Discovering Kodiak through the Census

Kodiak village in 1910. Kodiak Historical Society, P-4.

Last Monday, the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) released the 1940 census to the public. This is cause enough for celebration for historians and genealogists, but when the website received millions of hits on the first day, we were given another reason to rejoice (“Look! Look! People are gobbling up history!”).

I used the 1940 release as an impetus to do Kodiak census research. Through SLED (Statewide Library Electronic Doorway), all Alaskan residents have free access to Heritage Quest, a genealogy database that contains Alaska census records. I’ve had a hard time accessing the records from 1930, but I spent the last few days cropping, saving and printing the Kodiak census returns from 1910 and 1920. This is the slog work of history, but the payoff is well worth it.

"Babushka" Parascovia Gregorioff of
Afognak Village. Kodiak Historical Society.

Now that they are printed, these census records have already proved to be handy. Today a researcher was looking at our collection of travelling icons. One hung in the house of Afognak resident Pariscovia Gregorioff, grandmother of the museum’s first curator, Eunice (Von Scheele) Neseth. I browsed through the 1920 census return and found Mrs. Gregorioff. In 1920 Mrs. Gregorioff was a 68 year old widow who lived alone in a rented home and didn’t speak English. Unlike most of her Afognak neighbors, Mrs. Gregorioff was classified “IN” instead of “MXD”; either she or the enumerator identified her as Native rather than of mixed European/ Native descent. Her occupation was listed the same as that of all the women’s: none.  We know this isn’t true, as Mrs. Gregorioff was a midwife who assisted in birthing dozens of children over the course of her long life. This information, albeit incomplete and containing oversights, helps me as the curator of collections to better understand the significance, use, and value of the small bronze icon that once adorned Mrs. Gregorioff’s rented wall.

As a whole, these census records provide an unparalleled snapshot of Kodiak’s past. Unlike manuscripts, journals, and other printed materials which are usually individual accounts of the past, censuses are the record of the entire community, including those who didn’t leave behind other records. When looking at the records, line by line, patterns emerge that give one a good sense of the character of the archipelago in 1910 and 1920.

Englishman H.P. Cope doubled as the
first postmaster in Kodiak and the census
enumerator in 1910.
Kodiak Historical Society, P 284.

For example, I’ve often heard that Afognak was a more substantial village than Kodiak in the past. The 1920 census shows just this: Afognak definitely had a larger population than “Kodiak village,” but it also had a less diverse economy. In Afognak, a few people are listed as working in the general store (there were several stores in town), at the fish hatchery, “public school,” “ranch” and in mining (both copper mining and one occupation written as “gold”). But the vast majority of men are shown to be working for “sal. cannery.” While the preponderance for “fishing” and “sal. cannery” is also very high for Kodiak village during the same 1920 census, there are more places of employment and occupations listed. Kodiak contained salesmen, cooks, machinists, carpenters, a plumber, fox farmers, and servants, for example. As a result, even though Afognak had a larger population, Kodiak was still the economic hub of the archipelago.

However, as seen in the example of Mrs. Gregorioff’s occupation, census records can be deceiving. Most notably for Kodiak, the 1920 census is smaller than the 1910 census.  This goes against what one would think- that the population of the region would grow in that 10 year lapse. Going through the returns page by page provides several explanations. First, it seems that the 1910 enumerator and town postmaster, H.P.  Cope, took more care in counting. Miners Point at Uganik Bay, the few people living at Long Island, the handful of men on Tugidak Island- all were counted.

A Karluk beach seine gang, ca. 1910. The fishermen hailed
from Scandinavia and Italy, while the cannery workers were
Asian and Latin American. Kodiak Historical Society, P-60.

But, more importantly, the 1910 census was taken after the salmon season had started, while the 1920 census was taken before the cannery crews had been transported north. That is why the largest census return for the region in that year was…. Karluk. H.P. Cope travelled to the salmon canneries at Alitak, Karluk and Larsen Bay and enumerated the fishermen as well as the canning crews. The results show a veritable smorgasbord of ethnicities laboring on the Karluk Spit. Aside from the Alutiiq villagers, there are dozens of individuals from Italy, Norway, the Philippines, Mexico, Hawaii, China, a smattering from Germany, Holland, Korea and Chile, all enumerated (and separated) by bunk house.  While this is not news, what’s exciting are the individuals that emerge, like 27 year old Eulogiro Serinas from the Philippines, the Chilean Ivan Fernandez, and 58 year old Gee Yip from China.

Can you imagine finding your Italian great grandfather listed as living in Karluk in 1910? I’m sure that some family researchers have had that very surprise.

Kodiak's Russian New Year Celebration

Masqueraders in Afognak Village in the 1930s went to serious lengths
to disguise their identities, including wearing gloves as to not be
identified by their hands. Kodiak Historical Society P 639-8n.

Masquerading for Russian New Year continues as a Kodiak tradition, with the 2012 event earlier this month drawing an animated crowd, thanks to sponsorship efforts from the Sun’aq Tribe and the Native Village of Afognak. Up until around the 1940s or so, masqueraders donned fantastical homemade costumes and went en mass from door to door, disguising even their voices as to protect their identities. They would wear borrowed clothes and change their posture and stride to confuse onlookers. Once a masquerader’s identity was discovered they were out of the game, but not for long! Many people would have several costumes in waiting so that they could continue the masquerading rounds.

Eli Metrokin wore this mask
for Kodiak's Russian New
Years in the 1930s.

In her book Faraway Island: Childhood in Kodiak, Carolyn Erskine Andrews recalled a particularly memorable Russian New Years for the Erskine family. Her mother, Nellie, and Nellie’s friend Mrs. Finnegan decided to go as a monkey and an organ grinder. Nellie pieced together a costume that bore a passing resemblance to a monkey, but her efforts were in vain. Most Kodiak villagers had never seen a monkey before and had no idea what an organ grinder was. Add to this the fact that Nellie squatted and acted like a monkey for the entirety of the evening’s festivities, and you can understand that the villagers were likely left perplexed as to Mrs. Erskine’s behavior. Apparently, Nellie’s muscles were sore for days due to her monkey-like charades.

Recently, Mary and Joseph Jensen donated a masquerader’s mask, which was worn by Mary’s father, Eli Metrokin, in the 1930s. The wire mesh mask still has the colored outlines of eyes, nose, and mouth drawn in faded tones. Mary described how villagers would tie cheesecloth around their face and then put on the wire masks as to distort their features. She recalls that it was a special thing, to have a wire mask. Other old-timers recall that masquerading costumes and masks were for sale at Kraft’s and Erskine’s stores.

This photograph from Afognak Village helps us to see how the mask above
was fashioned into a costume. Kodiak Historical Society P 639-7n.

Within the museum I recently came across a wonderful collection of photographs from Afognak Village, taken in the 1930s. A schoolteacher captured masqueraders as they were entertained in a village home. Compare Mr. Metrokin’s mask with those in the photograph to the right, and you get a sense as to how the disguises were fashioned. It appears likely that the wire masks sold in Kodiak were also sold in Afognak Village stores during the same period.

Do you have masquerading photographs and objects from Kodiak’s past?  In your next foray into the attic, see what turns up. Who knows, perhaps Nellie’s monkey costume is just waiting to be discovered.