Under Mount Saint Elias: The History and Culture of the Yakutat Tlingit: Part One

Abstract

The field data on which this report is based were gathered at Yakutat in 1949, 1952, 1953, and 1954. On my first exploratory visit, June 8 to July 13, 1949, I was assisted by Edward Malin, then a graduate student at the University of Colorado, and by William Irving, then an undergraduate at the University of Alaska. At that time several old village sites and a number of well-informed, friendly natives gave promise that combined archeological and ethnological investigations would be fruitful. Furthermore, I learned that there were two persons in the community who could speak Eyak, a language which I had feared was extinct.<br/>In the summer of 1952 (June 6 to September 13), I returned to Yakutat with a larger party. Dr. Catharine McClellan, who had worked with me at Angoon in 1950, collaborated in the ethnological investigations at Yakutat, and Francis A. Riddell, who had also been with us at Angoon, now directed the archeological excavations at Knight Island near Yakutat under my general supervision. He was assisted by Kenneth S. Lane, Donald F. McGeein, and J. Arthur Freed, then all students at or graduates of the University of California, Berkeley. For part of the summer, Dr. Fang-Kwei Li, Department of Far Eastern Studies, University of Washington, undertook linguistic research on Eyak, both at Yakutat and at Cordova.<br/>The following summer, Riddell returned to continue the archeological work, with another party from the University of California consisting of Lane, McGeein, Albert H. Olson, and Robert T. Anderson. During the summer some ethnological information was gathered, although this was not the primary aim of the expedition.<br/>In the winter and spring of 1954 (February 13 to June 16), I was able to resume ethnological work at Yakutat, assisted by Mary Jane Downs (now Mrs. Benjamin Lenz, then Fellow in Anthropology at Bryn Mawr College). We were accompanied by my mother, Professor Emeritus Grace A. de Laguna, although she took no active part in our investigations.<br/>For hospitality in the field I am indebted to Paul Stout, manager of the cannery in 1949, and for other courtesies to Robert Welsh, manager in 1952 and 1954. J. B. Mallott, owner of an independent store, was also very helpful. The Alaska Native Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the U.S. Public Health Service, the U.S. Forest Service, and the U.S. Coast Guard, all rendered invaluable assistance.<br/>Research at Yakutat was supported by the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research (1949, 1952), the Arctic Institute of North America, with funds from the Office of Naval Research (1949, 1953), the Social Science Research Council, the American Philosophical Society (1954). The Department of Anthropology, University of California at Berkeley, the University of Pennsylvania Museum in Philadelphia, and Bryn Mawr College have all supported the fieldwork and aided in the preparation of this monograph. A Faculty Research Fellowship from the Social Science Research Council in 1962-63, and the hospitality of the Berkeley campus have enabled me to write much of this volume.<br/>A grant from the National Science Foundation (G-4875) made possible assembling the illustrative and bibliographic material.<br/>In preparation of this monograph, I have received the help and advice of many persons. For bibliographic assistance, especially in finding unpublished materials, I am indebted to Dr. J. Ronald Todd, Chief Reference Librarian, University of Washington, Seattle; to Dr. Willard E. Ireland, Provincial Librarian and Archivist, Victoria, British Columbia; to Dr. Wilson Duff, then Curator of Anthropology, and Donald N. Abbott, then Assistant Anthropologist, both at the Provincial Museum in Victoria; to Dr. John Barr Tompkins, and to Assistant Director Robert H. Becker, indeed to all the staff of the Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley. Kenneth Lane, who had copied many rare items in the Bancroft Library, generously turned over to me his complete notebook, and Dr. Robert F. Heizer, Department of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley, gave me notes and photographs made at Yakutat by C. Hart Merriam in 1899.<br/>Through the kindness of Dr. Luis Pericot Garcia of the University of Barcelona I was able to secure copies of pictures, in the Museo Naval at Madrid, which had been made at Yakutat in 1791 by the painter, Tomás de Suría. Permission to publish the sketches in the MS. journal of this painter (cf. Wagner, 1936) were given by Dr. David Watkins, Chief Reference Librarian, and Dr. Archibald Hanna, Curator, Western Americana Collection, Yale University Library. I am also endebted to Dr. Joaquin Gonzales-Muela, Professor of Spanish, Bryn Mawr College, for assistance in translating the accounts of Suría and Malaspina. Dr. Erna Gunther, now at the Department of Anthropology, University of Alaska, not only furnished a list of all Suría&amp;apos;s paintings in Madrid, but gave me her invaluable notes on the specimens from Yakutat acquired by the Portland Art Museum from the Reverend Axel Rasmussen in 1948. Permission to publish photographs of these is gratefully acknowledged, as is additional information obtained from Donald Jenkins, Curatorial Assistant. Dr. Luyse Kollner, Curator, Mrs. Mona Bedell, Secretary, and Virginia Hillock, Registrar, procured photographs and information on specimens in the Thomas Burke Memorial Washington State Museum, Seattle, and Dr. Walter A. Fairservis, Jr., Director, gave me permission to publish data on them. Edward L. Keithahn, Curator, sent information and his own photographs of Yakutat specimens in the Alaska Historical Library and Museum, Juneau. Other pictures of specimens there were taken for me by Malcolm Greany, photographer. Dr. Frederick J. Dockstader, Director, gave permisison to publish photographs of specimens in the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation, New York City. I am grateful to Dr. Harry L. Shapiro, Chairman, to Miss Bella Weitzner, Associate Curator Emeritus, and to Dr. Richard A. Gould, Assistant Curator, Department of Anthropology, American Museum of Natural History, New York City, for permission to utilize notes and photographs made by G. T. Emmons at Yakutat before 1889. I am especially grateful to Dr. Gould for his tireless help and skill in photographing so many specimens in the Emmons collections. At Princeton University, Dr. Donald Baird, Department of Geology, and Will Starks, photographer, spared no pains to give me excellent photographs and fullest data on the collection made in 1886 by Libbey at Yakutat. Lastly, I should like to thank my Yakutat friends, John Ellis, Mrs. Minnie Johnson, and Mr. and Mrs. Harry K. Bremner for giving me pictures of Yakutat persons and scenes to use in this book.<br/>Parts of the manuscript in various stages of completion have been read by a number of experts, and if, despite their vigilance, errors have crept in or gone undetected, the fault is mine. These are Dr. George Plafker, Geologist, Alaskan Geology Branch, U.S. Geological Survey; Dr. John W. Aldrich, Research Staff Specialist, and Dr. Richard H. Manville, both of the Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service; Dr. Fenner A. Chace, Jr., Dr. J. F. Gates Clarke, Dr. Harald Rehder, Dr. W. R. Taylor, and Howard L. Chapelle, all at the U.S. National Museum; Dr. Donald Baird, Department of Geology, Princeton University; Dr. Michael E. Krauss, Department of Linguistics, University of Alaska; Dr. Dell Hymes, Department of Anthropology, University of Pennsylvania; and lastly, Dr. Catharine McClellan, Department of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin, Madison, my collaborator in the field in 1952.<br/>Preliminary studies of Yakutat recordings were made by Lindy Li Mark and by Agi Jambor, Professor of Music at Bryn Mawr College. The transcriptions in the Appendix, however, are those prepared by Dr. David P. McAllester, Director of the Laboratory of Ethnomusicology, Wesleyan University, under a grant from the Penrose Fund of the American Philosophical Society (1967).<br/>It is Edward Schumacher, staff artist of the Smithsonian Institution, who has so skillfully and beautifully prepared the maps and many of the illustrations for this book. But without the skill and patient devotion of the editor, these labors would have come to nothing.<br/>Preparation of the index was made possible by the kindness of Maude Hallowell, and through grants from the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research and from Bryn Mawr College.<br/>To those institutions that made this work possible, to the many individuals who gave help and information, and to my companions in the field, I wish to express my thanks.<br/>Frederica de Laguna<br/><I>Bryn Mawr College</I><br/><I>Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania</I>