Legacy of the Chief:
2003, Chitina: The Story Begins
Today she would indulge herself, allowing her feelings to overwhelm
her more practical self. For this moment she was indeed seeing Johnny Gakona come back to life through her own grandson, even though she was not absolutely sure her father had ever really passed on. No one from the Native Village of Chittyna ever saw or heard of him again in
nearly sixty years. How could she even entertain such obviously silly notions ? If he had survived to this day against all odds he would have to be over a century old. How ridiculous. Only the truly superstitious would allow themselves to engage in such thinking. Oh, why not. Just this one time.
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The 1977 Rock-ola
model 470 jukebox |
J.M. realized that this was going to be one of those rare moments. He could see it in Rose's eyes. J.M. told Rose he would be in his small office in the next room, when and if anyone needed him, leaving Rose alone with her grandson in the tavern. It was just them and that Rock-ola jukebox--and that song. The dusty, unpaved road outside, once known as
"Main Street," was as deserted as one would expect in a near-ghost town such as Chitina.
There were no modern buildings anywhere in the old town--just a few framed false-front structures with peeling paint interspersed with rotting log buildings, some with blank windows staring back at nothing while others were boarded-up. Then there was that one derelict boxcar, left behind when the railroad company pulled out of the Copper Valley for good some seven
decades ago. That lone boxcar until recent times had been ground zero for an annual blue grass festival put together by J.M. and a few of his mostly old hippie friends. Each year, as the alcohol flowed in great quantities, the festival became increasingly more boisterous. During one memorable festival, a dispute fueled by illegal drugs turned to violence. Guns, alcohol and drugs
proved to be a lethal combination. Two people died. So did the annual festival. So did J.M.'s attempt to revive a dying town through his once-famous annual outdoor event. Chitina's deadly reputation had returned to haunt the town. The visitors did not return.
Maybe it looked a little out-dated and out-of-place to some, but Rose admired the looks of this particular jukebox in this bar, J.M.'s "Ye Olde Kopper Kettle Saloon." Those
obsolete record-playing contraptions were becoming rare. This one was obviously a relic from the pipeline construction era when disco-themed jukeboxes were seen in all the busy rock and
disco-playing places in the downtown strips of Anchorage and Fairbanks. Roslene had not listened to one of these machines in years. Just looking and then listening to this one as it set that record on the turntable sure brought back the memories of those days when the pipeline and Big Oil was almost the only topic of the day. She loved that mechanical sound--the plunk of the quarter, the whirring sound of the records as the selection moved into position, and finally that gripper arm landing the record in place so it could play that song.
"Mama take this badge from me
I can't use it anymore
It's getting dark too dark to see
Feels like I'm knockin' on heaven's door . . ."
Rosalene never imagined she would take to a heavy metal band such as this one, but this performance somehow transported her back to the days when she was young girl once again, the days when legendary Native chief dealt with some of the most powerful men in the country, maybe even the world, to help his people deal with the changes brought on when a now-forgotten railroad ran through the heart of Ahtna-Athabascan country, delivering millions of tons of rich copper ore to a nation which desperately needed that copper. Because that nation was involved in a war it did not want almost in the same way that the Ahtna people found themselves dealing with change that they did not seek but could not avoid.
She was almost the last survivor of some incredibly tumultuous times, now mostly a remote memory held by only a select few. She simply could not let those memories and the hard lessons learned from them quietly die the not-so-slow death she saw as each generation moved farther away from those days. She felt compelled to pass all this on. Besides she was no longer considered a significant player in the larger world. All she had now were her memories and her stories, most particularly her family stories. Would Sonny be able to fully appreciate the tragedy and the magnificence of the story she was about to tell on this her 80th birthday ? Now was time to find out.
The late afternoon shadows had moved over the town that once was a railway center lying downhill from the Native village to its south--a somewhat dark place even during broad daylight that was wholly ringed by tall, steep hills and even high mountains to the south and west of the Native Village of Chittyna . Some went so far as to declare that the town itself and perhaps the village as well were under the spell of an old Native curse. The place certainly had a foreboding appearance to it, but who in this day and age could believe such things ? Rosalene did.
No white man, having met such a hard-headed, obviously well-grounded woman such as this would have imagined it. But it was true. Like her fellow elders, she never discussed such matters. It was en-gii. But she believed. She had lived through it . She knew it was real. All the elders knew of it, but left it alone.
As those haunting words emanated out of that old jukebox in this very-haunted place touching her very soul, she sensed a strong, unmistakable, yet familiar presence from the old days. The unseen presence of the spirit that was Chief Nicolai himself had slipped into the room. Was her
father in this room as well ? Or had Johnny Gakona transformed himself into Sonny, her most-favored grandchild, standing in front of that outdated, gaudy Rock-ola jukebox ?
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A new era begins as the first train ever to reach the
Alaskan interior arrives at Chitina: The Copper River & Northwestern Railway
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"Mama put my guns in the ground
I can't shoot them anymore
That cold black cloud is comin' down
Feels like I'm knockin' on heaven's door
Knock-knock-knockin' on heaven's door
Knock-knock-knockin' on heaven's door . . . "
" 'Sc'uldzesde tsuun !"
"Grandma, let's dance to this."
"Why, Johnny, I thought you would never ask !"
Had he not heard what she just called him? He did not even flinch. He just
motioned to her to join him on the dusty old dance floor with unspoken words.
"Come here. Join me on this floor. Let us
dance the dance.
"Let us be once again who we really are--a
people who were always here and who always will be here--even to the end, to the
last days given us by the Great Creator.
"We are the true guardians of the earth.
"We are the Children of the Earth.. We are the People of the Saghanni-ggay. "
Rosalene raised up from her seat as if she was only sixteen once again, joining
in an ancient dance with her grandson. And with all of her unseen relations--
while from the shadows the spirit of Nicolai quietly watched and silently
applauded.
The stories could wait.
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Abandoned boxcar at Chitina |
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The World of Johnny
Gakona:
including the
Route of the Copper River &
Northwestern Railway:
1914 to 1938:
click image for
larger map |
