corporation's efforts: had many

site locations not been noted by Dall, Jochelson, or

Hrdlicka, they most likely never would have been

applied for by the Aleut Corporation. Field investigations of Aleut site applications by BIA ANCSA archaeologists took place largely between 1 983 and 1 989

(although some work continued until 1 998), with crews mapping surface features, photographing site

localities, and plotting their locations on detailed

maps of the area. The only excavations that took

place as part of these surveys were very limited

tests.

Reminiscent of Jochelson's earlier interest in oral

traditions as well as archaeological remains, an integral and important part of the BIA ANCSA site investigations was gathering oral testimony from the presentday Aleut residents, usually elders, from communities

close to the sites being investigated. This testimony was used to bolster claims of significance for particular sites. The audiotapes recorded in the Aleut region

remain a valuable—and untapped—resource on Aleut

culture and history.

S. LORING AND D. W. VELTRE 3 1 3
An important consequence of the ANCSA 1 4(h)(l

)

surveys is that the sites conveyed under this provision

will become the property of the Aleut Corporation,

whose explicit permission will be a prerequisite for

conducting archaeological research. To date, Aleut Corporation leaders have been very supportive of

archaeological research, recognizing therein an opportunity to enhance understanding of Aleut heritage.

One current archaeological initiative undertaken with

Aleut Corporation permission is the Western Aleutian

Human Paleoecology and Biodiversity Project, an international and interdisciplinary research program initiated

in 1 992 to focus on the Near Islands, the westernmost

group in the Aleutian chain (Loring 1 994; Corbett et al.

1 997). Building upon earlier Smithsonian scholarship in

the region by Dall, Stejneger, and Hrdlicka (which fo- cused on the possibility that the Aleutians served as a pathway for human entry into the New World), this research collaborative seeks to understand the

emergence of cultural complexity in this remote

archipelago—one of the most geographically isolated landscapes ever colonized by maritime huntergatherers.

The research also seeks to utilize innovative data

recovery techniques from deeply stratified, well-preserved village midden deposits to acquire detailed

Holocene distributional and demographic data on

biodiversity. The analysis of faunal remains, especially

from avian and marine mammals species, provides an

opportunity to examine paleoecological changes at

both the local inter-island level as well as in the greater

North Pacific region as a whole. The research challenges

the assumption of ecological and cultural stasis in the

archipelago and reexamines the cultural and biological relationships between the Aleutian Islands and the

Asian continent in light of the research initiatives of

theJNPE.

Repatriation Legislation. Two relatively recent pieces

of federal legislation have also had an important impact on Aleut cultural heritage. These are the National

Museum of the American Indian Act of 1989 and the

Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation

Act (NAGPRA) of 1 990. These laws, which parallel one

another in purpose, provide for the repatriation of

human remains, associated funerary objects, and objects of cultural patrimony from the Smithsonian Institution and other repositories around the country to

Native American groups. As an initial result of this legislation, the Aleut (like many other Native groups) are learning for the first time

about the existence of collections of materials from

their region. Aleut entities ranging from the regional

Aleut Corporation to the various village councils and

corporations have been inundated with inventories of

specimens sent by over one hundred institutions. However, because these two repatriation laws are complex and costly to deal with for institutions as

well as for Native groups, their full effects have not yet

been felt in the Aleut region. Further, since there is no

statute of limitations for making repatriation requests,

regional and local Aleut groups have so far taken a

conservative and cautious approach to the entire

issue, learning from the repatriation experiences of other

Native groups. To date, a small number of National

Park Service NAGPRA Documentation Awards have

been made to local Aleut groups, one being the Aleut

Repatriation Commission, an entity set up specifically

to deal with repatriation matters for a coalition of

villages.

Aleut Cultural Identity. Concomitant with the

processes discussed above has been another change

instigated by the empowerment engendered by ANCSA

and other legislation. In recent years many Native

groups in Alaska (as well as indigenous groups worldwide) have begun to dispense with use of the names

given to them by outsiders—either other Native groups

or westerners—and to return to more traditional autonyms. In the Aleut region, this has meant that the

traditional names Unangan(m the eastern dialect) and

Unangasim the Atka, or central, dialect) have begun to

be Used (often in the form Unangax) by some Native

residents, since "Aleut" was never used in pre-Russian

3 1 4 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ALEUTIANS
times to designate the people of the region as a whole. It was only after the arrival of Russians that

"Aleut" became broadly—and confusingly—employed

to include not only the Aleut but also Native residents

of Alutiiq-speaking areas of south-central Alaska. Whether Unangax will gain widespread acceptance

among the Aleut is unknown at this time, although a

survey of elders in the region in the summer of 1 997

showed support for use of the term, and one local group—the Qawalangin Tribe of Unalaska—fully backs

its use (Barbara Svarny Carlson, pers. comm.). What is

clear, however, is that for some Aleut people today

the use of the term is a matter of substantial cultural— and political— significance.

Conclusions

Throughout Alaska today. Native people are reasserting their rights of self-determination and are working

both to strengthen and to reestablish connections to

their traditional pasts. This is certainly the case in the

Aleut region, where land ownership and control of

archaeological properties have provided the basis for

the Aleut people to take a more active role participating in, and developing goals for, cultural heritage

projects of many kinds. For the first three-quarters of

this century, at the same time that federal assimilationist

policies and outside economic interests were increasingly undermining traditional aspects of Aleut culture,

anthropologists, archaeologists, and linguists were

attempting to document both the distant past as well

as traditional aspects of contemporary Aleut life. Thus,

Aleuts today, in their pursuit of cultural heritage efforts, are building an understanding of their past in part

upon the foundations laid by earlier researchers in the

region. The oral tradition research of Barbara Svarny

Carlson, for example, has made extensive use of the

recently published stories recorded on wax cylinders

by Waldemarjochelson some 90 years ago (Bergsland

and Dirks 1 990).

One recent and important development for cultural

heritage pursuits in the Aleut region was the decision

in early 1 998 by the regional non-profit Aleutian/Pribilof

Islands Association (A/PIA) to establish a formal Cultural Heritage Department. This program is currently

pursuing a broad and creative range of cultural heritage goals, including developing a comprehensive Aleut

resources librar/, working to revitalize the Aleut language, and furthering repatriation issues. In 1 999 the A/PIA co-curated the installation of a case study on

Aleut history and culture in the Native North American

Hall at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural

History. The exhibit marked the return to the

Smithsonian of Aleut scholarship and self determination in providing an Aleut perspective that followed,

by 1 20 years the insights furnished by George Tsaroff.

It is worth noting that even the Cultural Heritage

Department owes its existence to ANCSA, since a

significant portion of its operating budget comes from

BIA 14(h)(1) funds which were contracted to A/PIA

(Veltre 1 997 b).

It is clear that the survival of the Aleut as a distinctive cultural group will involve two particular efforts. On the one hand, in a process that began perhaps two

decades ago, the Aleut have become increasingly

interested in learning about their pre-contact and postcontact cultural heritage. This has been done largely

through archaeological efforts, but has also been pur- sued through other ethnohistorical endeavors, such as

the study of museum collections of ethnographic speci- mens, recording of local oral histories, family heritage

projects, stewardship programs, and the like. Moreover, the Aleut have relatively recently begun to view

archaeological research as a means to investigate

questions of specific interest to them, such as those

dealing with historical land use. On the other hand, the Aleut have begun to resurrect traditional cultural activities—traditional in

spirit if not in actual content. Skin boat building and

traditional house building projects—as have been

undertaken in Atka, St. Paul, and Unalaska—and similar undertakings are examples of this. Perhaps nowhere

is interest in past traditions more evident than in

S LORINC AND D W VELTRE

3 1 5
the rediscovery— and, largely, the re-invention—of

Aleut dance that began in 1995. Since that time,

dance groups have emerged in at least three Aleut

communities, Atka, St. Paul, and St. George, the dancers combining the very limited ethnohistorical information regarding older Aleut dance forms with elements

of contemporary Alaska Native dance (Fig. 97). This

synthesis has generated enormous pride among the

Aleut throughout the region.

Finally, the survival of Aleut culture seems predicated on Aleuts' abilities to maintain a distinct selfidentity, rather than on the content of that identity.

That is, while this identity may be rooted in part on

specific cultural traditions having demonstrable roots

in their pre-contact past, it may just as well be based on modified or newly emergent cultural forms. When

understood in light of the historical and legislative processes by which the Aleut people have come to have more control over their own lives, the legacy of the Jesup Expedition and related early anthropological

ventures in the Aleut region lies both in the foundations they provided for subsequent more formal inquiry as well as in the wealth and diversity of information they collected which is now forming an important

basis of modern Aleut cultural heritage efforts.

Acknowledgments

There are many entities which deserve thanks for their

help over the years with our individual research projects

mentioned in this paper. These include the Aleut organizations which made our work possible through permission to work on their lands and in kind support:

The Aleut Corporation, the Aleutian/Pribilof Islands Association, the Ounalashka Corporation, the TDX Corporation, and the St. Paul Tribal Government. In addition, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, especially the

Captain and crew of their research vessel Tiglax, have

provided logistical support and permission for some

of our field projects. For their generous in kind assistance, thanks go to all the folks at Reeve Aleutian Air,

PenAir and Northern Air Cargo who have safely, and so

efficiently, transported our equipment, crews, and speci- mens. Finally, we wish to acknowledge Allen McCartney

for his inspiration and collaboration over the years.

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ed. Pp. 1 19-35. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Insti- tution. McCartney, Allen P., and Douglas W. Veltre

1999 Aleutian Island Prehistory: Living in Insular Ex- tremes. World Archaeology iO{S):SOi-] 5. Merriam, C. Hart

1 92 7 William Healy Dall. Sc/e/7ce 65(1 684):345-7.

Pinart, Alphonse

1 87 5 La Caverne d'Aknanh, Isle d'Ounga (Archpel

Shumagin, Alaska). Paris: E. Leroux.

S. LORING AND D. W. VELTRE 31 7
Sense, Richard, and Christy G. Turner, II 19 70 Catalog ofArchaeological Site Survey Records,

Amchitka Island, Alaska. Holmes and Narver, Inc., on

Continent Test Division. Report submitted to United

States Atomic Energy Commission.

Stejneger, Leonhard, and Frederic A. Lucas

1 889 Contributions to the Natural History of the Commander Islands: a Contribution to the History of Pallas' Cormorant. Proceedings of the National Museum

1 2:83-8.

Turner, Christy 11 1970 Archaeological Reconnaissance of

Amchitka Island, Alaska. Arctic Anthropology 7 (2):

1 1 8-28.

Vakhtin, Nikolai B. 2001 Franz Boas and the Shaping of the Jesup

Expedition Siberian Research, 1 895-1 900. In Gate- ways. Exploring the Legacy of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition, 1897-1902. Igor Krupnik and Wil- liam W. Fitzhugh, eds. Pp. 71 -89. Contributions to Circumpolar Anthropology, 1 . Washington, DC:

Arctic Studies Center.

Veltre, Douglas W.

1988 Aleut Use of the Western Portion of Attu Is- land in the Decades prior to World War II. Report

submitted to the Aleut Corporation.

1 990 Perspectives on Aleut Culture Change during the Russian Period. In Russian America: the For- gotten Frontier. B. S. Smith and R.J. Barnett, eds.

Pp. 175-83. Tacoma: Washington State Historical Society.

1992 Imprisonment and Internment: World WarII and

the Treatment of Alaska's Aleut Population. Unpublished paper presented at the symposium "Indig- enous People and Global Conflict: World War II Fifty Years later" at the 91 st Annual Meeting of the Ameri- can Anthropological Association, San Francisco.

1997a An Archaeological Survey of Selected Sites on

Northern Adak Island, Aleutian Islands, Alaska. Report

submitted to the Aleut Corporation, Anchorage,

Alaska. 1997b Cultural Heritage Program Opportunities in the Aleutian and Pribilof Islands Region. Report submitted

to the Aleutian/Pribilof Islands Association, Anchorage, Alaska.

1 999 Environmental Perspectives on Historical

Period Cultural Change Among the Aleuts of

Southwestern Alaska. In Development and Envi- ronment in the North. Proceedings of the 1 3th In- ternational Abashiri Symposium, The Hokkaido

Museum of Northern Peoples. Pp. 1 -12. Abashiri,

Japan: Association for the Promotion of Northern Cultures.

Veltre, Douglas W., and Allen P. McCartney

1994 An Archaeological Survey of the early Russian

and Aleut Settlements on St. Paul Island, Pribilof Is- lands, Alaska. Report submitted to the TDX Corporation, St. Paul, Alaska. 2000 The St. Paul History and Archaeology Project:

Overview of 2000 Field Operations. Report submitted to the TDX Corporation, St. Paul, Alaska. 2001 The St. Paul History and Archaeology Project:

Overview of 2001 Field Operations. Report submitted to the TDX Corporation, St. Paul, Alaska. 2002 Russian Exploitation of Aleuts and Fur Seals: The Archaeology of Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Settlements in the Pribilof Islands, Alaska. Historical Archaeology 36iS). 8-] 7. Veltre, Douglas W., and Mary J. Veltre

1986 Early Settlements on St. George Island: an Ar- chaeological Survey of Three Russian Period Sites in the Pribilof Islands, Alaska. Report submitted to

the Alaska Division of Parks and Outdoor Recreation,

Anchorage.

3 1 8
85/ "Crossroads of Continents" exhibit on tour at the Anchorage Museum of IHistory and Art, 199

3 1 9
86/ A dear friend, Sergei Serov (1940-1992), Russian Crossroads exhibit coordinator and Latin Ameri- can culture expert, seen here helping mount archaeological specimens during one of the American museum

venues. Photographer, William Fitzhugh

87/Reception for the North American Crossroads team at the Museum ofAnthropology and Ethnography (MAE) director's office in St. Petersburg, then Leningrad in 1983. MAE director, Rudolf Its, stands at his desk under the portrait of Vladimir Lenin. Other participants include (sitting left to

right): Joan MacDonald, Bill Holm, William Sturtevant, Sergei Arutiunov (Institute of Ethnography,

Moscow), James VanStone, George MacDonald. Photographer, William Fitzhugh

320
88/Andres Slapinsh, Latvian film producer, mailing ethnographic films among the Eveni< people in East Siberia. Several Slapinsh's videos were used for the public programs accompanying "Cross- roads of Continents" exhibits. Slapinsh was killed by Soviet troops in the winter of 1991 while filming an independence rally in his native Latvia

89/ The "Mini-Crossroads" team departing on its tour to Siberia. Nome, 1990. Left to right: Roger

Powers, Darlene Orr, Valerie Chaussonnet, James Dixon, William Fitzhugh

3 2 1
90/ Mini-Crossroads exhibition being unloaded from a Russian Yal<-40 transport

plane. Vladivostok, Russia, August 1997. Photographer, Olga Shubina

91 / Mini-Crossroads in Russia: school tours at the exhibit, Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, December 1997. Photographer,

Olga Shubina

322
92/Jochelson's display of the re- sults of the Ryabushinski

Expedition 's archaeological work

in the Aleutian Islands and

Kamchatka at the Imperial Rus- sian Geographical Society in St. Petersburg. Model of a section

from the shell-midden atAglagax

on Umnak Island reveals the deep

stratigraphy of manyAleut village

sites (NAA 2003-20968)

93/ Informal photographs ofAleut are almost non-existent in Jochelson's photography making this picture of

Aleut children most unusual. It appears as the very last image in a photograph album that he presented to the National Museum which suggests that he was cognizant of the continuity between the archaeological materials he excavated and the contemporary Aleut communities he visited (NAA 89- 1 1 741).

3 2 3
94/ WaldemarJochelson with Aleut laborers in a deep midden cut, probably on Umnak

Island, 1909 (NAA 89-11750)

324

95/ Excavations at the Margaret Bay archaeological

site by Rick Knecht have revealed a stone-walled Aleut

house dating to ca. 3100 B.P. A structure of more

recent vintage stands in the distance. Photographer,

Douglas Veltre.
96/ A portion of the village of St. Paul in the Pribilof Islands, with fur seals resting on the

beach in the foreground. Photographer, Douglas Veltre.

97/ The Atka Dancers (Atxam Taliigisnikangis) at the Aleut Elders' Conference, Unalaska,

1996. Since their founding in 1995, the Atka Dancers have performed at numerous national and Alaskan venues. Photographer, Douglas Veltre

3 2 5
98/ Yakut artisan, Anna Nikolaeva dressed in a fur

coflt or buuktaakh son, whicli she produced following

the photos from the AMNH collection. Front view.

326
/ 1/ Woman's fur coat created by costume designer

Lena Gogoleva for characters in the Yakut/Sakha op- era Nyurgun Bootur, performed by the Yakut Theater

of Ballet and Opera

327
102/ Musqueam house post purchased by Harlan Smith, 1898 (AMNH 42936)

103/ Susan Point, House Posts, 1997. University of

British Columbia Museum ofAnthropology, Vancouver,

B.C. Nbz 838, 837. Photograph courtesy Susan Point

and Bill McLennan. 328
> *

1 04/ Masset village, Haida, 1 879. Photograph by O. C. Hastings (RBCM, PN- 1 0980)

3 29
7 05/ Alert Bay, Kwakwaka 'wakw, 1910. Photographer unknown (RBCM, PN-10189)

330
/ 06/Ellen Neel (1 91 6-1 966) in 1 950. Photograph cour- tesy Phil Nuytten.
108/ Ellen Neel, Totemland Pole, 1950. Photograph

courtesy Phil Nuytten

109/ Matthias JoeCapilano, Thunderbird Dynasty Pole, Stanley Park, Vancouver, British Columbia, 1936.

Photograph courtesy of Vancouver Archives

IN N 103.1

3 32
1 1 0/ Susan Point (b. 1952) in 1997. Photograpli courtesy of Susan Point and Bill McLennan.

1 1 1/ Susan Point, Common Thread, 2000. Spirit

Wrestler Gallery, Vancouver, BC. Photograph courtesy

Susan Point, Spirit Wrestler Gallery, and Kenji Nagai.
In fvt^niom of Vladimir |vanov~(Jnarov, ] ^^/—lOOO

MARJORIE MANDELSTAM BALZER

Vladimir Kharlampovich Ivanov-Unarov, sixty-four,

scholar of the art and spiritual culture of indigenous

peoples of the North, died in Yakutsk, Sakha Republic

(Yakutia), Russian Federation, December 29, 2000. His

careful fieldwork and refined scholarship covered a

range of peoples, from the Evenk, Even, Yukagir, Chukchi

and Yakut (Sakha) of his native republic, to peoples of

North America. Author of numerous monographs and

articles, including Yakut Bone Carving and Problems of

Folk Ornamental Art, his knowledge of the peoples of

the Far North was deep as well as broad.

Continuing the tradition of meticulous ethnographers of the nineteenth century, he brought back to

life the Jesup North Pacific Expedition's volume by

Waldemarjochelson The Yukaghir and the Yukaghirzed

Tungus by translating it into Russian and having it translated into Yukagir for the remaining indigenous communities of the Sakha North. He was active, with his

wife and colleague Zinaida Ivanova-Unarova, in the Jesup

2 project that brought indigenous peoples and scholars together at the American Museum of Natural History in New York in 1 997. Famously productive, he was one of the only people in the history of foundation grants to complete a MacArthur-funded project

before his supporters expected.

Vladimir bridged multiple disciplines with his perceptive, boundary-crossing intelligence, and bridged

multiple cultures with his contributions to international communication. A mentor and friend to many, he en- couraged colleagues in the Sakha Republic to make

7 / 2/ Vladimir Ivanov-Unarov (1937-2000). Photographer, Marjorle Mandelstam Balzer.

the leap into collaborative work with American and

European scholars. After several trips to the U.S., he was pivotal in returning the knowledge and wealth of

spiritual and material culture kept in American muse- ums back to his people through successful academic

and public lectures and slide shows. He was a founder

and mainstay of the department he headed in the Academy of Sciences Institute of the Problems of Minorities

of the North, and was often asked to take on more

3 34
administrative responsibility than he wanted. Originally

trained as a geologist before gaining a degree in Art

History, Vladimir's combined scientific and humanities

focused approaches were fieldwork based, ethnographic, and flexible. One of his last projects included

helping to adapt a cultural studies curriculum to the needs of the Sakha Republic.

Gentle and generous, Vladimir's great empathy

and brilliant analysis of the symbols that make lives meaningful made him one of the most important mentors and examples of my life. At one breakfast he

patiently explained the symbolism and history of the

beautiful wooden Sakha challices (choron) that hold

fermented mare's milk. That breakfast lasted for hours,

going nearly until lunch.

I am deeply privileged to have been welcomed

into the love of his multigenerational family. Each time

I enthusiastically would come home with news of

meeting a Sakha, Even, Evenk or Yukagir colleague in

Yakutsk, Vladimir would provide wonderful background on the significance of their work and the kin networks and political backgrounds of their families.

His perspective on life in the republic was invaluable. I

recall him at his happiest playing with his grandchildren, and teaching them how to get onto the Internet. He is survived by his wife and colleague Zina, "son the

doctor" Maxim, his daughter Marina the artist, and their

partners and wonderful children.

335

1
"y~!ie f^evitaiization of the *]~raclitiona!

(^uiture of fNjortfieast Siberian peoples

Ko!e of the Jesup f~ xpeditioi

VLADIMIR IVANOV-UNAROV

AND ZINAIDA IVANOVA-UNAROVA

From papers published in Russian anthropological journals at the beginning of the twentieth century, it is

apparent that teams of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition (JNPE) had operated in the Northeast of Russia in

1 898-1 902. Unfortunately, this expedition was hardly

mentioned during the Soviet period of Russia's history.

Data on and references to the expedition's materials were censored primarily for political reasons. The former

leader of the Siberian portion of the JNPE, Waldemar

(Vladimir) Jochelson, after being officially permitted to go the U.S. in the 1 920s to complete his Jesup Expedition monograph about the Yukagir, failed to return to

Soviet Russia. Until the middle of the 1 980s the overall scope of the Jesup Expedition, the value of its Siberian

collections as well as their present fate, remained all

but unknown in the former Soviet Union, particularly in

the regions where the JNPE teams once operated.

How We Became Acquainted with the

Collections of the Jesup Expedition

During Soviet times, any thought of traveling from

the authors' native city of Yakutsk to New York to study the JNPE Siberian collection would have been

equivalent to thinking about flying to the moon. But

the great transformation that occurred in Russia during the past decade changed everything, including our

lives. On February 3, 1991, then-US Ambassador to

Russia, Jack Matlock, and his wife Rebecca Matlock

stopped for two days in Yakutsk on their way to Khabarovsk, a city in the Russian Far East. They came

not as official visitors but as guests of the newly

established local association, "Sakha omyk" (Sakha

Nation). The Americans, who were interested in the

culture and art of the Native peoples of Siberia, paid

a visit to the Artists' Union of the Republic of Sakha

(then, Yakutskaya ASSR). We, as art historians, quickly

organized a small display of indigenous art and in- troduced the guests to local artists. During our con- versations we asked Ambassador Matlock about

the current location of the Jesup Expedition's Siberian

collections. He promised to find out and let us know.

But Mrs. Matlock suggested that we could visit New

York and search for the JNPE Siberian treasures ourselves. For the first time this previously unthinkable venture seemed possible.

In 1 992 few Russian curators and art historians had

the opportunity to leave the country on work-related

trips. But luck was with us and we received a grant

from the Soros Foundation for travel and a two-month

stay in the U.S. Thus, in November and December of

1 992, we were able to work full time in the collections

of the American Museum of Natural History in New

York. The American Museum astounded us with its openness. Laurel Kendall, curator of the Asian and

Siberian collections, did everything possible to ensure

that our work with museum materials, including not

only the ethnographic objects but also archival documents and historical photographs, would be productive. She encouraged us to take photographs and

to make photocopies of many historical documents,

336 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ SIBERIA
such as personal letters and diaries of the Jesup Expedition participants that were stored at the AMNH archives. Only someone who has once worked in the museums and archives of the former Soviet Union can

fully appreciate the level of friendliness and hospitality we encountered at the AMNH.

The Siberian Team of the Jesup Expedition

The work of the Jesup Expedition is sufficiently described

in the literature (Boas 1 903, 1 905; Freed et al., 1 988a,

1 988b). We will focus here on a few details that have

not been covered and also, but very briefly, on those

aspects necessary for an understanding of the issues we deal with in this article. The main goal of the Jesup Expedition, formulated

by Franz Boas, was to look for the origin of American

Indians and for their possible routes into the New World

from Northeast Asia using ethnographic evidence as

well as folklore and linguistic data, and to study the

physical anthropology of the local people. In accor- dance with this basic goal. Boas assigned to expedition participants strictly defined tasks in the collection

of field materials. In order to study the connections

between the Native peoples of North America and

Northeast Siberia it was necessary to find scholars who

were both familiar with the culture of the studied

peoples and willing to work with the expedition,

often in rugged and remote areas. For the northeast

Siberian part of theJNPE, these two requirements were met quite successfully. The then-director of the Russian Academy of Sciences' Museum of Anthropology

and Ethnology in St. Petersburg, Prof. Vasily V. Radloff

(Radlov), recommended Waldemar Jochelson (Vladimir I. lochelson, 1855-1937) and Waldemar Bogoras

(Vladimir C. Bogoraz, 1865-1936) to Boas as highly

qualified specialists with excellent first-hand knowledge

of the region (see more in Cole 2001:37-9; Vakhtin

2001:78-82).

Jochelson and Bogoras were former political dissidents, who had been sentenced by the Russian

court to spend several years in exile in northern Yakutia

for their participation in the revolutionary Populist

movement. Their place of exile eventually became

both the location for and the object of self-initiated

scientific study. The innovative idea of "going to the

people" turned into an active interest in research on

the languages and culture(s) of the local populations.

In 1894, Dimitri Klements, then the Chairman of the

East Siberia Branch of the Russian Geographic Society

encouraged them to Join the Yakut (Sibiryakov) Expedition, organized with funds from the Russian goldmining magnate, Alexander M. Sibiryakov. Klements'

task for Bogoras was to collect data on the Chukchi,

the Even (Lamut), and the local Russian-speaking

(Creole) populations of northern Siberia. Jochelson lived more than two years among the Yukagir people (1 895-

1 896), traveled with them on their annual migration

routes, documented two Yukagir languages, and put

together a dictionary of 9000 words and over 1 50

folklore texts (Shavrov 1935:49). One of Jochelson's

field Journals from 1896, when he lived among the Upper Kolyma River Yukagir, is now preserved in the AMNH archive (AMNH-DA, Box A). A small notebook,

entitled 'Travel notes No. 3," contains valuable infor- mation but is written in small, Russian handwriting that

is hard to make out. We prepared a few passages from

the journal for publication in a recent issue of the Yakut

(Sakha) literary journal Ilin (Ivanov-Unarov and Ivanova

1998).

In addition to the Yukagir, Jochelson's interests included the Yakut (Sakha) people. During his years of

exile in Yakutia he became acquainted with many of

the Yakut cultural workers and representatives of the Yakut intelligentsia. He also knew the Yakut (Sakha)

language. According to several reports, the Yakut

(Sakha) language was then the primary mean of communication in many areas of Yakutia, even for the local

Russian population.

In the fall of 1 898 Jochelson received a letter from Boas, offering him a three-year contract with

monthly pay of $100 and $4000 for field expenses

during the time he served with the Jesup Expedition

V. IVANOV-UNAROV AND Z. IVANOVA-UNAROVA 337
(Vakhtin 2001:80-1).' Intense correspondence began

at this time between Boas and Jochelson, giving a

picture of both their relationship and the course of

the proposed fieldwork (these letters are now kept

in Jochelson's file in the AMNH-DA archives). According to the contract, all scientific data, ethnographic

collections, and field journals were to become the

property of the American Museum of Natural History

in New York.

In his letter of reply, Jochelson agreed to the overall

plan for the expedition. Judging by Boas' response,

Jochelson also submitted a series of his own suggestions, broadening the tasks set by Boas in the collection of materials and in subsequent publications. Boas responded appropriately, though somewhat severely,

insisting that Jochelson should fulfill the tasks as they were assigned to him. He reminded Jochelson that,

according to the original contract, Jochelson's primary

Job for the American Museum was the survey of the

Koryak; his visit to the Yukagir was only to collect

artifacts. Boas did not have any objections to the

collection of additional material as long as it did not

interfere with the fulfillment of Jochelson's basic task.

Boas also stated that the museum did not have any

interest in publishing Jochelson's materials other than a monograph about the Koryak; but that if there were

to be a publication about the Yukagir it should be

quite short."

During the preparation and actual fieldwork of the Jesup Expedition, Jochelson managed to convince Boas

and, it seems, AMNH President Morris K. Jesup , of the

necessity of broadening the study area, to include—in

addition to the Koryak and Chukchi—other Siberian

peoples, such as the Yukagir, the Even (Lamut), and the Yakut (Sakha).

In August of 1 899, Jochelson and Bogoras met in

St. Petersburg and worked out a plan for their cooperative field research. Jochelson notified Boas of this in

a letter on October 30.^ Given Bogoras's knowledge

of the Chukchi language, they proposed that they would

work together for one and a half years with the Koryak,

whose language is close to Chukchi. Bogoras would

concentrate on study of the Koryak language and

the collection of folklore texts. Jochelson would make

anthropometric measurements, take photographs,

and collect ethnographic objects for the Museum.

After the joint survey of the Koryak, they would set

off separately—Jochelson to the land of the Yukagir to

the west and Bogoras to the Siberian Eskimo (Yupik)

country to the northeast, along the shores of the

Bering Strait and the Arctic Ocean. Boas did not approve their plan to work together, and they ended up

working separately.

In March 1 900, Jochelson received a letter from

Morris K. Jesup saying that Jochelson was to be in

charge of the (North) Siberian section of the expedition and stipulated the pay Jochelson would receive.''

In August of the same year, Jochelson, his wife Dina

Jochelson-Brodsky, and two other members of his field

team, Alexander Axelrod and Norman Buxton, arrived

in the small town of Gizhiga on the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk to study the local Koryak (Fig. 7). A month

earlier, Bogoras, accompanied by his wife Sofia, arrived

at the mouth of the Anadyr River to begin his work

with the Chukchi. As a result, the two Siberian teams of the Jesup

Expedition gathered a huge amount of information

about not only the Chukchi and the Koryak but also

the Yukagir, Even (Lamut), and Yakut (Sakha). Altogether, some 6400 items they had collected were

delivered to the American Museum of Natural History

in New York. According to Jochelson's final report, 91 7

of these were Yakut (Sakha) objects, 300 were Yukagir,

and more than 5000 were from the Koryak, Even,

Chukchi, and Siberian Eskimo. In addition, there were hundreds of photographs, phonograph recordings,

and other research materials. Besides the two originally planned monographs on the Chukchi (Bogoras

1904-9) and Koryak (Jochelson 1908) for the JNPE

series, two more monographs were eventually published on the Yukagir Gochelson 1 926) and the Yakut/

Sakha Gochelson 1933).

338 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ SIBERIA
The Siberian Collection of the Jesup Expedition

The ethnographic objects collected by Jochelson and

Bogoras some 100 years ago were quite significant

for academic and museum researchers who were interested in Native Siberian peoples. They also seemed

"exotic" and exciting to the general European and American public. But at the time they were collected, these were quite ordinary items, used routinely for both daily

life and festivals. Today, after a hundred years that have

seen profound changes in these cultures, the significance of the Jesup Expedition collections has changed

dramatically, first and foremost for the bearers of these

cultures.

The Sakha (Yakut) Collection

878 items from the JNPE collections are identified in

the AMNH catalog as "Yakut." These are not only pieces

of Native art but also many everyday objects, without

artistic embellishment, as well as models and toys.

The most complete samples represent Yakut/Sakha

decorated clothing, silver decorations, wood carvings,

ceramic objects with ornamentation, and traditional

horse gear. There are also several ivory carvings, which the AMNH records identify as "Russified" objects. Interestingly, there is a storage box made of mammoth ivory

that is almost an exact copy of a box from 1 799 that

is in the State Historical Museum in Moscow. It differs

in only a few minor details, namely, the subject matter

depicted on the sides of the box. We believe this piece was made by a Yakut ivory carver, most probably by

Leontii Popov. Though Yakut ivory objects from the

eighteenth century were commonly copies of can/-

ings by northern Russian carvers from the town of Kholmogory, there were already at that time certain

features that clearly distinguished Yakut artists, especially in technique, ornamentation, and subject matter. On the whole, objects from the Yakut (Sakha) collection at the AMNH are typical and quite familiar,

and not significantly different from objects in other museums. This further substantiates the stability of the

Native traditions. However, within the Yakut collection at the AMNH there are many unique objects that do not exist in museums in Russia. The collection illustrates the variety of women's

winter and summer/fall fur coats. Altogether there

are thirty-two coats and fur robes in the American Mu- seum. Six of these are so-called " khotoidookh son" ("fur

coat with eagle") the likes of which do not exist in any museum in Yakutia (Sakha Republic). Local artists are

very interested in this type of traditional women's dress,

although they had never before seen them. Having

only before heard about this type, they are now creating their own modern versions based on items in the AMNH collections. For example, in 1992 Anastasia E.

Sivtseva, an acclaimed Yakut seamstress, sewed a fur

coat for the exhibition "Kudai Bakhs/ with an eagle on

the back showing head, claws, and wings. In this case,

the Yakut fur robes from the American Museum collection provided her with an original example of this type

of fur clothing. They were acquired in the MiddleKolyma iSrednekolymsk) and Verkhoyansk districts in

northern Yakutia. It is most likely that they are from the second half of the nineteenth century. There is therefore no doubt that they represent the old type of Yakut

sangyakh. These have been mentioned in the literature,

including a mention by the famous Yakut historian,

Sehen Bolo.^ Jochelson, who acquired these fur robes

from the northern Yakut calls them " kybytyylaakh son"

apparently the name his informants used for them. This means simply, "fur robe with an inset."

It is well known that the eagle is a sacred bird for many peoples, including the Yakut and many North

American Indians. Among the Yakut, its name may not even be spoken aloud. The folklorist and founder of Yakut literature, A. Kulakovskii, wrote that the Yakut

do not dare pronounce aloud the word "khotoi" (eagle),

calling it instead "toion" that is, "master." As a result, in many Sakha/Yakut settlements the word "khotoi' has been completely forgotten (Kulakovskii 1979:79, 92).

At the same time, the technique for making the robe is

reflected in the name "kybytyylaakh son" recorded by

V. IVANOV-UNAROV AND Z. IVANOVA-UNAROVA 339
Jochelson, which is kyhytan tigii, "sewn inset." The robes

from his collection are made from a variety of materials. For example, one robe is made of quite expensive

lynx fur (AMNH # 70/8525). On the back it has a slit

typical of all Yakut fur robes and coats. However, the

slit is absent in all the other "eagle robes" from the

Jochelson AMNH collection; instead, it is replaced by a mock slit—an ornamental fur stripe. This is strongly

reminiscent of the northern type of caftan. An inset of

dark brown otter fur is sewn on the back of the "eagle

robe" (AMNH # 70/8525), reminiscent of a bird's spread

wings. The other robes are made of dark brown Siberian marmot fur, white reindeer fur, and calf and foal

hides. All the robes have the same inset made of darker

fur in the form of open wings; this is why they are

called " khotoidookh son" (fur robe with eagle).

The belepchi (AMNH # 70/8826) that Jochelson acquired in the village of Churapcha is another rare item.

Belepchi is an article of clothing no longer made. Sakha/

Yakut men wore it over their trousers, both for warmth

and as a component of festival wear. There is only one

specimen preserved in the local museum. It was found

in the late seventeenth or early eighteenth century grave

of a man. Sakha ethnographer F. Zykov sees a parallel

between Yakut men's belepchi and women's belebshi

among the Buryat, Kirgiz, and Kazakh (Zykov

1993:268). At the same time, the Kirgiz epic "Manas" mentions bei'demchi as male armor. It should be noted

that Jochelson acquired most of the items for his Yakut

(Sakha) collection in the village of Churapcha on the

left bank of the Lena River, 200 km north of the city

of Yakutsk. He justifiably thought that ancient Yakut

tradition would be best preserved here and argued

this in his letter to Boas. The Jesup belepchi is particularly valuable because, unlike the single surviving archaic specimen recovered from the grave, this was a

type that was actually worn in Jochelson's time. There are also decorated "ribbons for the fiancee's

room." They are two leather straps, almost four meters

long, but only about two centimeters wide, decorated

with beads and round metal plates and finished on the

end with a fringe of suede leather (rovduga). Their

significance is now forgotten, even by the elders. The AMNH collection also contains engraved silver Jewelry with the engraving in good condition.

Among the unique artifacts made of wood and birch

bark, there is a complete set of summer birch-bark

covering for a Yakut urasa (summer dwelling). Jochelson

suggested to Boas in a letter that he would like to

build a full-size urasa in the American Museum courtyard, using the precise model that he had acquired for

his Yakut collection. If Jochelson had indeed built this,

it would today be the only authentic, non-reconstructed Yakut urasa in the world.

The Even (Lamut) Collection

There are 481 artifacts in the AMNH Even catalog.

Most of these objects were collected by Bogoras' wife,

Sofia Bogoras, in the village of Markovo on the Anadyr

River. She made several trips there from the fall of 1 900

to April 1901, while her husband, along with a Cossack and a local guide, was on a long trip to Kamchatka

in search of Chukchi and Koryak materials.^

In addition to these, there are also several Even

items acquired by Jochelson. During a trip in two boats on the Sea of Okhotsk to the mouth of the Nayakhan

River he discovered a sixty-one tent Tungus (Even) camp.

There he succeeded in collecting ample ethnographic

data about Even people who were living along the

Sea of Okhotsk coast. He wrote Boas about this in his

letter-report from Kushka.'

We made a detailed study of Jochelson's collection of Even clothing and have concluded that it is

typical for reindeer Even in cut and style, though the

character of the decorations shows a certain Koryak

influence.

The Yukagir Collection

Comprised of 342 artifacts, it is unique in that it contains practically every type of clothing and daily use

objects of a small Native nation that was in danger of

cultural extinction. Jochelson was fully aware of this

340 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ SIBERIA
and he stated many times that he considered his JNPE volume, The Yukaghirs and the Yukaghirized

Tungus (1 926) a memorial for a vanishing people. Following his earlier work among the Yukagir on the Russian Sibiryakov Expedition he wrote: "In a few decades

the Yukagir language could disappear and the tribe would under these conditions, cease to exist, a part

dying and a part dissolving into other tribes" Cochelson

1 900:xv).

In our view, the most valuable items in the JNPE

Yukagir collection are the numerous birch-bark objects,

including maps and letters engraved on bark as well

as wooden and birch-bark animal figures.

The Koryak and Chukchi Collections

The very rich Koryak and the somewhat smaller Chukchi

collections were acquired by Jochelson and Bogoras.

The collecting process was unbelievably difficult be- cause of the climate, lack of roads, and attitude of

the local people. Bogoras almost died of influenza on his return trip from Kamchatka in the winter of 1 90 1

The Koryak, who were on friendly terms with Jochelson, made sure that none of their traditions would

be violated or dishonored in the collecting process.

Nevertheless, Jochelson's Koryak collection contains

several shaman drums and also samples of burial clothing, acquired in the village of Kamenskoe in northern Kamchatka. According to Koryak beliefs, the latter must

not be shown to anyone.

Jochelson was evidently charming and persuasive

as a collector and field worker. For proof of this here is

another example: When he arrived in the Yakut village

of Churapcha at the beginning of May 1 902, the local

residents gave him not only a complete urasa (birch

bark summer dwelling), but they also held a ysyakh

festival especially for him. This festival was usually held two months later, at the end of June, before haying

began (Fig. 1 1 3).

Berthold Laufer, another Jesup Expedition Siberian

collector, on his earlier trip among the Amur River

people (1898-9) assembled a small collection from

V. IVANOV-UNAROV AND Z. I VANOVA- U N AROVA

the local Evenk people who lived along the Amgun

River, a tributary to the Amur River. Altogether, eightfive Evenk artifacts collected by Laufer are listed in

the AMNH catalog along with many from Laufer's

objects acquired among the Nivkh, the Nanay, the

Orok, and the Ainu.

One Hundred Years after Jesup 1

Although the European takeover of the Arctic began

long before the start of the twentieth century, it at first

did not move particularly quickly nor did it have any

decisive impact. Thus, despite several destructive

events, the peoples who inhabited the arctic regions

usually had time to adapt to this tempo and to preserve the integrity of their cultures, traditional economies, their beliefs, customs, and rituals, clothing and

utensils, and decorative art. But in the twentieth century the social shocks and intensive exploitation of

natural resources in the North brought irredeemable

losses to the Native people at all levels. A number of factors have brought on the current

crisis for the traditional cultures of the Native people

of the Russian Arctic. The Soviet government's declared program for northern indigenous people of "transition from primitive social structure to socialism, by-passing

the stage of capitalism" meant that the specific

characteristics of these small nations and their cultures were ignored. This caused a quickening in the

destruction of their way of life; a way of life that had

adapted over millennia and was ideally suited to the extreme conditions of the Arctic. Many aspects of

Native legacies were lost and there was the distinct

threat of complete assimilation and/or extinction for

the smaller indigenous nations such as the Yukagir.

Beginning in the 1930s the destruction of the social and economic fabric was hastened by the seizure

of property, the formation of collective farms {kolkhozes)

and "state-farms" (sovkhozes), the enforced transition

to a settled way of life and "villagization." This was

accompanied by a process of banning and hounding

out traditional beliefs, customs, and rituals that were

34 1
seen as out-dated, archaic, and even savage. This

censure of Native spiritual traditions delivered a heavy

blow to the indigenous people and triggered the loss

of a substantial component of their cultural legacy.

The Eurocentric theory of cultural evolution was firmly

established as an ideological paradigm in the former

Soviet Union. According to this theory, with the appearance of professional art and literature, traditional

folk art becomes merely historical atavism and ought

to disappear. It was thought that this was a natural

step in the progressive development of a people and

their culture.

This stereotypical viewpoint has unfortunately

proved very persistent and is still held by many scholars even today. Supporters of this theory advised

Native artisans to replace their traditional ornaments

with modern Soviet emblems. They embraced the socalled authored, creative approach to artistic production and demanded of folk art that it be innovative

and modern. The vulgar, materialist approach to folk

art focused on the external form of the artwork, completely ignoring the semiotic content that had been

worked out over centuries. It is well known that in each specimen produced by a folk artist, in every motif

and in the composition of ornaments there is a definite

symbolic meaning. This is the essence of folk art. Even though the semantics of the many ornamentation

motifs had already been forgotten in the nineteenth

century, the folk artists intuitively did as their ancestors had done. In this way, the continuity of traditional artistry and artistic thought was preserved.

Unfortunately, many transitions introduced by the

Soviet system and, particularly, the mandatory boarding schools (intematy) for Native students tore children from their parents and accustomed environment, and

changed peoples' lives. The centuries-old system of

aural-visual transmission of crafts and knowledge from

generation to generation was destroyed. This break in

the transmission of tradition led to the disappearance

of some forms of folk art and to the artificial mutation

of others. At the same time, as the continuity in transmission of tradition was destroyed, the informational boom caused great harm to folk art. It facilitated the

introduction of many foreign elements into Native art

(such as materials, technology, ornamental motifs, etc.),

which, in turn, undermined traditional culture from within.

This is directly evident in the case of Even and Evenk

culture, whereas the Yukagirare in danger of completely

disappearing as a culturally distinctive group. Here we cite the story of the Berezov group of Even who managed to maintain until very recently a

special, unique oasis of traditional language and culture. This group of nomadic reindeer Even remained

fully isolated until the mid-1950s, when they were

discovered by the Soviet security services and reincorporated into the highly regulated life of the Yakut

Republic. Due to decades of deliberate isolation, the

Berezov Even, unlike other groups of Even in Yakutia,

had preserved their language and traditional culture. One of the authors (V. I-U.) visited the village of Berezovka —to which these people had been relocated—in the

late 1980s. Communication with several elder women

of the village had to be through an interpreter because

they knew neither Russian nor Yakut. In this they differ from other indigenous people of northern Yakutia (Sakha

Republic) who commonly prefer to speak Russian or Yakut rather than their own language.

The relation to language and culture today can be

assessed from a survey conducted by the second coauthor [Z.I.] in two northern districts (ulus) of the Sakha

Republic, the Srednekolymskii (Middle Kolyma), and

Nizhnekolymskii (Lower Kolyma), in March 1 997. Seven

adults who consider themselves Native artists completed the survey, as did fifty-three high-school students in grades 8 to 10. In Berezovka, the village visited by Vladimir Ivanov-Unarov ten years earlier, the

older women still speak primarily their native Even

language; but now they also know a little Russian and

a little Yakut. They live sedentary lives and raise the

children in the family. Sewing and decorative traditions have been handed down from the older generation,

but some women think them outdated and therefore

342 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ SIBERIA
do not concern themselves with teaching the children

these handicrafts. Thirteen- and fourteen-year old Even

children speak Russian at school and Even at home.

Only one of the girls in the survey reported that she is

learning Native sewing skills from her grandmother.

Once again, it was the artificial isolation of the

Berezov Even that helped them preserve their traditional decorative art. Unfortunately, a tendency toward

innovation and a desire to satisfy the tastes of audi- ences at folk-art exhibits, who are delighted with

abundant bright beads and color, will soon lead to

the use of quantity decor in their work.

Tundra Yukagir made up the majority of the

population in the Lower Kolyma area at Jochelson's

time (1895-1902). Today, of the twenty-five thirteen

to fifteen year-old students surveyed in local schools

in the towns of Cherski, Andriushkino, and Kolymskoe,

only four considered themselves Yukagir, and two of

them have Russian fathers. They do not know their

native language and speak only Russian. They all have

negative attitudes toward the traditional culture of

handicrafts.

Nevertheless, since the mid-1980s there has been

an intensive growth in ethnic consciousness among

many peoples of Russia, including the indigenous small

nations of the Russian North. Native intellectuals, including professional writers and artists are among those

leading the movement for the preservation and revival

of ethnic culture.

During the Soviet period the loss of Native cultures

did not proceed at the same rate among all the groups.

Thus, the Sakha people, who were the majority population in Yakutia until the 1960s, were granted a certain limited level of administrative autonomy in the

early 1 930s. For the most part they preserved their language and some of the traditional features of their way of life. Today, in comparison with other Native

nations of the Sakha Republic, the Sakha people have

been quite successful in reviving their cultural legacy.

The popular festival ysyakh was revived and has come

to be a focus of ethnic cultural life, including songs.

dances, games, clothing, ceremonial dinnerware and

utensils, decorations and foods. Related forms of folk

art are correspondingly beginning to be revived.

Traces of the old customs have been presepv/ed

somewhere deep in people's memory. For several decades it seemed as if shamanism had long been cut

out of the lives of Siberian peoples. In recent years,

however, shamans have reappeared in Yakutia as well

as numerous psychic healers who fill the role that sha- mans once filled. Moreover, it appears that active sha- mans still practice among the isolated, migratory

groups of the Evenk in southern Yakutia, continuing to

fulfil their traditional functions as protectors of the clan,

soothsayers, and healers. Today, in the Republic of Sakha there is an officially recognized Association for Traditional Medicine,

headed by the contemporary Sakha shaman, Vladimir

Kondakov, and a Center for Traditional Medicine whose

doctors have medical training and also know traditional folk methods of healing.

We cite another example. During the 1 980s, many

students in Yakut folklore were talking about the fading out of the storytelling tradition among the Sakha

people. At that time there remained only a few elders who were accomplished at improvisational storytelling.

In the past few years, however, as a result of the increased interest in folklore and the growth in ethnic

consciousness, the situation has changed dramatically

as if some hidden resources were emerging from deep

in Native memory. There are young people and even

children with the gift of performing traditional epic folk

tales. Many people have stepped forward to perform

various old rituals and half-forgotten practices that de- mand great improvisational competence.

In Yakutia today much effort is being put into the

revival and preservation of the culture of the Native

people. There is emphasis on the development of song

and dance traditions and all forms of professional art. A special presidential program supports talented young

people who tour all over the world winning honors

and awards. The so-called Academy of Spirituality was

v. IVANOV-UNAROV AND Z. IVANOVA-UNAROVA 343
established in 1997 by a decree issued by Mikhail

Nikolaev, then the President of the Sakha Republic. Many

professional artists, writers, performers, composers, and

even the local bishop of the Russian Orthodox Church,

have become members of the Academy. However,

not one representative of the traditional folk culture or

practitioner of the traditional religion is a member. Several Centers for Folk Art have been established, and

there have been many conferences on Sakha religion;

however, these have neither official acceptance nor adequate financial support. But at least they have not been banned.

All the same, the obstacles on the path to cultural

revival are mounting. Alongside the economic hardships produced by the general social-economic break- down in Russia, there are also the difficulties connected

with the loss of cultural continuity. Efforts to revive

Native decorative arts are stalled because many con- temporary artisans no longer know the traditional skills and have lost cultural information related to the old

practices. In 1 996, at a seminar for Native folk artisans and seamstresses in the town of Srednekolymsk in

northeastern Yakutia, we witnessed the tremendous

interest that exists in the recovery of the lost traditions. It seemed that many modern artisans do not know the traditional techniques and technologies of working with fur and leather, of sewing and decorating ethnic dresses. They use eclectic, quirky decorative motifs. The seminar participants thus were very

excited to see the slides we made at the American

Museum in New York of traditional objects from the JNPE Jochelson's collection.

The Present-Day Value of the JNPE Siberian

Collections

The Siberian collections of the Jesup Expedition are now the most priceless resource for the traditional art and crafts of the Native people of northeast Siberia who have suffered enormous cultural losses during the

twentieth century. Since our research at the American

Museum of Natural History, we have frequently had

occasion to speak of the Jesup Expedition collection on the media and at the various meetings with folk

artisans. These conversations strengthened our conviction that the knowledge of this collection is of

critical importance today for the bearers of the cultures represented in the Jesup Expedition collection. The case of the artisan mentioned above, Anastasia

Sivtseva, is a good example. Several pieces of her art- works and fur clothing have been acquired recently by

the AMNH. After seeing pictures of traditional eagle

robes in the Jesup Expedition collection, she acknowledged that she neither visualized nor made the "fur robe with eagle" properly. Another artisan, Anna

Nikolaeva, sewed a buuktaakh son coat following a copy ofJochelson's photograph, "Yakut Woman in Feast

Dress" (AMNH, # 70/73 1 4 and 70/73 18,181 8-9; Figs.

98 and 99). She also made a beautiful birch bark

container after Jochelson's "Birch Bark" (AMNH # 70/

8862; Fig. 100).

In a recent performance of the Yakut national

opera Nyurgun Bootur, the main characters were

dressed in national clothing made by the costume designer Lena Gogoleva. The styles she used for coats and ornaments were based on the photos and drawings we had made of objects in Jochelson's collection

at the AMNH (Fig. 101). Unfortunately, since there were

no good quality slides and photographs available for

the Yukagir and Even artifacts, we were unable to generate the same amount of interest in these objects or

to make them as widely known.

It is to be hoped that Bogoras' and Jochelson's

monumental monographs in the Jesup Expedition

series. The Chukchee, The Koryak, and The Yukaghir

and the Yukaghihzed Tungus\N\\\ become available in

full translation for a Russian-speaking audience, including the Native peoples of Russia. Bogoras' The Chukchi

and Jochelson's The Koryak were already reprinted in

Russian (Bogoras 1 991 ; Jochelson 1 997), although not

in their original JNPE format and in small print. In 1 996 we were commissioned by the Institute on Problems

of Northern Peoples in Yakutsk to translate another

344 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ SIBERIA
Jochelson's JNPE monograph, The Yukaghirs and the

Yukaghirized Tungus Oochelson 1 926). The translation was done with help from a grant from the MacArthur

Foundation, but publication is still pending.*^ This is,

indeed, a unique and so far the only major source on

Yukagir traditional ethnography, social life, family relations, and spiritual and material culture. It is especially

significant that this book was written on the basis of

almost four years of personal observations among the

Yukagir, at a time when their language and many of

their traditions were still alive. Yukagir poet and philologist, Cavril Kurilov, wrote a special Foreword to

this modern translation of Jochelson's famous book,

and his brother, the artist Nikolai Kurilov, redrew the

original drawings. Both of the Kurilov brothers are

highly respected cultural leaders of the modern

Yukagir nation. They believe they are descendants

of the shaman Somon, whom Jochelson met on his

trip and named Shomonov (Shamanov) in Russian

transcription.

In our translation we maintained all of Jochelson's

original text, only adding several contemporary notes and corrections in the Footnotes section. Unfortunately,

because of the long time between the recording of

his Yukagir field data (in 1895-6 and 190 1-2) and the

final preparation of his monograph for the JNPE series

(published in 1926), Jochelson allowed a few errors in

attribution of some artifacts to slip in. For example, a few Even objects were identified as Yukagir. Sergei

Ivanov later used these incorrect attributions in generalizations about the special characteristics of Yukagir

ornamentation in his monograph on the ornamentation styles of the Native people of Siberia (Ivanov 1 963).

These were recycled in the recently published monograph, Odezhda yukagirov {C\oth\r\g of the Yukagir) by

L. Zhukova.

It would also be of great value to bring the copies

of the original Jochelson's photographs and an excellent photo exhibit. Drawing Shadows to Stone, to Yakutia.

This exhibit was produced by the AMNH curators

for the opening of the conference dedicated to the

Centenary of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition in New York (Kendall et al. 1 997). In the winter of 1 998

a conference was held in Yakutsk on the occasion

of the national festival Ysyakh. At this conference, we showed Jochelson's photograph of the Ysyakh

opening ceremony in May 1902 in the village of

Churapcha (see Kendall et al. 1 997:91-2, Fig. 1 1 3).

This photo from the AMNH collection was kindly

given to us by Thomas Miller, one of the organizers

of the Drawing Shadows to Stone Exhibit. Jochelson's

photo attracted great interest because it was taken

1 00 years ago when the Ysyakh festival was still a

living tradition and not a yearly festival with invented

and staged performances. This photo and several

of Jochelson's other Jesup pictures, along with our comments and a brief story of the Jesup Expedition, were reproduced recently by the Yakutsk-based

Journal Ilin (Ivanov-Unarov and Ivanova 1 998).

The importance of the Jesup Expedition's ethnographic collections is that it represents the classic legacy of the traditional cultures of the Sakha,

Koryak, Chukchi, Even, Evenk, and Yukagir peoples.

The Yakutsk-based Institute on Problems of Northern Peoples of the Russian Academy of Sciences

recently initiated an international research and publication program entitled Circumpolar Culture of the

Peoples of the Arctic and North: Monuments of Culture of the Peoples of the Arctic. The goal of this

project is to lay the groundwork for a series of basic encyclopedia-style volumes on each of the Native peoples of the North and the Arctic. The AMNH

Jesup Expedition collections can make an invaluable

contribution to this project. For this reason, project

outlines include the publication of summary catalogs of the JNPE collections on each nation of Siberia,

with photographs and detailed description of the

objects. Once published locally, in Yakutsk and in

Russian, these catalogs would constitute a crucial

contribution to the revival of the cultures of the in- digenous peoples of Siberia once depicted by the Jesup Expedition.

V. IVANOV-UNAROV AND Z. IVANOVA UNAROVA 345
Acknowledgments

We would like to express our gratitude to the Soros

Foundation for enabling us to study the collection of

the Jesup Expedition in New York in 1992. Special

thanks go to the many people on the AMNH staff:

Laurel Kendall, curator of the Asian Ethnographic Collections; Thomas Miller, former Scientific Assistant; Ann

Wright-Parsons, Senior Scientific Assistant; Belinda Kay,

former head of the American Museum's archives; Nina

Root, former head of the AMNH Library; and Thomas

Baione, who generously helped us with photographs

for the Russian translation of Jochelson's monograph

(1 926). With their help we were able to study in depth

the AMNH Siberian collection, to familiarize ourselves

with the archives and photographic records, and to amass the necessary sources and illustrations for a

Russian translation of Jochelson's monograph—all in two months. We are especially thankful to Marjorie

Mandelstam Balzerand Harley Balzerfrom Georgetown

University, whose friendship comforted us during our visit in America. We are also very grateful to the MacArthur Foundation for a grant to our home Institute on Problems of Northern Peoples in Yakutsk for

the translation of Jochelson's JNPE monograph. The

Yukaghirs and the Yukaghirized Tungus (1926). Igor

Krupnik provided critical assistance in the final editing

of this paper and in our often arduous communication

with our colleagues and conference organizers in the

U.S. David Koester who translated this paper deserves

our final thanks.

Notes

1. Boas to Jochelson, 28 October 1898 (AMNHDA, Jochelson's collection. Box A). In this letter Boas suggested to Jochelson that he arrived in New York by February 1, 1899, in order to re- ceive fieldwork instructions. He was then to head

for the northern shore of the Sea of Okhotsk in the spring of 1899 to study the Koryak. According to preliminary plans, he was to take the sum- mer of 1899 to the end of winter 1900 for the

survey of the Koryak, adding a short visit to the

eastern Yukagir (see copy of the letter in Vakhtin

2001 :81).

2. Boas to Jochelson, 5 December 1898, AMNHDA. This correspondence is now published in Vakhtin 2001:80-2.

3. Bogoras and Jochelson to Boas, 30 October

1899, AMNH-DA. See Vakhtin 2001:84-5.

4. Jesup to Jochelson, March 24 1900, AMNHDA.

5. In his description of ancient Yakut clothing,

Bolo writes that "[l]n ancient times Yakut robes were 'tangalaidaakh son' , onoolookh son', buuktaakh

son', and 'buurukteekh son', but in addition to these,

according to some legends, there was also

'khotoidookh son.'" (Bolo 1994:94).

6. Jochelson to Boas, 27 November 1902,

AMNH-DA, Jochelson collection, Box A.

7. "We also made a very successful trip by sea

in two boats to the mouth of the Najachan river,

where we found a Tungus camp of 61 tents. It was a great opportunity for ethnographic work,

unfortunately I couldn't stay long. The ethnological collection is now 1 440 artifacts (including 1 73

from the Tungus)." Jochelson to Boas, 21 July-3

August 1 901 . AMNH-DA, Jochelson collection, Box

A.

8. As of winter 2003, this manuscript remained

unpublished, due to the minuscule budgets of

today's academic institutions and presses in the

Sakha Republic and to the shortage of funds from

potential sponsors.

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347
/ 14/ Susan Point, Spindle Whorl, 1994. Vancouver International Airport, Vancouver, BC. Photograph courtesy

Susan Point and Bill McLennan.

348
The Invention and Terpetuation of Culture

~y~Ke ^oasian [ egactj and | wo ZOth Centurtj Woman ~l otem fole CLarvers

ALDONA JONAITIS

In 1898 Harlan Smith collected house posts from

the Musqueam reserve in Vancouver, British Columbia (Fig. 102). Like other British Columbia artifacts from the Jesup North Pacific Expedition, they be- came part of the American Museum of Natural

History's vast Northwest Coast collections.' In 1997,

the University of British Columbia's Museum of An- thropology asked Salish artist Susan Point (born

1952) to carve two new Salish house posts based on those collected one hundred years earlier. In keeping with the secretive nature of specific family prerogatives to which she had no right. Point was careful not to copy the AMNH models exactly but instead drew inspiration from them to create two new

Salish fourteen-foot house posts (Fig. 1 03) with their own unique original power (McLellan 2000:94-7).

But unlike the originals, which had been once erected

within the Musqueam house, these were exterior

public sculptures that stood on the Museum ground,

among totem poles from other Northwest Coast

First Nations.^

Most monumental Northwest Coast art was, and

continues to be, made by men. Women usually make

baskets, textiles, leatherwork and beadwork. Point's

creations, and those of another Native woman artist, Kwakwakalwakw Ellen Neel (1916-66), challenge

this gender-based labor division by carving the

iconic Northwest Coast sculpture - the totem pole.

And, beyond that, their artworks contest some basic

principles that have governed aboriginal art studies

since the time of Franz Boas.

As Boas's life-time project was to understand precontact Northwest Coast culture, he sought the most

unacculturated artifacts. Only items that we might characterize as embodying timeless traditionalism were

considered worthy of collecting and study. Those

emerging from the colonial encounter were to be disregarded, as products of a new, polluted tradition. To

analyze culture historically. Boas tried to identify in- ventors of a traditional element, like the totem pole,

and reconstruct its historic diffusion over time and ge- ography. In his view, certain creative groups such as

the Kwakwaka'wakw and Haida stood at the center and others, like the "imitative" Coast Salish lan- guished at the margin. The essentialist premise underlying this approach has characterized much dis- course on Northwest Coast cultures and art, in which

types are real, but variations on those types are judged peripheral, derivative and imperfect.^ The "essential" totem pole is that which is fixed in the con- temporary imagination as what a totem pole should

be: a tall, freestanding column developed during the Golden Age of cultural purity. As abundant anthropological analyses have demonstrated, essentialism

and timeless traditionalism disregards the dynamic

nature of cultural interactions. A typical sightseer who enjoys being photographed next to a totem pole in a Vancouver, Victoria

or Seattle park likely believes the carving to be ancient, and, if clearly new, the representative of an ancient tradition widespread across the Northwest Coast."

In reality, few poles existed at first contact, and then,

349
probably, only among the Haida. They became more

numerous and larger as new wealth from the fur trade

necessitated more impressive expressions of status and metal tools enabled taller poles to be carved more

quickly. From the one or two poles observed in Haida

Cwaii (Queen Charlotte Islands) communities in the

1 790s, totem poles proliferated so, by the mid-nineteenth century, these villages became forests of to- tem poles (Fig. 104). During the nineteenth century,

the totem pole concept spread to the mainland of

British Columbia, inspiring first the Tsimshian and only

at the end of the century the Kwakwaka'wakw (Fig.

105). Totem poles were popular in the southernmost

part of the Alaska panhandle, but the northern Tlingit

disdainfully dismissed them as "foreign." And exterior

poles never became part of the Coast Salish artistic

repertoire at all. Totem pole carving ceased among

the Haida, Tsimshian and Tlingit by the late nineteenth

century, but a few communities among the Kwakwaka'wakw, Nuu-chah-nulth and Citksan continued

making poles for their own purposes into the twentieth century Qonaitis 1999:106-1 10).

Beginning in the late nineteenth century, the nonNative Euro-American public became familiar with

totem poles at world's fairs like the Chicago World

Columbian Exposition, in museums such as the American Museum of Natural History's North Pacific Indian

Hall, and along the popular Alaska Inside Passage

steamer routes. ^ Although many poles standing in mu- seum galleries are nineteenth century carvings removed

from their original villages, most poles seen today in

parks, along roads and outside buildings are the results of programs conceptualized and managed by

museums, governmental agencies and private organizations that hired carvers to restore, copy or carve

original poles. Only during the past two decades have

First Nation communities themselves raised new poles on their own lands.

Boas had large quantities of Northwest Coast material culture collected during the Jesup North Pacific

Expedition, including totem poles. Many objects from

the Jesup Expedition collections appear as illustrations

in his various art publications, including his major Primitive An, first published in 1 927,' Better known for his

paradigm-shifting anthropological writings and impressive competence in ethnology, linguistics, folklore and

physical anthropology, Boas made significant contributions to scholarship on aboriginal art including his groundbreaking study of the formal and iconographic

components of Northwest Coast art and speculations on the history of the Northwest Coast totem pole. Boas found totem poles interesting as objects

which could be subjected to historic analysis. In 1888,

shortly after this first visit to Vancouver Island, Boas suggested that:

I am inclined to believe that another custom

of the North West Americans besides their dances originated among the Kwakiutl. I mean the use of heraldic columns. This view

may seem unjustified, considering the fact that such columns are made nowhere with

greater care than in the northern regions,

among the Tsimshian and Haida, and farther north and south they are less frequent and

less elaborately carved. The Haida, however,

frequently took up foreign ideas with great energy, and developed them independently...

It appears that the tribe has a remarkable

faculty of adaptation (Boas 1888:195).

Boas ascribed to the Kwakwaka'wakw, then as now

clinging tenaciously to their traditions, the honor of

inventing the totem pole, and suggested that the

Haida, who by that time appeared thoroughly acculturated, had simply adopted the idea and elaborated upon it. Later, as a result of a far more careful

historical reconstruction of the region, Boas modified his thesis of Northwest Coast cultural development in Primitive Art (Boas 1 955; first published 1 927)

and gave the Haida, Tlingit and Tsimshian credit for

originating the elaborate symbolic style which diffused

north and south. Despite Boas' early inaccurate reading of history, his premise that one group invented

poles that then spread to other groups signaled a new

historical consciousness that would pervade subsequent studies of the totem pole. Of course, this history

350 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ FEMALE CARVERS
did not cease at contact, and late eighteenth century

Haida carvings, early twentieth century Kwakwaka'wakw monuments, innovative creations by modern artists like Ellen Neel and Susan Point, and the to- tem poles of future generations all represent products

of intellectual and material exchange that contribute

to the ongoing "invention" of culture. Those exchanges,

moreover, were not only among First Nations people

but also between the original Northwest Coast residents and their colonizers.

Ellen Neel

In Primitive Art, Boas asserted that "It is not safe to

base our arguments [on Northwest Coast art history] on models or on objects made for the trade," of which

abundant examples were at that time in circulation. "I

shall use, therefore, exclusively, older specimens which

have been in use" (Boas 1955:209). Such disinterest in

the modernization of First Nations people precluded

Boas from understanding the wealth of meaning embodied in commodified art such as model totem poles

made expressly for the tourist market.^ These are not

bastardizations of authenticity, nor the pathetic works

of a shattered people completely dominated by their

colonizers. Chris Cosden and Chantal Knowles state in

the introduction to their study on colonialism in New

Guinea:

Chemists make a distinction between a mixture and a reaction. A mixture is a

solution in which different chemicals combine, but retain their original form, whereas a

reaction creates something new out of its original constituent parts. Colonial New

Guinea was a reaction to which all parties

contributed, so that there can be no question that all had influence and agency. (Gosden and Knowles 2001 :xix).

An important concept here is agency, the power of an

individual or group to affect its own destiny. Going on

to criticize those who insist on an essentialist concept

of culture, Gosden and Knowles assert that "Anthropologists have tried to undo or ignore the reaction

and focus upon one part. New Guineans, creating a

partial and static picture in the process." The model

totem pole that Boas rejected as an unacceptable cultural "mixture" was in reality a "reaction" replete with agency. One of the most well regarded mid-twentieth century model totem pole maker was Ellen Neel (1916-

1966), a Kwakwaka'wakw carver from northern

Vancouver Island (Fig. 106). Neel's well-known artist

grandfather, Charlie James (1867-1938) taught the young girl how to carve and by her teenage years, she was selling model poles to visitors in her native Alert

Bay. In 1943, Neel married, moved from Alert Bay to Vancouver, and in 1946, began carving and selling

model poles to help support her family. With the assistance of her six children, Neel produced numerous small, modestly priced models to sell to department stores and souvenir shops. In 1948, the City of Vancouver

Board of Parks Commissioners permitted her to carve,

display, and sell her works in an abandoned military

building in Stanley Park. She gradually became more

and more well known for both her model poles and

full-size carvings, including a sixteen foot pole which

Neel and her husband donated to the Alma Mater Society of the University of British Columbia (UBC) and a

large pole for the Pacific National Exhibition, an annual

fair.9Tourism is deeply implicated in the history of

totem poles, for as early as the 1 880s, steamship companies beckoned prospective clients with descriptions

of the abundant poles they would see on their Inside

Passage cruise. Recognizing the value of poles for tourism, a group of British Columbians along with the-then Vancouver Mayor Charles Thompson formed an association and formally adopted the name "Totemland"

to trademark the province, promote tourism, and

encourage the use of totem poles on license plates,

stamps and, especially, advertisements. So receptive was the community that a local newspaper wrote

optimistically, "The BC totem may become as famous

as the Idaho potato" (K. Phillips 2000:1). The goals of

this group were published as follows:

A. JONAITIS
To collect in writing and disseminate the legendary history, customs and philosophy

of our native Indians; also to encourage and

preserve their ancient weaving, painting and

sculptural arts; to promote the use of a Thunderbird Totem and the slogan

Totemland as the symbol of the colour and

romantic interest of the British Columbia

Indian together with their singular

totemology and unique wood-carving art; to advise, encourage and support the British Columbia Indians in overcoming obstacles

that may stand in the way of their attain- ment to the enjoyment of full citizenship (K. Phillips 2000:25).

The Totemland Society asked Ellen Neel to design the model pole which would become its official emblem

(Fig. 108).

Neel created a unique two foot pole for that organization. A thunderbird sits on atop an egg-shaped

globe prominently depicting western British Columbia

with Vancouver Island, and a human figure kneels underneath. In creating this pole, Neel integrated symbols and sculptural forms from her own heritage with

a distinctly western geographical representation. Understanding the non-Native desire to know the "story"

of any pole, Neel explained its iconography as a narrative of the thunderbird giving British Columbia to the

first man. Neel herself reproduced this vividly painted,

highly original pole a number of times as gifts, while

her popular image of Totemland appeared on society

letterhead, scarves, T-shirts, ties, and a Royal Albert

china dinner service. One could judge this pole as a "degradation" of

a treasured aboriginal artistic tradition appropriated

by the colonialist class — but that would be wrong.

As her friend Phil Nuytten (1982:47) commented,

Neel, who never took herself too seriously anyway,

"laughed a lot about the Totemland Poles." According to Nuytten (personal communication 2003) Neel's

artist uncle Mungo Martin half-seriously, half-jestingly

referred to it as a "white man's pole" but then agreed

with his niece that "a white person wouldn't know

the difference anyway," and they both laughed.

Perhaps Neel recognized the underlying fatuousness of this commission — or at the very least its silliness. But a serious message underlies this artwork as

well, for the globe on the Totemland Society's pole

depicts only Vancouver Island and the nearby mainland, not even the entire totem pole region of British

Columbia. In the middle is Kwakwaka'wakw territory,

situating Neel's own tribal land at the center of the

world (Phillips 2000:69-70). Nuytten (personal communication 2003) also points out that the human underneath the globe has a uncanny resemblance to the European concept of Atlas with the world on his shoulders; Neel seems to have appropriated a non-Native

concept and transformed it into a very Kwakwaka'wakw-like image. Every official who proudly

displayed this pole, every T-shirt emblazoned with its

image, every piece of Totemland china declared, to a

largely white audience who may very well not have

understood, the fundamental centrality of the

Kwakwaka'wakw, their traditional ownership of this

land, and their new ownership of a European symbol.

Ellen Neel was certainly a major mid-century Native artist, admired by her contemporaries. However,

since her death in 1966, she has effectively vanished

from the discourse on Northwest Coast art. An episode in totem pole history may provide insights into why that might be. Two versions exist of the story of

University of British Columbia's efforts to have several

of their Northwest Coast totem poles restored. According to Phil Nuytten (1982:9-10, 52-53), the UBCs

Totem Pole Committee approached Neel first, asking

her to restore fifteen poles. This collection had special

meaning for Neel, as one had been carved by her grandfather Charlie James, and another by her relative Mungo

Martin. During that summer Neel restored four poles

from Fort Rupert, including James'. Because her business had suffered during her absence and as a creative

artist, she found replication uninspiring, Neel suggested that the next summer the Museum of Anthropology hire her uncle, Mungo Martin, for this job

which they did (Fig. 107). Audrey Hawthorn, wife of

352 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ FEMALE CARVERS
Harry Hawthorn, Director of the Museum of Anthropology from 1947-1974, offers an somewhat different account of Martin's hire, stating that he had been

selected from the very beginning, and that the Mu- seum had also approached Neel to be his assistant;

"she was not, however, in a position to assist Mr. Martin on restoration work at that time" (Hawthorn 1993:9-

1 0). With those words. Hawthorn effectively erases

Neel's contributions to the Museum of Anthropology totem pole restoration project.

The museum, with a clear vision of its general role

in cultural preservation as well as this project's historic

significance, played a major role in overseeing the actual restorations. Such conscious attempt to recreate

the past provided opportunities for museum anthropologists to appear as "cultural saviors." Harry Hawthorn directed Martin "to return to the style of the first phase of contact, using steel tools but painting sparingly," so, Martin abandoned his customary covering

of bright paint (which his Kwakwaka'wakw customers apparently liked) and colored only certain features. In a pamphlet explaining Martin's work in

1 952 replicating poles in Victoria's Thunderbird Park,

anthropologist Wilson Duff asserted that by remaining outside in the park, the old poles would have soon decayed:

It was decided to obtain skilled Indian carvers to carve exact copies of the best old

poles, and some new ones, to replace the

old exhibits and produce a permanent and

representative outdoor display of this unique

art for the benefit of future generations. By

employing native craftsmen and having them

work in public view in the park, he

programme accomplished the added aims of

keeping alive native art and providing a

public educational attraction (Duff n.d.:29).

It was thus the museum, not Natives, who "kept the

culture alive" by hiring an authentic Indian, Mungo

Martin, "one of the few surviving authorities in the old ways of life" (Duff n.d.:29). Despite his rudimentary

English the highly personable Martin, along with his

equally charming wife Abayah, became extremely

popular with visitors to both the Museum of Anthropology and the British Columbia Provincial Museum, now known as the Royal British Columbia Museum.

Mungo Martin, conforming beautifully to the "Vanishing Indian" myth which harmonized nicely with the myth

of the totem pole as an ancient tradition on the verge

of disappearance, became the most well known and

highly regarded Northwest Coast Native of his time

(Class 2000).

Ellen Neel never became a significant player in the

official history of British Columbia's totem pole projects,

perhaps because, unlike Martin, she did not adhere to

the timeless traditionalist stereotype favored by anthropologists and the public. Indeed, Neel was one of

the first Natives to actually challenge the disappearing

Indian trope to which Duff so compellingly refers. At a

1 948 conference on Native art and culture, Neel dis- missed the concept that Native art is dead, calling it

"one of the great fallacies where the art of my people

is concerned." She continued "For if our art is dead,

then it is fit only to be mummified, packed into mortuary boxes and tucked away into museums... Whereas

to me, it is a living symbol of gaiety, the laughter and

love of color of my people." Innovation and change

had always been aspects of her artistic tradition. It is

striking that, in contrast to Harry Hawthorn's instruction to reduce the amount of color for historical verisimilitude, Neel and the contemporary Kwakwaka'wakw

"love" color. She pointed to the national identity inherent in her work: "Our art continues to live, for not only

is it part and parcel of us, but can be a powerful factor

in combining the best part of Indian culture into the

fabric of a truly Canadian art form" (Nuytten 1 982:50).

Neel spoke good English and instead of wearing

ceremonial regalia, even at events, dressed in clothes more appropriate for a 1 950s housewife. Moreover,

by marrying a white man, she lost her Indian status

according to Canadian law. Instead of purporting herself like Martin as a high status aboriginal, she presented herself as Mother, supervising her six half-Native cildren as totem pole apprentices. Her art, while

A. JONAITIS 353
capable of being quite traditional, also at times ventured into the unexpected, as in the Totemland pole.

Ellen Nee! did not make poles that alluded to the golden

age of authenticity, did not fit nicely into the category

of "disappearing Indian" so favored by the museums,

and despite her lineage, did not go down in history as

a truly "authentic" Native. Today Nee! is rarely mentioned in the literature, and the biography offered in Nuytten's The Totem Pole

Carvers {] 982) remains still her only significant source. '°

The most important catalogue of contemporary North- west Coast art, The Legacy {\ 980) praises Charlie James

and Mungo Martin, but fails to even mention Ellen Neel.

Steven Brown, in his survey of Northwest Coast art

history to the present includes Neel along with eight

other male carvers in a list of Kwakwaka'wakw artists

of her generation, but illustrates none of her work

(Brown 1 998: 1 5 5). Just as Hawthorn excluded her from

the history of the Museum of Anthropology's pole carving projects, the literature has, in effect, erased her from

the history of Northwest Coast art. In contrast, her

uncle Mungo Martin has been transformed into its

super-star.

Susan Point

A very different reception was given a contemporary woman artist, Susan Point (born 1952) member of the Musqueam band of Salish (Fig. 110). In 1 981 , she took

a jewelry-making course at Vancouver Community College, where she learned to make northern-style silver

bracelets and rings. Courses were not offered in Salish

art which was not greatly valued at that time. Because

she recognized the impressive artistic tradition of her

people, Point visited museums and began making prints

based upon traditional Salish images. In 1991, she

crafted the first Salish-style monumental carving in decades, a twelve-foot house post for the First Nations' House of Learning on the University of British Columbia

campus. Then she embarked upon adventures into new

media including glass and produced Common Thread,

a remarkable seven foot house post of glass depicting

the moon, stars, our planet earth and an assortment of

animals—wolf, raven, wolverine and sturgeon (Fig. 111).

Unlike Neel, Point has received many accolades. She has had solo exhibits at the Museum of Anthropology in Vancouver, Steilacoom Tribal Museum in

Washington, and the Canadian Museum of Civilization

in Hull, and has participated in numerous group exhibits in Canada, the United States, Japan, and Europe. She was one of three contemporary Northwest Coast Native artists featured in Indianer Kunstler der Westkuste

Kanadas {Native Artists from the Northwest Coast), a major exhibition in Zurich in 1989 (Gerber and KatzLahaigue 1989)." And she is the subject of a beautiful

coffee table book published in 2000, thus being one

of the few Northwest Coast artists validated by a personal art monograph (Wyatt 2000). In that catalogue

Peter Macnair writes, "more than any other contemporary Northwest Coast artist . . . Point has been successful .. . due to her desire for new challenges, her willingness to explore new mediums." As a truly brilliant artist, Point deserves every honor bestowed upon her.

But as she herself says, "Coast Salish art is relatively

unknown to most people today . . . much of the Native art associated with the Pacific Northwest Coast is from principle tribes of northern British Columbia" (Point

1996:132-3).

Why was then Salish art unrecognized as a major

art tradition before Susan Point revealed its excellence? Why was so much more such attention paid to more

northerly Northwest Coast art from the Kwakwaka'wakw to Salish? As Wayne Suttles has indicated on numerous occasions, Franz Boas and his successors created the stereotype of "imitative and passive"

Salish as "a pale reflection of the 'real Northwest Coast'

to the north" (Suttles 1987:xii; 257).'^

Boas wrote the art section of Teit's Jesup Expedition publication, and in that asserted that the Salish were "a receptive race, quick to adopt foreign modes

of thought," perhaps due to "a low stage of development of their early culture, or to social conditions unfavorable to the continued growth of their own culture"

354 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ FEMALE CARVERS
(Boas 1900:390,387). He also characterized Coast

Salish art as "cruder" than that of the Northern tribes

(1 900:389). This art became stigmatized as less complex, less interesting, and less aesthetically valuable

than either "baroque" Wakashan or elegant northern

Northwest Coast art.'^

Perhaps because family-owned images were considered more private than they were farther north, the

Salish carved only interior house posts, never exterior

totem poles.'" But, since tourists to Vancouver—a true

capital of "Totemland"—wanted totem poles, throughout the twentieth century, poles made farther north

filled the city's museums and parks. The art of local

Salish was ignored. Before Susan Point began carving

Salish-style monumental art, only one totem pole by a

Salish carver, the Thunderbird Dynasty pole stood in

Vancouver's Stanley Park. In 1936, Squamish Chief

Matthias Joe Capilano made this pole for a group of Vancouver citizens who were planning to erect Haida

and Kwakwaka'wakw poles in Stanley Park, and

wanted one made by a local artist. Matthias Joe chose

as his model not the minimalist carvings of Salish house

posts, but instead created a Kwakwaka'wakw type

of pole with assertively carved and vividly painted

images surmounted by an open-winged thunderbird

(Fig. 109). Most poles publicly declare the crest privileges of an extended family; but this one depicted

mythic beings associated with the Salish creation story

-thunderbird, its wife, son and daughter, and the sea

monster. It also commemorates not a major tribal

event such as a potlatch, a wedding, or the death of a

chief, but instead the first meeting of Captain Vancouver

and the Salish people on June 1 3, 1 792. S.W.A. Gunn,

author of the 1965 booklet on Stanley Park poles approvingly appraised this pole, which, with thunderbird

imagery communicating the story of the Creation, "com- memorates the meeting of the Indians and the white man [which] opened up an entirely new world for both" (Gunn 1965:22-3).

In reality, the Capilano monument represented one

of the first poles that embodied an explicitly political

statement, for what appeared to be celebrating an

historic event was actually a subtle assertion of aboriginal land rights. During the early 1 900's, Coastal

First Nations people had been exceptionally active attempting to obtain sovereignty over their land; in 1 906,

a delegation of Salish chiefs made an unsuccessful trip

to London to petition King Edward II to change governmental policy. In 1912, the Coast Salish, along with

the Nishga, Haida and Interior Salish, joined together

to form the Allied Tribes of British Columbia to contest

the province's land allocation policies. Squamish chief Andrew Paul, along with Haida Peter Kelly, labored especially diligently for this, but ultimately to no avail. In 1927 the Allied Tribes disbanded, in part due to their

failure to achieve their goals, and in part due to a new

section of the Indian Act making it illegal to solicit

funds to pursue land claims (Kew 1990:166). In this

context of continual rebuffs to their appeals, the 1 936

Matthias Joe pole served as a quiet, legal mechanism

to proclaim Salish rights to the Vancouver region. This

statement, like the position of Kwakwaka'wakw territory on Neel's Totemland totem pole, probably went

over the heads of most observers.

In recent years, aboriginal people worldwide have

been more vociferously defending ownership of their

lands and insisting on more voice in government, education, and the arts. Australian aborigines. New Zealand

Maoris, Scandinavian Saami, Canadian Inuit have all be- come significant forces within their countries. Concomitant with these actions of empowerment, Native

people have used their artistic traditions to express

identity, celebrate heritage, and, at times, make political statements. This was certainly the case on the Northwest Coast, where the totem pole has assumed

yet new meanings as Native Americans and Canadians join in this worldwide movement.

The British North American Act (1867) and the Indian Act (1876) denied First Nations their sovereignty

and defined them as wards of the state. In keeping

with the national and international aboriginal sovereignty movements, British Columbia Natives, along with

A. JONAITIS 3 5 5
other Canadian First Nations sought to win back their independence as autonomous units with self-determination in political, social and economic affairs. This was

slow in coming, as only in 1982 did First Nations appear as a category of citizens in the Canadian constitution. Its Article 35 now explicitly states, "The existing aboriginal and treaty rights of the aboriginal peoples

of Canada are hereby recognized and confirmed... In

this Act, 'aboriginal peoples of Canada' includes the

Indian, Inuit and Metis peoples of Canada" (quoted in

Cerber 1 988:1 22). Ownership of the land and the right

to control its resources, remain to this day highly

contentious, as British Columbia Natives never signed

treaties with the federal or provincial governments

for their land, and have brought their land claims to

court.

In this contentious political atmosphere, Susan Point

received a major commission in the early 1 990s to

create artworks for the International Terminal at Vancouver International Airport in Vancouver, BC. At

the top of the escalator arriving international passengers must descend is a monumental, 16-foot diameter

spindle whorl of red cedar (1 994) hanging suspended

over a waterfall symbolizing Salish rivers (Fig. 1 14).'^

Several messages — greetings, flight, subsistence —

are conveyed by two large eagles constrained within

the circle enveloping in their wings images of the Coast

Salish people who hold salmon within them. At the

base of the escalator, two welcome figures (1 996, see

title page), the male and female ancestors of the

Musqueam, stand facing the spindle whorl and cas- cade to greet arriving passengers. On the backs of

each figure a panel. Flight, depicts eagles of glass, and

humans with upraised arms.

Point's images embody several messages intended

for the new visitors. Ever gracious, the Musqueam wel- come them to their land. The eagle, a motif found in

earlier Salish art straddles the ancient with the modern

by alluding to natural and man-made flight. The salmon

and water signify not only the traditional economic

basis of the Salish, but the contemporary struggles for

fishing rights. The very position of these images as the

first monumental carvings that greet newcomers, communicates clearly and vividly that they have arrived on Musqueam land; with this welcome, the Salish are placing claim on ownership of the land. Point has taken

the motifs of her ancestors and created a work that

not only stands as an exceptional work of art but also makes some very contemporary politically charged

statements. It is likely that the public, sensitized to

aboriginal land claims issues, finally grasp this message that has been conveyed by various Northwest

Coast art works.

The "Essential" Totem Pole

While the Northwest Coast Indians were carving and

raising poles, Europeans, Canadians and Americans were creating an abstraction - the [essential] totem

pole. Early on these carvings became signifiers of tradition, embodiments of authentic Nativeness, compelling presentations of the mythic world. Tourist literature for well over 100 years has represented the to- tem pole's antiquity and connection to nature; the more

romanticizing passages in the literature project upon

the pole a kind of aura that transforms them from ordinary to extra-ordinary.

In their Boasian quest for ethnographic purity, past

scholars have sought a neat encapsulation of clearly

defined types, and rejected or, at least, placed a lesser

value on, hybridized forms. Adhering to a preconceived

model of cultural purity discredits most, if not all, cultural hybridities, and disregards the dynamic nature of

cultural interactions. In the popular imagination, the

"essential" totem pole should be a tall, freestanding

column of great antiquity, carved by Indians for Indians. In the quest for this totem pole, and the genuine

Indian who makes it, Ellen Neel has been ignored and

Salish art degraded. Neel's poles, made strictly as

commodities, were judged not authentic and, for that

matter, neither was the modern Ellen Neel herself. However, the more recent dismantling of such stereotypes and acceptance of creativity, originality, and

356 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ FEMALE CARVERS
challenges to the status quo have allowed space for Susan Point's innovative artistic expressions.

Let us address the issue of Neel and Point's gender.

Because men are traditional carvers on the Northwest

Coast, any woman carver is not traditional - and thus

in the eyes of some, not "authentic." In addition, perhaps, as Nuytten argues, Neel was erased from the

discourse on Kwakwaka'wakw art because she was

female working at a time before feminism applauded

endeavors such as hers (Nuytten, personal communication. May 2002). Some thirty years later, Point's gender did not negatively influence the public's reception

of her works. However, one must ask whether the appreciation of her work has something to do with her

being Musqueam. Her work emerges from the tradition of a marginalized group whose art has been

underappreciated. In contrast to the canonical traditions to which many contemporary Northwest Coast

Native artists adhere. Point enjoys enormous freedom

to experiment. This lack of constraints imposed by a

canon, coupled with the absence of Salish male artists measuring up to her brilliance, creates a place for her

to be accepted and admired. It would be interesting

to speculate on whether, if Point were from a more

northern Northwest Coast group, she could successfully compete with recognized male masters of art

styles long admired and valued. I personally hope that,

with the enhanced consciousness of the contemporary era, any great artist, regardless of tradition or gender, would be recognized as such.

I have selected Neel and Point to discuss their roles

not only as women artists, but also their importance in

a revitalized history of Northwest Coast art. Fred Myers

introduces a volume on contemporary perspectives

about material culture by asserting:

Movement, destablization, and dynamics are highly visible processes in the social life of

things. ... changes in the intersections of

different levels of circulation cannot be

studied simply as "breakdowns" - either from

art into commodity of from "culturally

authentic" to inauthentic - or as simple

appropriations.... The relocation of material

culture demands understanding that value is never simply defined but is always involved

in global as well as local circuits of ex- change, display and storage. This is especially important as objects move through

space and time with greater rapidly than

ever before, breaking down the analytical

categories that for so long have been used

to contain and define them theoretically

(Myers 2001:1 1-12.).

Both Neel and Point contributed to disassembling stillprevalent stereotypes of "authentic Indians" and genuine traditional Indian art, revealing as fictional the very concept of ethnic purity. In the Boasian paradigm,

authentic Native artists would probably not have communicated political statements in their work. Neither

would they be innovative in terms of integrating western and non-western concepts. And they certainly

would not have made authentic art for commercial

purposes. But, in the globalized world of today, Native

artists like Neel and Point express resistance with art.

Neel makes her homeland the center of the universe,

whereas Point presents Vancouver as Musqueam territory. Both are innovative, creating new works of "reactions" between Native and non-Native concepts, with

Neel transforming a common item of tourist art into a

uniquely hybrid image of the Native and non-Native

worlds, and Point creating a Salish masterpiece from a

very untraditional medium, like glass. And both make

excellent art for non-Native sponsors; Neel for visitors

to Stanley Park and the Totemland organization, Point

for the Vancouver Airport Commission. What Boas thought about the totem pole models as commodities, about the originality of the Salish, and, indeed,

about the timeless traditionalism of Native art itself,

has been turned on its head, opening the way for even more innovative Northwest Coast totem pole carvers—including women.

Acknowledgments.

This paper derives from talks given at the University of

Rochester in April, 2002 and Stanford University, May

A. JONAITIS 357
2002. The development of the totem pole will be the

subject of a book in progress that I am writing with Aaron Class, the working title of which is Monumental

Myths of the Northwest Coast Totem Pole. I thank him

for his impeccable research and compelling ideas on

this subject. I also thank the Susan B. Anthony, Institute of Gender Studies and Janet Catherine Berlo, past

Susan. B. Anthony Professor of Cender Studies at the

University of Rochester as well as the Art Department

at Stanford University where I was Visiting Distinguished

Professor of American Art for providing the opportunity to research, write and give these talks. I want to

express my appreciation for the generosity of Phil

Nuytten in sharing his recollections of his friend Ellen

Neel, Bill McLennan and Dan Savard for their assistance

with the photographs, Laurel Kendall and Igor Krupnik

for their editing of the manuscript and, especially, Susan Point for her permission to reproduce images of

herself and her works.

Notes

1. See Jonaitis (1988) for an extended review

of the American Museum of Natural History's

Northwest Coast art collection, including its sec- tion originating from the Jesup North Pacific Expedition Oonaitis 1988:154-213).

2. It is because they stand in public and visually resemble other carvings on the property that

I categorize Point's monumental columnar carv- ings as totem poles.

3. I am indebted to Wayne Suttles who gave a

talk "Northwest Coast Art and Essentialism" at the

Otsego Institute for Native American Art Studies

in 1999 and introduced this concept of Boas and

essentialism, especially from the perspective of

his life long research on the Salish. See also

Michael Harkin's concept of Boas' "Kwakiutlism"

(Harkin 2001:100-102).

4. During his 1 996 interviews of visitors to the

stand of totem poles at Stanley Park, Aaron Class

verified these stereotypes.

5. The literature on impact of fairs, collecting and

tourism upon Native art is extensive. See in particular Cole (1 985), Rydell (1 984) and Lee (1 999).

6. The most outstanding recent totem pole

project at Qay'llnagaay, or Sea Lion Town, is the

six new poles erected at Skidegate on Haida Cwaii

(Queen Charlotte Islands) as part of a large-scale

cultural tourism project. Each pole represents one

of the main historic village sites of the southern

Haida - Skidegate, T'aanuu, SCaang Cwaii

Ninstints, Ts'aahl (ChaatI), K'uuna (Skedans), and

Cumshewa.

7. See Jonaitis (1995) for reprints of all Boas' essays on art, selections from Primitive Art, and

articles on his art history and his influences on

twentieth century studies of Northwest Coast art.

8. The literature on tourist art is extensive, but

the two most important books on the subject

are Craburn's groundbreaking volume (1976) and

Phillips and Steiner's recent edited volume of the current state of scholarship (1 999).

9. As a result of winning an award for this pole

at that fair, Neel began to receive orders for small

poles. By this time, her model poles were not inexpensive, with a 14 inch piece selling for $30,

a 36 inch one for $1 50 (Nuytten 1982:57). When

the business was good, Neel, helped by her chil- dren, filled an order from the Hudson's Bay Company for 5,000 poles.

10. Kimberly Phillip's unpublished master's thesis written at the University of British Columbia

Department of Fine Arts (K. Phillips 2000) is an- other excellent source on Ellen Neel.

1 1. The other two artists were Joe Davis and

Lawrence Paul. 12. In Coast Salish Essays (1987:256, 266),

Suttles suggests that the results of the Jesup North

Pacific Expedition had a lot to do with the per- petuation of these stereotypes.

13. I have always thought that if the Salish did not live just south of the other Northwest Coast

people who produce such incredible art that they

would be thought of as an important North Ameri- can art-producing people. In their publications, Bill Holm (1991) and Steve Brown (1998) have made

significant contributions to the reassessment of

Salish art.

1 4. See Suttles 1 987: 1 00-33, for further development of this idea.

1 5. There has been a wealth of material on British Columbia land claims. For a good source,

First Nations Land Claims and Treaties in BC by

the Vancouver Public Library (2002), on line at

358 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ FEMALE CARVERS
www.vpl.vancouver.bc.ca.

1 6. This was done with the assistance of two

other carvers, John Livingston and Jeff Cannell.

References

Barbeau, Marius

1929 Totem Poles of the Gitksan, Upper Skeena

River, British Columbia. Anthropological Series 1 2, National Museum of Canada Bulletin 6] . Ottawa. 1950 Totem Poles. Anthropological Series 30, National Museum of Canada Bulletin 1 1 9. Ottawa. Boas, Franz

1 888 The Development of Culture in Northwest

America. Science 12:194-96.

1 900 Art. In The Thompson Indians of British Co- lumbia, byJamesTeit. Pp. 376-90. The Jesup North

Pacific Expedition, vol. 1 , pt. 4. Memoirs of Ameri- can Museum of Natural History Memoirs, 2. New

York: G.E. Stechert.

1 95 5 Primitive Art. New York: Dover Press. 1st edition, 1927. Cambridge MA: Harvard University

Press. Brown, Steven

1 998 Native Visions: Evolution in Northwest Coast

Art from the Eighteenth through the Twentieth Century.

Seattle: Seattle Art IVIuseum and University of Washington Press. Clifford, James

1997 Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University

Press. Cole, Douglas

1985 Captured Heritage. The Scramble for Northwest

Coast Artifacts. Seattle: University of Washington

Press. Drucker, Philip

1 948 The Antiquity of the Northwest Coast Totem

Pole. Journal of the Washington Academy ofSciences

38(12):389-97.

Duff, Wilson

1 98 1 Mungo Martin, Carver of the Century. In The

World is as Sharp as a Knife. Donald N. Abbott,

ed. Pp. 3-70. Victoria: British Columbia Provincial Museum.

n.d. Thunderbird Park. Victoria: B.C. Government

Travel Bureau. Gerber, Peter, and Vanina Katz-Lahaigue

1 989 Susan A. Point; Joe David; Lawrence Paul:

Indianische KUnstlerder WestkiASte Kanadas/Native Artists from the Northwest Coast. Zurich: Volkerkundemuseum der Universitat Zurich. Class, Aaron

2000 Cultural Salvage or Brokerage: The Emergence

of Northwest Coast 'Art' and the Mythologization

of Mungo Martin. Unpublished paper.

Gosden, Chris, and Chantel Knowles

2001 Collecting Colonialism: Material Culture and Colonial Change. Oxford: Berg. Graburn, Nelson H.H., ed.

1976 Ethnic and Tourist Art: Cultural Expressions from

the Fourth World. Berkeley: University of California

Press. Gunn, S. W. A. 1965 Totem Poles of Stanley Park. Vancouver:

Whiterocks Publications. Harkin, Michael

2000 (Dis)pleasures of the Text:Boasian Ethnology on the Central Northwest Coast. In Gateways: Ex- ploring the Legacy of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition, 1897-1902. Igor Krupnik and William

Fitzhugh, eds. Pp. 93-105, Contributions to Cir- cumpolar Anthropology, 1 . Washington, DC: Arctic Studies Center. Hawthorn, Audrey

1993 A Labour of Love: The Making of the Museum

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1976. Vancouver: University of British Columbia

Press. Holm, Bill

1 990 Art. In Northwest Coast. Handbook of North

American Indians, vol. 7. Wayne Suttles, ed. Pp. 602-

32. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution. Jonaitis, Aldona

1 988 From the Land of the Totem Poles: The North- west Coast Indian Art Collection at the American Mu- seum of Natural History. New York: American Mu- seum of Natural History; Seattle: University of Washington Press.

1 995 A Wealth of Thought: Franz Boas on Native

American Art. Seattle: University of Washington Press.

1 999 Northwest Coast Totem Poles. In Unpacking

Culture: Art and Commodity in Colonial and Postcolonial Worlds. Ruth Phillips and Christopher Steiner, eds. Pp.

1 04-20. Berkeley: University of California Press. Kew, Michael

1 990 History of Coastal British Columbia Since 1 849.

In Handbook ofNorth American Indians, vol.7. North- west Coast. Wayne Suttles, ed. Pp. 1 59-68. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution. Lee, Molly

1 999 Tourism and Taste Cultures: Collecting Native

Art in Alaska at the Turn of the Twentieth Century. In Unpacking Culture: Art and Commodity in Colonial and

Postcolonial Worlds. Ruth Phillips and Christopher

Steiner, eds. Pp. 267-80. Berkeley: University of Cali- fornia Press. Macnair, Peter 2000 Susan Point: Her Place by the River. In Susan

Point: Coast Salish Artist. G. Wyatt, ed. Pp. 25-44.

Vancouver: Douglas & Mclntyre.

A. JONAITIS 3 59
Macnair, Peter, Alan Hoover, and Kevin Nearly

1980 The Legacy: Continuing Traditions ofCanadian

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Malin, Edward

1 986 Totem Poles of the Pacific Northwest Coast.

Portland: Timber Press. McLennan, Bill 2000 Contemporary Architectural Carvings. In Su- san Point: Coast Salish Artist. C. Wyatt, ed. Pp. 94-

7. Vancouver: Douglas & Mclntyre.

Myers, Fred, ed.

2001 The Empire of Things: Regimes of Value and

Material Culture. Santa Fe: School for American

Research.

Nuytten, Phil

1982 The Totem Carvers: Charlie James, Ellen Neel,

Mungo Martin. Vancouver: Panorama Publications. Phillips, Kimberly

2000 Ellen Neel. Unpublished paper (quoted with

author's permission).

Phillips, Ruth, and Christopher Steiner, eds.

1999 Unpacking Culture: Art and Commodity in Colonial and Postcolonial Worlds. Berkeley: University

of California Press. Point, Susan

1996 Artist's statement in Topographies: Aspects

of Recent B.C. Art. G. Arnold, M. Gagnon, D.Jensen,

eds. Pp. 132-33. Vancouver: Vancouver Art Gallery. Rydell, Robert

1984 All the World's a Fair: Visions ofEmpire at Ameri- can International Expositions, 1876-1916. Chicago:

University of Chicago Press. Suttles, Wayne

/ 987 Coast Salish Essays. Compiled and edited with

the assistance of Ralph Maud. Seattle: University of Washington Press. Teit, James

1900 The Thompson Indians ofBritish Columbia; The

Jesup North Pacific Expedition, vol. 1 , pt. 4. Memoirs

ofAmerican Museum of Natural History Memoirs, 2. New York: C.E. Stechert. Wyatt, Gary, ed.

2000 Susan Point: Coast Salish Artist. Vancouver: Douglas & Mclntyre.

360 CURATORS AND CONSUMERS/ FEMALE CARVERS
(Consumers, l^hen and !\Jow

GLORIA CRANMER WEBSTER

In the early 1 970s, I worked as an assistant curator at

the Museum of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver BC. One day, when I was

very busy, the late Wilson Duff came in and showed me a raven rattle, saying, "Isn't it beautiful?" I agreed

that it was. Then he asked, "But how do you read it?" I

replied impatiently, "Wilson, I don't read those things, I

shake them." The title of this chapter could have been

"Shakers and Readers," because that is how the world

is divided for me. There are us and there are those who

write about or "read" us. Readers have very little relevance in the world of Shakers, primarily because their

statements are so often wrong.

Franz Boas' arrival on the Northwest Coast of British Columbia marked the beginning of a long relationship with our people, the Kwakwaka'wakw, more com- monly known to the outside world as the "KwakiutI," a term that is as inaccurate as calling the indigenous

people of this continent "Indians". Kwakwaka'wakw

is not a new word, as some Readers have suggested;

it has always meant all of the people who speak the

language, Kwakwala. I am a present-day Kwakwala

speaker and the word is certainly known to me and

other speakers with my level of fluency.

Boas collaborated with George Hunt in gathering

material relating to nearly all aspects of

Kwakwaka'wakw culture at a time when that culture was losing its center. His dependence on Hunt's knowledge of the Kwakwala language is repeatedly acknowledged throughout their long collaboration. George

Hunt was my great-grandfather. His oldest son, David, was my mother's father. We have always known that George was the half-breed son of an English father and

a high-ranking £anget [Tlingit—ed.] woman from

Tangas, Alaska. Counter to some modern Readers of

our history who see this pedigree as an indication that George Hunt was not a legitimate participant in Kwakwaka'wakw culture, we take pride in our Alaskan connection. These ties give us the right, as Hunt's

descendants, to treasures brought to Fort Rupert by

Anisglaga, as my great-great-grandmother was known

to us. Hunt's marriage to Tlali^i'lakw (Lucy) was a

Kwagu'^ ceremony, with her family bringing kis'u, including names, dances, and songs, to him, thus establishing his position in the society. Hunt's position be- came stronger each time one of his sons married into

families rich in kis'u. Each of his daughters gave her

husband's family kis'u coming from Lucy's family as

well as from Anisalaga's family.

On March 20, 1905, Hunt wrote to Boas saying

that, "The Indian Agent is trying to get my three boys

to leave the Indians and turn to be white men, but the

Indians don't want for my boys to leave them." The

"boys" were my grandfather and his brothers Samuel

and Jonathan, all of whom had married chiefs daughters from different tribes of the Kwakwaka'wakw.

That the "Indians" did not want them to leave seems a

clear indication of acceptance, in my view. Further- more, when George Hunt was dying, he called together the Kwag'u^ chiefs and asked that one of them

36 1
marry fat^g^a'widzamga (Francine), his second wife,

so that she would remain in Fort Rupert rather than

return to her home village. George feared that she would

not be well taken care of by her own people. Soon

after Hunt's death, Charlie Wilson, a chief of the Kwagu'^,

married Francine. It seems highly unlikely that such a

high-ranking person would honor the dying wish of one who was not accepted.

Boas entered our world when people were experiencing drastic changes in their lives, including rapid

population decline due to introduced diseases, and

loss of land and access to traditional resource sites.

Missionaries and government agents added to the upheaval by attempting to "civilize" us in their residential

schools, and, in time, succeeded in pressuring the Canadian government to enact legislation prohibiting the

potlatch. In 1921 , the federal government took many

of our treasures from us, following a large potlatch

that had been held in violation of the law prohibiting

such ceremonies. In 1 980, we opened our cultural center, in which is housed part of this Potlatch Collection,

returned to us by the Canadian Museum of Civilization. We asked our old people what an appropriate name

would be for our center. It was at their suggestion that we decided to call it the U'mista Cultural Centre. They saw the repatriation of our treasures as a kind of

u'mista, that is, the return of people who, in earlier

times, were taken captive by other tribes and returned

to their homes, either through payment of ransom or by a retaliatory raid. Fluent Kwakwala speakers are

familiar with the expression u'mis'wist'as that is used

when one is angry with or frustrated by another person. It means, "may you go back to where you come

from."

Other Readers have made the U'mista Cultural Center the subject of their reading in ways that have nothing to do with what we did. We did not even think

about Readers when we designed the exhibit. Very

simply, the exhibit turned out the way it did for two

reasons: firstly, the only designer I wanted to work

with was not available; secondly, I did not feel that I

could tell the story of potlatch prohibition better than those people who actually experienced those

terrible times. So, the exhibit texts are copies of

letters, petitions, and reports, both for and against

the potlatch. We did not need individual labels for

the masks because we know what they are. Then, came the Readers who read all kinds of things that were not there. We certainly were not trying to confuse white visitors, or forcing any questions on them.

As for the Readers' claims that we left off the labels

for poetic impact, our Board of Directors, mostly

fishermen, would have laughed.

In terms of Kwakwaka'wakw society, Boas and

those who followed him were the consumers of our

culture. They took away knowledge and treasures to

distant places that had no connection to our world. Today, we have become consumers of a different kind. We are reclaiming what was lost during the "dark years,"

as our old people say. In recent years, on the North- west coast, there has been a renewed interest in building canoes, an activity that had almost died out as our

people adapted to motorized vessels. The detailed

description of canoe construction recorded by Hunt and Boas has been invaluable to novice canoe builders. The missionaries almost succeeded in their efforts

to wipe out our language, so that we utilize the Boas/ Hunt texts in developing language material to teach Kwakwala to both adults and children. Another example of the value of the Boas/Hunt

material has to do with the construction of kerfed boxes. When one of our carvers bent his first box, he sewed it

together with a twisted cedar withe. The next day, he

looked at his work and found that the withe had unraveled. It was only when he referred to the Boas/Hunt

volume on technology that he discovered the correct way to twist the withe. Although Boas and Hunt did not work extensively

with the HPdzakw of Bella Bella, their work is valued

there as well. A HPdzakw friend said, "Boas certainly

paved the way for doing business with our people in a more inclusive way when one considers the way the

362 CURATORS, COLLECTORS, AND CONSUMERS
anthros [anthropologists—ed.] of today are doing business." (P. Waterfall, personal communication, 1 996). Her

use of the material relates primarily to names, and she

told me that her grandfather had given her son his name. Both her grandparents had very sketchy information about the history of the name. She then turned

to the Boas/Hunt material and read it to the old

people, who became very excited, because hearing it triggered additional information. She was then

able to combine their version with the information

from Boas and ended up with a complete history, which

her son memorized. He wrote it out in a book form,

completed with his own illustrations. She also uses the Boas/Hunt material to cross-reference names, which

are still remembered while their histories are almost

forgotten. These few examples of the way we "con- sume" the material produced by Boas and Hunt give some idea of the distance between us, the Shakers,

and them, the Readers.

Following George Hunt's death in 1933, my father Dan Cranmer worked with Boas and his daughter, Helene

Yampolsky, on the KwakiutI Grammar, published in

1947. Franz Boas died in 1942, and I quote from a

letter of condolence my father wrote to Mrs. Yampolsky,

dated January 9, 1 943: "The sorrowful tidings of your deep affliction reached me today and, oh my dear

Helene, if only sympathy were like waves of light, how

the rays would pour from my heart to illumine the gloomy veil of grief which wraps you in its somber

folds." In the letter, my father refers to Boas as "my

master," for whom he would sing mourning songs at an upcoming potlatch. He also mentioned that the Kwagu'^ of Fort Rupert had sung mourning songs

for Boas. I wonder how many people whom other

anthropologists have studied have the same feelings of respect and affections that our people had

and still have for Franz Boas?

In 1 986, the descendents of Franz Boas and George

Hunt gathered in Alert Bay and Fort Rupert to celebrate the centenary of the first meeting of these two

remarkable men. Although the Hunts outnumbered the

Boas family by several hundred, we had a great time

getting to know each other. The Boas family pre- sented us with copies of one thousand pages of

the correspondence between Franz Boas and

George Hunt, which has been of great value to us. Other anthropologists followed Boas into our territory, but I cannot imagine such a gathering happening with their families. 1990 marked the 10th anniversary of the opening

of the U'mista Cultural Centre. At that time, my youngest brother gave a potlatch during which Dr. Norman

Boas received his grandfather's name, originally given

to Franz Boas in 1 896. The name means, "speaking

well from the beginning." Norman's wife, Doris, received

the name Xwani, meaning, "swaying from side to side." The name had been given to (a young Russian anthropologist) Julia Averkieva when she accompanied Boas on his last trip of 1 930-3 1 . The decision to give these names was made by three of George Hunt's granddaughters, Agnes Cranmer nee Hunt, Helen Know, and

her sister Margaret Frank, both of whom were daughters of Emily, George's oldest daughter.

George Hunt traveled to New York in 1903, to work with Franz Boas on the collections they had

accumulated for the American Museum of Natural

History. He kept a Journal of his trip, beginning with

his departure from Fort Rupert on January 24th. He

named each place at which the train stopped, often adding the number of miles he had traveled, the

population at each stop, and the elevation. Under one of the entries headed, "1807 miles from Fort

Rupert," he wrote:

...and came to Keewatin and 1852 and we

passed Normen and now feel like if I was in the world unknown for I did feel like I was

daid man from all my relations or something

like wounded duck with one wing broken.

No friend near to me. O I thought how foolish

I was to leave my near relations to go and

pleas other man and that I only got a very

short time to live in this world oh I felt sorry. But I at last made up my mind to go through

with my trip.

GLORIA WEBSTER 363
Unfortunately, the entries stop before his arrival in New York, but there are no further regrets expressed

about making the journey.

The exhibit «Chiefly Feasts», which opened at the American Museum of Natural History in 1 991 , was another chapter in the Boas/Hunt story. A year earlier,

the curator of the exhibit, Aldona Jonaitis, invited a group of our old people to come to New York to look

at the treasures that had been selected for the exhibit. Three of Hunt's grandchildren and two great-grandchildren were part of the group. So, 87 years after Hunt's

lonely visit to this museum, some of his descendents came to do much the same work as he had done with

Boas. This was the first time most of our group has

seen the masks since they had been bought for the museum by Boas and Hunt. It was also the first time

that George Hunt's detailed information on the collection was connected to individual masks, revealing that many of them belonged to the same story. Translating my great-grandfather's notes was one of the

highlights of my involvement with the exhibit. Many

of Hunt's descendants attended the official exhibit

opening, and the Boas family was there as well. Norman

Boas spoke on behalf of his family and my brother

spoke on behalf of ours. Chiefly Feasts was our exhibit; I had worked on other exhibits in large museums,

but Chiefly Feasts stands out as the one project to which I really felt that our people had made a significant contribution. My feeling has a lot to do with the

legacy of Franz Boas and George Hunt. The exhibit was the beginning of a new relationship between Shakers and a few Readers that I hope will become widespread in the larger museum community. It brought

together two different kinds of consumers, each of

whom benefited from the experience in a very positive way.

In the last hundred years, the world of the

Kwakwaka'wakw has changed irrevocably. Today, in common with most Native communities, we struggle

with many social economic and other problems. We

see the fishing industry that was the main source of income on our reserves becoming more uncertain each

season, our environment being destroyed by industry

and development, while the issue of land claims re- mains unsettled. At the same time, we strengthen

what was left of our culture after the white people

did their best to destroy it. In that task we are more

fortunate than most indigenous groups, because we

have a strong foundation to build on and for that we owe much to Hi^dzakwal's (Franz Boas) and

Kixitasu' (George Hunt). Cilakas'la, ninigad 'wi'ump —thank you, wise forefathers.

364 CURATORS, COLLECTORS, AND CONSUMERS

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Contributions to Circumpoiar /^nthropologt)

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Smithsonian Institution. Washington, DC. 2001. xvi+335 pp.

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and Daniel Odess. Arctic Studies Center, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution. Washington, DC. 2002. xvi+319 pp.

Vol. 3: Akuzilleput Igaqullghet. Our Words Put to Paper. Sourcebook in St. Lawrence Island Yupik Heritage and History.

Edited by Igor Krupnik, Willis Walunga, and Vera Metcalf. Compiled by Igor Krupnik and Lars Krutak. Arctic Studies

Center, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution. Washington, DC. 2002. 464 pp.

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