SITKA Administrative History

Chapter 3:
SITKA NATIONAL MONUMENT, EARLY YEARS (continued)

Territorial governor initiates totem pole project

Alaska's governor John W. Troy submitted the final proposal of the late 1930s that affected the resources of Sitka National Monument. He wrote to A.E. Demaray, a senior park service official, to suggest that it would be possible to get Civilian Conservation Corps help not only for landscaping at Sitka, but also to rehabilitate the totem poles there. Such work would need a National Park Service technical advisor. It could begin as early as October 1938. [184]

Demaray responded that the park service was interested. It had "no general plan of development for Sitka National Monument," and would be glad to participate in the program. He regarded it as essential that a technician be employed to see that the work was properly planned and executed. Would the Alaska Civilian Conservation Corps (administered by the U.S. Forest Service) be able to employ the technician? If arrangements could be made, Demaray said, details would be worked out by the park service regional office at San Francisco. [185]

Alaska Regional Forester B. Frank Heintzleman, who may have been behind Troy's original suggestion, followed it up in January of 1939. The Forest Service had obtained Works Progress Administration funding for totem pole restoration. He telegraphed Demaray with the news that funds were available. If the park service could provide a qualified foreman, the project would begin. [186] Cammerer, now Director of the National Park Service, replied that no park service specialists were available to super vise the work. The service could pay for the services of an ethnologist or qualified graduate student in anthropology to give initial supervision. He suggested looking for such an expert at the University of Washington or the University of Alaska. If such scientific assistance were not available, the project could go ahead so long as before and after photographs were made and "record card file" documentation of work was created. [187]

By April of 1939 Heintzleman was able to write to Cammerer that the totem pole work at Sitka was underway with WPA funds. He enclosed a photographic record of the poles in place on February 18. The Forest Service would submit a final report when the work was finished. [188]

The Alaska Road Commission provided a dump truck for the project. The Forest Service Wood Products Laboratory sent advice on preservation treatment for the poles. John Maurstand served as foreman for the project, with George Benson as chief carver and nine Indian workers. The WPA funds were used up by March and the Forest Service continued work with Civilian Conservation Corps money. About half of the old poles, many of which were badly deteriorated, were duplicated. Duplicates and repaired poles were treated with Permatox B, painted with compounds care fully constructed to match original Native colors, and then treated again with Pentra-Seal. [189]

Most of the work at Sitka was completed by March of 1940. Although plans were discussed to build an open air shed in which to store originals of the duplicated poles, they were eventually shunted aside to uncovered storage on skids. [190]

While the totem pole work was beginning, the park service began to reassess its treatment of Sitka National Monument's resources. Mount McKinley National Park Superintendent Frank T. Been and Earl A. Trager of the service's research and information bureau visited Sitka to look things over. [191] Carl P. Russell, Supervisor of Research and Information for the service, suggested a special study of the area from "anthropological, historical and museum standpoints." [192]

The totem pole rehabilitation and duplication project marked a significant resource policy decision for Sitka National Monument. When the park service agreed to plans to duplicate entire poles and then concluded that some of the originals were beyond preservation, it established a lasting ethic of resource management that extended through the next 30 years of Sitka National Monument administration.