Document text
Alaska Club faces dwindling numbers By SHARI DOWNHILL Once an Alaskan, always an Alaskan. Just ask one. Whether they originally hailed from Alaska, or later migrated from Kansas, Kentucky or Washington, those who managed to weather at least one, long, dark winter there, or those who spent a lifetime, say they forged a lasting bond. It's a bond a group of Southern Oregon residents have attempted to nurture since 1958 with The Alaska Club of Rogue Valley. Meeting about three times a year in various locations in the Rogue Valley, members gather to share their food and their memories of the north. They began gathering in small numbers at first, coming together and reminiscing over curling black and white photos, tales of the Alcan Highway and trips north on the steamships and ferries that traversed the Alaska Marine Highway. They have a common appreciation for shared experience and a yearning to keep those memories alive. At first glance, Edith Erwin might not have the appearance of a Alaskan adventurer. She sat quietly Sunday afternoon in her mint green suit watching the afternoon's goings-on with polite intent in the club house at Rogue Lea Estates in Grants Pass. Erwin is the last original founding member of The Alaska Club. She helped establish the group shortly after she moved to Southern Oregon from Fairbanks with her husband in 1957. Erwin doesn't consider her original steamboat trek there in the 1930s as a young mother extraordinary. There is no hint in her voice that the trip up the rough Valdez Trail to Fairbanks with a 4-year-old daughter was daring. But that, Alaskans say, is the spirit of a true Alaskan. It's the kind of strength that can last through weeks of long, dark days and nights and temperatures that can plummet to 80-below. Even though Erwin smiles when she recalls her life in Alaska, where she helped her husband tame two separate homesteads and raise her young daughter, she said she returned to the lower 48 for the same reason given by most of the others. The bone-busting cold. "It was a real wilderness," she said of her first memories of Alaska. "And of course we got acquainted to the famous mosquitoes," she said. Erwin's stories, as well as those of many of the other Alaska Club members gathered Sunday, could fill volumes. But The Alaska Club's membership is dwindling. Peaking at about 125 in earlier years, 25 members showed up for Sunday's potluck and game of Who Wants to Win a Million Clams? Lynn Thomas, 60, said she considered suggesting the group disband because of the apparent lack of interest in the last few years. No one is willing to step up as officers. There are fewer numbers, she said, because the "old timers" are dying, and "the younger ones" just aren't interested. But that may be because the Alaska of today is much different than the that of Thomas's youth. When she was born in Anchorage in 1940, the town boasted a population of 3,000. Today, almost a quarter of a million people live there. Thomas remembers eating cold-storage eggs and looking forward to a ship's arrival for things like fresh vegetables. Today, the state's transportation systems have improved, lessening the scarcity of goods. "It's a different Alaska," she said. But Thomas didn't suggest the group stop meeting. New, younger former Alaskans arrived Sunday. Why did they leave? "It's cold there," they all said. The Alaska Club will hold its next potluck picnic at Tom Pearce Park in Grants Pass at 1 p.m. Sept. 9. For more information, call 476-0482. Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.