Rolfe Buzzell has been a resident of Alaska for 45 years. He earned a Master of Arts degree and a Ph.D., both in History, from the University of California, Santa Barbara. He was employed for two years as a historian for the National Park Service in Alaska and 29 years as a historian for the State of Alaska, Department of Natural Resources. He worked as a field historian documenting historic and prehistoric sites on public construction projects and he participated in the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill cleanup monitoring the protection of cultural sites. Dr. Buzzell authored 60 interpretive signs posted along Alaska’s highways celebrating the Gold Rush Centennial, wrote approximately 100 professional reports including a history of bridges in Alaska, and worked as an expert witness for the State on litigation regarding the use of navigable waters and rights-of-ways for historic trails and roads across public lands. He mapped and documented the ruins of the gold rush town of Sunrise and is an expert on the Turnagain Arm Gold Rush of 1896-1898. He edited two books by people who lived in Sunrise and nearby mining camps in the 1890s. His article, “Women of the Sunrise Mining Camps, 1895-1901,” was recently published in Alaska History journal. He is currently writing a history of the town of Chitina in Alaska’s Copper River Valley.

Summary of Presentation: Historian Rolfe Buzzell will discuss two books he edited on the Turnagain Arm Gold Rush of 1895-1901. The first is the memoirs of Albert “Jack” Morgan, entitled Memories of Old Sunrise, Gold Mining on Alaska’s Turnagain Arm (1994 and 2013),in which Morgan writes about his experiences as a miner in the Sunrise area. The second book is Gold Rush Wife, The Adventures of Nellie Frost on Turnagain Arm, 1895-1901 (2016, 2020) which provides rare insights into the role of women in one of southcentral Alaska’s earliest mining camps. Dr. Buzzell will talk about the Turnagain Arm Gold Rush, which began 20 years before the founding of Anchorage, and how he came to edit the two manuscripts. He will also provide highlights of these two books, which provide markedly different perspectives on life in a remote mining camp. The books are available from Alaska’s “Ember Press.”   

Corinna Cook asks how can a geologically-enlarged sense of time benefit writing that is motivated by immediate concerns and/or lived experience?

Corinna is a former Fulbright Fellow, an Alaska Literary Award recipient, and a Rasmuson Foundation awardee. She offers writing workshops, teaches at Alaska Pacific University, and is working on an oral history account of the early years of the Alaska Eskimo Whaling Commission. Her current creative focus is a book project centered on Yukon-Alaska art, ecology and history. More at www.corinnacook.com.

Corinna Cook

Adventure, Danger, Scurvy, Romance by Mr. Whitekeys

The true story of the largest expedition ever organized during the 1898 Alaska Gold Rush. Eighty greenhorns from Chicago sailed to Alaska, built a 110-foot sternwheel riverboat, sailed up the Yukon and Koyukuk Rivers, and endured one of the most brutal winters on record. One of the prospectors lugged a 40-pound camera for 2 1/2 years and documented his time in the gold fields with over 100 images. His photos have been stored unseen for 120 years. This meeting will be the FIRST presentation about this book.

Mr. Whitekeys’ Bio

For all of his fifty years in Alaska, Mr. Whitekeys’ job description has proudly been “mouthing off and making snotty comments.”

In the early 1970s, while performing with The Oosik Music Company at Chilkoot Charlie’s, he gave the bar its world famous slogan, “We Cheat The Other Guy and Pass The Savings On To You.”

In 1980, he opened Mr. Whitekeys’ Fly By Night Club—Anchorage’s center for “Spam, Booze, Rhythm and Blues.” The Whale Fat Follies musical comedy satiric revue was a legendary production involving music, singing, dancing, costumes, and a photographic multi-media show. It was truly The Alaskan Show The Department of Tourism Does NOT Want You To See.

In his spare time, Whitekeys has written a book version of The Whale  Fat Follies (Alaska Bizarre,)  a monthly column for Alaska Magazine, and a weekly satirical segment for KTUU-TV in Anchorage. He also produced a cinematic lampoon of the state’s history, Alaska—The First 10,000 Years—and a DVD version of The Whale Fat Follies Live in Concert.

Since performing The Whale Fat Follies  “Farewell Tour” in 2019, Mr. Whitekeys has proudly continued to embarrass the entire Alaskan environmental community as the Commander in Chief of the Anchorage Audubon Society.

Mr. Whitekeys

Jen Jolliff, a competitor in orienteering races, will introduce her first novel, Fogrunner. The book is set in a world where map reading, good decision making, and efficiency are the keys to success. It is her way of encouraging navigational literacy in a generation for whom computer algorithms have seemingly taken over the need for individuals to process visual information.

Jolliff grew up in Waco, Texas, and graduated from Middlebury College in 1992 with a BA in English/Creative Writing, a life-partner from Alaska, and a love for navigation-based adventure. Two years later, she moved back to Anchorage. Jolliff ran the couple’s whimsical fleece hat company (Gimme Dat Hat Co.), worked as an activities therapist, and began competing in navigation races put on by the Arctic Orienteering Club.

Around 2000, she began to work as a custom visual artist, painting murals in homes around the city and creating wood carvings as commissions and gallery work. Jolliff has designed and facilitated two dozen large-scale permanent art pieces in schools and libraries through the Teaching Artist and 1% for Art programs. In recent years, Jolliff has shifted much of her energy to literary arts. More information is available at jenjolliff.com.

Participants can join the Zoom meeting at 11:30 a.m. for conversation and to troubleshoot connections. Please sign on by 11:50 a.m. to be prepared for start of the program at noon. Get details by sending a message to sherrie@arctic.net.

Jen Jolliff