Local histories of a Native village known as Klucktoo say it was destroyed by a mudslide in the 1890s and abandoned, but a recent review of historic records suggests it remained inhabited until at least 1919.
Also, an 1895 photograph of undetermined origin shows a settlement at present-day 19 Mile Haines Highway with as many as 50 structures, contrasting with historic information describing it as having eight or 10 houses.
“No one has said anything about a village of this size, but we have this photograph,” archaeologist Anastasia Wiley said during a presentation at last week’s Alaska Bald Eagle Festival.
Wiley has been leading a survey of the site by a university archaeology class the past two years. They’ve unearthed house planks along a two-mile stretch there. “This site is very, very rich. There’s a lot we can still learn. We will be going back there.”
Many think of archaeology as uncovering treasures through excavating sites, but the reality is that most of that type of work is digging up garbage pits, Wiley said. “For the most part, we find the things that have been thrown out.”
Considerably more clues about the past come from ethnological sources like stories and legends, from museum collections and from historic records, she said. “Each of those four (sources) give us part of the picture, but none give us the full picture.”
Wiley said a search of written records by one of her students found 40 references to Klucktoo, a name shortened from Kaatxwaltu. The Tlingit expression means “punch bowl” and refers to an upslope spot where cliffside boulders fall on a pan-like scree. Longhouses and other structures photographed at the site were at Chookanya, a grassy spot closer to the river.
The site shows up on a famous map of the area drawn in 1869 by Kohklux, a Chilkat chief, and on surveys starting in 1880. Missionary Carrie Willard’s diary describes an overnight there between 1881-83 and referred to it as the “first village of Klukwan” and the present-day village site as the “second village of Klukwan,” references presumably based on the sequence of those arriving from Haines.
A well-known photo of the village, taken by photographers Winter and Pond around 1897, shows a gathering for a potlatch, with crowds of regalia-clad Natives in canoes. At the center of a half-dozen traditional Tlingit longhouses at the site is a Western-style frame structure with an arched doorway. What appears to be another frame building in the photograph may have been a school, Wiley said.
Wiley said a Donnelly family history told by Nellie Pettit establishes that Pettit’s mom, Mae Donnelly, was born in Kaatxwaltu in 1908. Mae Donnelly recorded the site as her home as late as 1916 and records show Judson Cranston Sr. was born at the site in 1919, Wiley said.
She said that information suggests the fateful mudslide may have come much later than the 1890s and that the site was abandoned in the 1920s.
The relationship between the village and Klukwan isn’t certain, but one story tells of a rift between brothers that led to development of a second village, and a battle at the site between Killer Whale people and the Gaanaxteidi clan against another clan. In that story, medicine men called down rocks to bury the war dead. The story might explain the prevalence of Killer Whale houses in the village.
Another account by historian Russell Sackett maintains that the Raven House on Front Street originated at Kaatxwaltu and moved to the 4 Mile village of Yendeistakye before moving again into town. That information would appear to agree with an account by pioneer enthnographer George Thornton Emmons that Yendeistakye and Kaatxwaltu were established by Chilkoot Tlingits after dissension in Chilkoot settlements.
Nancy Nash, a longtime Sheldon Museum worker and local history buff, said Wiley’s research on the site reflects that local history is still being deciphered. “For fairly recent history, there’s a lot that’s still not known. It’s neat the she’s digging into these things and sharing them.”