A book of historical photographs showing Anchorage's humble beginnings and its growth to becoming Alaska's largest city hit bookstore shelves this summer.
"Anchorage" is part of the Images of America series, and its first photos are actually from before most settlers moved into the area, which is the ancestral homeland of the Dena'ina Athabascan people. But as the city became more established, it expanded from railroad camp, to military community, pipeline construction boomtown and, eventually, a sea- and air-shipping hub.
University of Alaska Anchorage history professor Ian Hartman compiled the photos, most of which come from the Anchorage Museum's collections, in conjunction with the Cook Inlet Historical Society. And while the city has seen a lot of change, Hartman says Anchorage's relatively short history made the project easier.
This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
Ian Hartman: Anchorage is such a young city. And so when we're talking about the photographic history of Anchorage, I mean, we can pretty much encompass the time from the old railroad, tent-camp city, to the present. And so when someone picks up this book, who has been in Anchorage for a while, or maybe they're new to Anchorage but they have a little bit of familiarity with its history, my hope is that it'll resonate with them, of course. But it's also really kind of trying to demonstrate that we live in this vibrant town that has this really fascinating history, and that if you only have a half-hour, or an hour or two hours, or, you know, you want to pick it up on your flight to Seattle or something like that, you can kind of thumb through it and get a sense of, like, maybe the highlights of Anchorage's history over the last 100 years.
Casey Grove: Yeah, I mean, I would definitely say that, just as an Anchorage resident, that was my experience with it. It's just fascinating. Just the thing where you're, like, recognizing landmarks that are still, they still look the same, like the mountains look the same, or the corner of Spenard and Fireweed (Lane). I used to drive through there all the time. So that was one, yeah, or Arctic Valley. I think it was a Fort Rich military recreation area at the time. But the mountains, you know...
IH: The mountains stay the same.
CG: Yeah, and it's like, "Oh, I know what that looks like."
One thing, and something I had never read about, was the first building that was located in Anchorage, the first like structure, I guess, made by folks settling the area. I thought that was super interesting, because we think of downtown, and I think people have heard the history of the railroad coming in and the railroad camp down there by Ship Creek. But that's not the case with this building.
IH: That's exactly right. So what you see here, there's a few of these images of St. Nicholas, Russian Orthodox Church. And so one of the things I was trying to kind of grapple with, again, as I just plotted the narrative of this, is like, "OK, the easy thing to do here would be to kind of start with the railroad camp, but that's not quite right."
And so I thought it was important to kind of ground the book in sort of a recognition of Dena'ina land, of the role of the Dena'ina in the area, and to some extent, recognition of the fact that there is this sort of Russian Orthodox presence, not all that strong in this part of Southcentral Alaska. The Russian Orthodox had a much greater influence in other places, but their impact is still kind of seen in the area. And so the orthodox church that is in the Native village of Eklutna is, I think, a good way to maybe just kind of ground this broader history to both the colonial presence of the Russians, but kind of even more importantly than that, the Dena'ina presence, which is kind of threaded throughout the book but opens it in a real explicit way.
CG: There's a lot of photos of Anchorage devastated by the Good Friday Earthquake, right? The one I marked here that really stood out to me is Mac's Fotos. And maybe I'll ask you to tell me what you see in that photo. But the thing that stood out to me is that he's smiling, you know, in this face of this devastation.
IH: Yeah, he is. So this is one of these ones where you get sort of wrapped up in the destruction of the earthquake. And there are all kinds of images that demonstrate that. And you can talk to the people who've been in Anchorage for a long time, and they have these vivid memories of the earth shaking for, what was it? Over four minutes?
But people also had a sense of humor, and so in this particular image you've got a gentleman outside of Mac's Fotos, and it says, "Closed due to early breakup. Business moved to 7th and C," and he's kind of pumping his fist, and he's got a smile on his face. And Alaskans obviously associate breakup with the spring and associate breakup with, you know, the melting of the ice and everything else. But here you see the early breakup is the guy's photo shop is literally broken up.
I mean, the whole thing is kind of in a state of disrepair, but he sees the humor in it, and he kind of understands that it's appropriate to the time being in March and coming up on April. Even in the midst of this devastation, you find, sort of in typical fashion, Alaskans being good sports and trying to make the most of a really awful situation. So part of this chapter, too, is just to demonstrate the devastation of the earthquake, but also demonstrate how quickly people get back up on their feet.
CG: There's a photo in here from the '70s, from the pipeline boom. It's of a rodeo. I guess it was at West High School, which was just Anchorage high school at the time. I mean, it looks like what you would think. It's a guy on a horse bucking. Tell me why (include that)?
IH: Yeah, so, if you think of the context here, so this is from the summer of 1977, right at the time, of course, that the oil boom is really coming up on its peak. I mean, you think of, like, '70s-era Alaska, you think the pipeline, you think of oil. You think of, obviously the full weight of the money coming into the state but also the demographic changes.
And so part of the the transformation, of course, is the state's economy, and it's this new recognition that Alaska is going to be a petrostate for the most part. But it's also kind of a recognition that along with that comes this really huge demographic change where you've got all these folks coming up from the American South — Texas, Oklahoma, primarily. And so they bring their culture with them. It ties into this broader context of oil, but it also is a little bit of an oddball photo, because it seems out of place until you do sort of reckon with that broader context of the oil boom.
CG: Well, in general, what do you think the story that this book tells us is, other than just the history of Anchorage? I mean, it seems like there are some common themes throughout the book, you know?
IH: Yeah, I'm glad you asked that. So top of my mind was to, I think, really draw out the diversity of Anchorage as a throughline. Anchorage is a town, of course, founded on Dena'ina land. There's been this rich Dena'ina presence here for, obviously, generation on top of generation on top of generation. And Anchorage is a place that has always brought people from around the world to this Native place.
Anchorage, for its size, is among the most diverse places in the country. I mean, you look at these places in Houston, Texas and New York City, and maybe like Los Angeles or elsewhere in California, and it's not terribly surprising that they would be these centers of international migration over the last maybe generation or two or three or more. But you don't expect to see Anchorage on that list, and yet, there it is.
