Kodiak Island

History

Kodiak is the ancestral land of the Sugpiaq, an Alutiiq nation of Native Americans. The original inhabitants subsisted by hunting marine mammals, fishing, and gathering. The European discoverer of Kodiak Island was the Russian fur trader Stepan Glotov (1793).

The first outsiders to settle on the island were Russian explorers under Grigory Shelikhov, a fur trader, who founded a Russian settlement on Kodiak Island at Three Saints Bay in 1784; the present-day village of Old Harbor developed near there. In 1792, the settlement was moved to the site of present-day Kodiak and became the center of Russian fur trading with the Alaska Natives.

In 1793, Grigory Shelikhov, with the help of the governor-general of Irkutsk, was given twenty craftsmen and ten families of farmers with the obligation of paying government taxes for them, for promoting successful development of Russia-America settlements and the establishment of shipyards and factories. The settlers provided to Shelikhov were not serfs in the full sense of the word. It was not possible to sell, mortgage, or give away the settlers; they were owned by the company for as long as the Shelikhov-Golikov Company existed.

In 1784, Shelikhov, along with 130 Russian fur traders, massacred (see Awa'uq Massacre) several hundred Qik’rtarmiut Sugpiat ("Sugpiaq people of Qik’rtaq/Kodiak") tribe of Alutiiq men, women and children at Refuge Rock, a tiny stack island off the eastern coast of Sitkalidak Island. In Alutiiq, this sacred place is now known as Awa'uq, "to become numb".

The Alutiiq were conscripted by the Russian occupants for the purpose of hunting, gathering, and processing food and furs. Native labor was commandeered through hostage taking, physical threat, and punishment. The Alutiiq men were forced to obtain quotas of otter pelts and bird skins which were then stitched into waterproof parkas by the Alutiiq women. The waterproof garments, made by the Alutiiq women, were given to the Alutiiq men as payment for the furs brought to the Russian fur traders.

The Orthodox mission in Russian America was authorized by Catherine II in 1793, and then was established on Kodiak Island in 1794 by a group of monks from the Valaam Monastery in Saint Petersburg.

The Russian fur traders radically expanded sea otter hunting operations and forced the Alutiiq men to hunt for longer periods of time at increasingly distant areas as the local population of fur-bearing animals was extinguished. The Alutiiq suffered starvation and physical separation of families because of the able-bodied men hunting and trapping furs rather than providing food for the women, young, old, and sick as they had done traditionally.

In 1837–1839, a smallpox epidemic swept through all the Russian America territory and destroyed an estimated one-third of the Native population. The remaining Alutiiq on Kodiak Island were then consolidated into seven settlements where they were more readily offered medical, educational, and religious services by the Russian-American Company. The smallpox epidemic was eventually stopped with vaccination of the natives.

Following the 1867 Alaska Purchase by the United States, the island became part of the United States. Gradually Americans settled there, also engaging in hunting and fishing.

1912 Novarupta eruption

Novarupta is a volcano 100 mi northwest of Kodiak Island that erupted from June 6 to June 8, 1912: the largest eruption in the 20th century. Life on Kodiak Island was immobilized during the 60-hour eruption. Darkness and suffocating conditions caused by the falling ash and sulfur dioxide gas rendered villagers helpless with sore eyes and respiratory problems. Water became undrinkable. Radio communications were disrupted and visibility was nil. Roofs in the village collapsed under the weight of more than a foot of ash. Buildings were destroyed as avalanches of ash rushed down from nearby hillsides.

On June 9, Kodiak villagers saw the first clear, ash-free skies in three days, but their environment had changed dramatically. Wildlife on Kodiak Island was devastated by ash and acid rain from the eruption. Bears and other large animals were blinded by thick ash, and many starved to death because large numbers of plants and small animals were smothered in the eruption. Birds blinded and coated by volcanic ash fell to the ground. Even the region's prolific mosquitoes were exterminated. Aquatic organisms in the region perished in the ash-clogged waters. Salmon in all stages of life were destroyed by the eruption and its aftereffects. From 1915 to 1919, southwestern Alaska's salmon-fishing industry was devastated.

1964 earthquake

The island was also hit by the 1964 Good Friday earthquake and tsunami, which destroyed much of the waterfront, the business district, and several villages.

Climate

The weather of Kodiak is temperate. December to March is the cold season while June to August is the summer season. It is Dfc bordering on Cfb, Dfb and Cfc in the Koppen classification. | Jan record high F = 54 | Feb record high F = 60 | Mar record high F = 57 | Apr record high F = 70 | May record high F = 80 | Jun record high F = 86 | Jul record high F = 82 | Aug record high F = 84 | Sep record high F = 80 | Oct record high F = 74 | Nov record high F = 60 | Dec record high F = 62 | year record high F = 86 | Jan record low F = -16 | Feb record low F = -12 | Mar record low F = -6 | Apr record low F = 7 | May record low F = 18 | Jun record low F = 30 | Jul record low F = 35 | Aug record low F = 34 | Sep record low F = 26 | Oct record low F = 7 | Nov record low F = 0 | Dec record low F = -9 | year record low F = -16

Education

The University of Alaska Anchorage has a 50 acre campus which opened in 1968, located about 2 mi northwest of the City of Kodiak.

Parks and protected areas

Nearly two-thirds of the island is located within the Kodiak National Wildlife Refuge and has no road access. Refuge headquarters are located on the Chiniak Highway, right at the access road for the Buskin River State Recreation Site, which has camping, picnic areas, beaches, and fishing for salmon and trout in the Buskin River.

The Pasagshak River State Recreation Site is a 25 acre park with a small campground and access to some of the island's best salmon and trout fishing. The island is also home to the Fort Abercrombie State Historical Park.

References

References

1. "Kodiak". Alaska Magazine.
2. Dunham, Mike. (July 31, 2010). "Turns out Kodiak is largest U.S. island, depending on viewpoint". Anchorage Daily News.
3. (2007). "The Oxford Companion to World Exploration". Oxford University Press.
4. Brown, S.R., 2009, [[Merchant Kings]], New York:St. Martin's Press, {{ISBN. 9780312616113
5. Grinëv, Andrei. (2013). "The First Russian Settlers in Alaska". Historian.
6. Ben Fitzhugh (2003), [https://books.google.com/books?id=FLH-fMsjyM8C&dq=%22sitkalidak%22+%22alutiiq%22&pg=PA59 ''The Evolution of Complex Hunter-Gatherers: Archaeological Evidence from the North Pacific''], Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers, New York, 2003
7. (February 2016). "Alutiiq Subsistence Economy at Igvak, a Russian-American Artel in the Kodiak Archipelago". Arctic Anthropology.
8. (2015). "Cod Fishing in Russian America: The Archaeology of a 19th-Century Alutiiq Work Camp on Alaska's Kodiak Island". Arctic Anthropology.
9. Danver, Steven L.. (2017). "The Orthodox Church in Russian America: Colonization and Missions to Alaska's Native Peoples". Journal of the West.
10. Bland, Richard L.. (2015). "SMALLPOX, ALEUTS, AND KAYAKS: A TRANSLATION EDUARD BLASHKE'S ARTICLE ON HIS TRIP THROUGH THE ALEUTIAN ISLANDS IN 1838". Journal of Northwest Anthropology.
11. Jennifer Adleman. (Winter 2002). "The Great Eruption of 1912". Alaska Park Science.
12. (2001). "Preliminary volcano-hazard assessment for the Katmai volcanic cluster, Alaska". U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report OF 00-0489.
13. (1998). "Can another great volcanic eruption happen in Alaska?". U.S. Geological Survey Fact Sheet FS 0075-98.
14. "1964 Earthquake & Tidal Wave". Kodiak Island Convention & Visitors Bureau.
15. "Intellicast - Kodiak Historic Weather Averages in Alaska (99615)".
16. [http://www.koc.alaska.edu/about//index.cshtml Kodiak College]
17. [[The Milepost]], 2018 edition, page 578, {{ISBN. 9781892154378
18. [https://dnr.alaska.gov/parks/aspunits/kodiak/pasagsrs.htm Pasagshak River SRS], [[Alaska Department of Natural Resources]]