KTUU.com | Alaska's news and information source | Money from craft fairs and bazaars goes a long way in Alaska's villages

Money from craft fairs and bazaars goes a long way in Alaska's villages

by Rhonda McBride
Monday, November 23, 2009

ANCHORAGE, Alaska -- As you make up your holiday shopping list, you might want to keep Rural Alaska in mind.

If you buy a basket or a pair of ivory earrings, you will be helping families at a critical time with their bottom line.    

At the gift shop at the Alaska Native Medical Center, every day is like Christmas.

Every box that arrives is filled with pure delight. 

These treasures were sent by an elder from Toksook Bay.

"In some cases we are dealing with a third generation of people. And that's always kind of fun too," said the gift store manager, Jeanne Dougherty.

"That's baleen and ivory," said gift shop volunteer Norma Johnson, describing a bracelet to a customer.

Whether its bracelets, carvings or masks, finding a market for Native hand work is one way to ensure that the traditions stay alive.  

"These with the beadwork are Athabascan and they're from the Interior," Johnson said, holding up a pair of mukluks.

In the Interior and throughout Rural Alaska, the sales are now more important than ever.

Families in the Bush are hurting for cash and are counting on the gift shop's annual craft bazaar to make ends meet.

"So we're able to send them a very nice check for their Christmas," Dougherty said.

The medical center gift shop says it sent out about $120,000 to artists across the state last year after just five hours of sales. 

The Alaska Native Heritage Center also holds an annual crafts fair.   

"It's not extra money. That's the thing… It's money that heats the home, pays the electricity bill, gets firewood," said Becky Etukeok, a crafts instructor at the center.

With fuel, electricity and groceries-- that in many cases are to two to three times what families pay in Anchorage-- the need to develop an economy is critical.  

The Alaska Manufacturing Extension Partnership is working with artists and small businesses to help them sell their products on the Web.

Among the best-sellers: Rose Albert's hand carved gift boxes. 

"So it just makes it all the more better than buying, say, some box that you've seen in a jewelry store, manufactured in China. This actually has a history and a culture behind it," said Amanda Myers, with AMEP.

When a new dollar comes to a village it has a huge impact on the economy because most of the money in circulation is made up of federal and state dollars.

"From an economic standpoint, a dollar spent in a village, new money coming into a village, is much more productive," said Bobby Jo Kramer, Operations Manager for AMEP.

Those dollars also help to build a true economy.  

For many in Rural Alaska, where woes are more abundant than cash, there's a far more important bottom line.

"It makes you proud of who you are. It makes you proud of what you've done, that someone valued your work to hand over some money," Etukeok said.

And for those who buy the things made by an elder in Toksook Bay, there's both beauty to enjoy and the knowledge that they've made a difference.

There are two Native craft fairs coming up. Both are on Saturday, Dec. 5.

The one at Alaska Native Medical Center runs from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. The Alaska Native Heritage Center fair is from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Contact Rhonda McBride at rmcbride@ktuu.com