African American history in Alaska
Alaska Constitutional Convention and statehood
Alaska state legislators and legislation
Anchorage Winter Olympics bids
Arctic National Wildlife Refuge
Businesses, clubs, and organizations
Fishing, fisheries, and canneries
Fur trading, trapping, and farming
Geography and environmental studies
Non-English language collections
Senior Citizen issues and advocacy
Student newspapers, Anchorage Community College and University of Alaska Anchorage
This guide was created for the students in HIST A477: Senior Seminar offered by Dr. James in Spring 2011. This is not a complete listing of all of the Archives collections that date to the 1930s. It doesn't include many of the small tourist photograph albums and some other collections which only had a very small proportion of materials from this time frame. Be sure to search the Archives website or contact us if you do not see the topic you are looking for in the following list.
Some of these collections are quite large so you'll want to take a look at the collection descriptions the Archives provides before coming in for your research visit so you can decide where you'd like to start in each collection. Follow the links to collection descriptions and inventories. You can also keyword search all of our collection descriptions and inventories by using the search box available on each of the pages below.
Alaska Pacific Consolidated Mining Company; circa 1930-1987. HMC-0023. Many of the corporate records of Independence Mine as well as collected materials from personnel who worked at the mine.
C. Earl Albrecht papers; 1905-1996. HMC-0375. Personal and professional papers of a doctor who came to work in Palmer colony in 1935.
Anchorage Ski Club records; 1937-1966. HMC-0055. Includes meeting minutes of the founding meetings from 1937-1939.
Atwood family papers; 1906-2003. HMC-0989. This collection of papers from the family who managed the Anchorage Times from 1935 on includes a variety of materials relating to the period. Both Bob and Evangeline (nee Rasmuson) Atwood were lifelong researchers and collectors of research materials and the collection also holds family records from the time frame.
Glenn H. Bowersox photographs and papers; 1931-2005. HMC-0731. The bulk of this collection relates to Bowersox’s service on the ships Boxer and North Star in the 1930s. It includes images related to Admiral Byrd’s Antarctic expedition of 1939.
George K. “Steve” Brodie papers; 1934-1941. HMC-0378. Includes personal letters and photographs, primarily relating to Kodiak and U.S. Navy service in the late 1930s.
Francis and Grace Cogswell papers; 1920-1957. HMC-0744. Primarily relates to the Aleutian island mapping efforts done by the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey in 1935.
Dorothy and Gren Collins papers; 1900-2002. HMC-0422. The 1930s era materials include Gren’s correspondence and daily records of his employment as a game warden and wildlife agent in Alaska, as well as correspondence from both Dorothy and Gren, and photographs of some of the places they visited in Alaska.
O.C. and Ruth Connelly photographs; 1938-1941. HMC-0562. Photographs documenting life in Savoonga in the late 1930s: includes schoolroom scenes and reindeer harvesting.
Frederick John Date papers; 1833-1956. HMC-0379. Scattered photographs of Alaska in the 1930s and a small journal of a trip aboard a U.S. Revenue Cutter from Seward to Juneau in 1936.
Barbara D. Dimock family papers; 1865-2004. HMC-0895 A small amount of materials about life in California in the 1930s in the George and Lorna Deane sections of the collection.
Lawrence and Olga Doheny family papers; 1917-1980. HMC-0355. Scattered materials relating to the family's mining interests in Alaska in the 1930s.
Donnelley and Sheppard General Merchandise business records; 1926-1935. HMC-0837. A few account books from a general store in Flat, Alaska.
Russ Dow papers: 1917-1992. HMC-0396. Russ came to Alaska in the 1930s for a series of Brad Washburn's glacial expeditions. Stayed, worked for Bob Reeves the pilot for a while, and married Rusty in 1939. Particularly strong on photographs of Valdez in the 1930s. Some materials from his high school and college days in New Hampshire and elsewhere on the East Coast.
"Rusty" Dow papers; 1910-1989. HMC-0397. Papers of a woman who moved to Palmer in 1934 and opened her own trucking firm. Most of the collection dates to after the 1930s, but does include some family photographs from both Alaska and California that date from this time frame.
Oliver T. Edwards papers; 1939-1940. HMC-0105. Photographs and papers related to a wildlife specialist’s work in both Southeast and Southcentral Alaska.
General Federation of Women’s Clubs of Alaska records; 1934-2001. HMC-0680. Some scattered financial records and reports from the late 1930s.
Pat Granade papers; 1928-1947. HMC-0720. Primarily photographs and some documents relating to the Coast Guard Bering Sea/Aleutian patrols.
Elinor Delight Gregg movie; 1936. HMC-0424. Moving images of a nurse’s trip to Alaska in 1936.
Mildred B. Hendricks letters; 1936-1940. HMC-0368. A small set of letters from a woman living in mining camps near Dawson and the interior of Alaska.
Harry and Norma Hoyt family papers; 1908-1989. HMC-0988. A number of photographs and correspondence related to McKinley Park, Fairbanks, and Anchorage in the 1930s from a schoolteacher and owner of a car dealership in Anchorage.
Erickson family papers; 1903-1971. HMC-0356. Scattered materials relating to the family who lived in Anchorage and ran a mine at Crow Creek in the 1930s.
Alan May papers; 1902-1990. HMC-0690. Diaries, photographs, and correspondence related to several anthropological expeditions (sponsored by the Smithsonian and led by Ales Hrdlicka) to the Aleutians in the 1930s.
George B. Nelson papers; 1908-1980. HMC-0187. Correspondence, diaries and notes from an Alaskan hunting guide and game warden.
New York tourist travel diary; 1931, 1935. HMC-0591. Daily account of a luxury sightseeing trip to Alaska in 1931.
Fred Odlin letters; 1934-1937. HMC-0644. Some letters from a crew member aboard an Alaska Steamship Company ship in Alaska to his family in Seattle.
J.B. and C.T. O’Neill papers; 1929-1947. HMC-0194. Scattered materials relating to merchants and mining in the McCarthy area.
Christian T. Pedersen papers; 1920-1966. HMC-0197. Business records from several businesses involved in whaling and fur trading in Alaska.
Almer Peterson papers; 1935-1948. HMC-0413. Primarily photographs related to an attorney’s residence in Palmer colony.
Michael Philip papers; 1932-1933. HMC-0430. Materials related to the filming of the movie “Eskimo.”
Pioneers of Alaska Igloo #15 records; 1910-1988. HMC-0202. Some financial, meeting, events and membership records.
Frank Reed papers; 1920-1997. HMC-0206. A few items primarily related to utilities and Anchorage Light and Power from the 1930s.
Philip and Retta Reed papers; 1907-1981. HMC-0401. Items primarily relating to Philip’s service in the Signal Corps in the 1930s.
Victor Rivers family papers; 1869-1977. Scattered items, mostly photographs, regarding Alaska construction and politics.
Jack Roderick papers; 1900-2002. HMC-0547. Scattered items related to oil and oil development in Alaska, from Jack Roderick's research files for his book Crude dreams.
Stoll family papers; 1915-1987. HMC-0236. Some photographs and mining records from a family with international mining interests but who also were involved with Independence mine in the 1930s-40s.
David and Jenny Strandberg family papers; 1897-1970. HMC-0357. Materials relating to the family's mining interests and home life in Alaska in the 1930s.
Benjamin B. Talley papers; 1925-2002. HMC-0241. A variety of documents from an Army Corps of Engineers officer who served on the Nicaraguan Canal survey in the early 1930s as well as Wright Field in Ohio for the rest of the 1930s.
Turner and Wood General Merchandise receipts book; 1931. HMC-0839. Receipts book from a general store in Flat, Alaska.
U.S. Dept. of the Interior. National Park Service. Historic American Building Survey Petersburg Forest Service office and garage reports and plans; 1937, 1987. HMC-0286. Plans of Forest Service buildings constructed in the late 1930s.
U.S.S. Swallow operating records; 1931-1936. HMC-0691. Ship’s records for a minesweeper working on an Aleutian charting project in the 1930s.
Beth Wackwitz photographs; 1933-1395. HMC-0504. A few photographs related to a mining family near Fairbanks.
Frances and Harry Walton correspondence; 1923-1952. HMC-0342. Correspondence to, from, and between a couple that lived in Palmer and Fairbanks in the late 1930s.
Mildred Stratton Wilson papers; 1925-1987. HMC-0417. A small portion of the papers from the 1930s relate to the early career of this marine invertebrate researcher and her time at UC-Berkeley.
Wiseman Trading Company records; 1925-1948. HMC-0434. Some 1930s-period materials are scattered in this collection of business records from a trading company on the middle fork of the Koyukon River.
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