Culture

Talk of the Rock host Jared Griffin speaks with Patrick Saltonstall, Curator of Archaeology, and Nina Gronn, Gallery Manager, of the Alutiiq Museum about winter events, recent archaeological digs, and other exciting happenings. Listen here:

Isle Bells during a performance. Listen to this story; Kodiak’s handbell choir, the Isle Bells, is about to begin their fall practice. It’s their first regularly scheduled concert season since the pandemic. The group’s first performance is just around the corner. Ella Katelnikov is the director of Isle Bells. She says the seeds for the Isle Bells group were sown …

Listen to this story; The village of Ouzinkie on Spruce Island has an Orthodox church, and the far side of the island also has its own chapel over the grave site of St. Herman. But the three monks who live in the middle part of the island only have a small indoor chapel in their shared house. Father Andrew is …

Listen to this story; Andy Teuber went missing March 2 of 2021. The 52 year-old CEO of KANA was piloting a helicopter to Kodiak from Anchorage, and is believed by the National Transportation Safety Board to have crashed due to inclement weather in the ocean waters north of Afognak Island. The NTSB declared Teuber dead, following a days-long search by …

  Riders at the Ididarock starting line. Listen to this story; Motorsports enthusiasts from around Kodiak gathered at the head of Olds River over the weekend for this year’s Ididarock – a 34-mile off-road challenge open to teams of runners, dirt bikes, four-wheelers, and side-by-sides. Around 40 participants total met at an unmarked trailhead for this year’s off road challenge …

On this week’s Alaska Fisheries Report with Terry Haines: A Kodiak crab boat readies for the upcoming season. Plus Joe Viechnicki reports on the change of venue for the Board of Fish. Crab and Kodiak   Crab and Kodiak are inextricably linked. It’s been said that Kodiak is the birthplace of the modern crab fishery.  And every year in late …

Earlier this year, the Alutiiq Museum and Archaeological Repository embarked on a project to chronicle traditional Alutiiq stories and legends. That effort has finally borne fruit with the release of Unigkuat– Kodiak Alutiiq Legends on Thursday, according to the museum’s language and culture manager  Dehrich Chya. “It’s hard to say when exactly the idea came about, because it’s something that …

The Alutiiq Museum and Archaeological Repository has received ownership of the Alutiiq Center building from two Kodiak Native corporations. With an $8 million dollar grant from the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council to remodel the building, transferring ownership to the museum was the logical next step, those involved with the deal said this week. In a signing ceremony Wednesday, …

The Alutiiq language has lost four speakers in the last year. Tribal leaders say it’s a big loss — of the 30 remaining speakers, there are just a handful of people left who are able to teach Alutiiq. The Sun’aq tribe’s master-apprentice language program’s goal is to train new Alutiiq teachers, to spread the language further. Candace Branson, the program …

Kodiak’s Alutiiq Museum received a grant from the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Fund Trustee Council. And it’s a whopper; $8,000,000 will go towards renovating the museum. April Laktonen Counceller, Executive Director for the Alutiiq Museum says that it will change the floorplan and scope of the facility. “Our gallery, the public part of our museum where visitors walk through and …