Singaulik

This collection is Ernest S. Burch’s reconstruction of dwelling sites in the Kivalina Territory at freeze-up in 1895. Based on archival sources and descriptions from the elders he worked with in the 1960s and 70s, Burch describes a period of food insecurity throughout Northwest Alaska in the early 1880s. At that time, many Kivalina People left their homeland territory in search of food, with some settling at Pt. Hope, Utqiagvik (formerly Barrow), and Cape Lisburne. By the early 1890s, approximately 10 Kivalliñiġmiut families had returned to their homeland where several families from the Seward Peninsula (Sakmaliaġruitch) and Noatak (Napaaqtuġmiut) would also join them. During this period, most families from Kivalina and Noatak continued to move inland at wintertime, while those from the Seward Peninsula remained all year along the coast (Source: Ernest S. Burch, Iñupiaq Eskimo Nations of Northwest Alaska, 1998: 47-56).