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A blog by Bill Hess

Running Dog Publications

P.O. Box 872383 Wasilla, Alaska 99687

 

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Wasilla

Wasilla is the place where I have lived for the past 29 years - sort of. The house in which my wife and I raised our family sits here, but I have made my rather odd career as a different sort of photojournalist by continually wandering off to other places to photograph people and gather information, which I have then put together in various publications that have served the Alaska Native Eskimo, Indian and Aleut communities.

Although I did not have a great of free time to devote to this rather strange community, named after a Tanaina Athabascan Indian chief who knew Wasilla in the way that I so impossibly long to, I have still documented it regularly over the past quarter-century plus. In the early days, my Wasilla photographs focused mostly upon my children and the events they participated in - baseball, football, figure skating, hockey, frog catching, fire cracker detonation, Fourth of July parade - that sort of thing. 

In 2002, I purchased my first digital camera and then, whenever I was home, I began to photograph Wasilla upon a daily basis, but not in a conventional way. These were grab shots - whatever caught my eye as I took my many long walks or drove through the town, shooting through the car window at people and scenes that appeared and disappeared before I could even focus and compose in the traditional photographic way.

Thus, the Wasilla portion of this blog will be devoted both to the images that I take as I wander about and those that I have taken in the past. Despite the odd, random, nature of the images, I believe they communicate something powerful about this town that I have never seen expressed anywhere else. 

Wasilla is a sprawling community that has been slapped down hodge-podge upon what was so recently wilderness of the most exquisite beauty. In its design, it is deliberately anti-zoned, anti-planned. In the building of Wasilla, the desire to make a buck has trumped aesthetics and all other considerations. This town, built in the midst of exquisite beauty, has largely become an unsightly, unattractive, mess of urban sprawl. Largely because of this, it often seems to me that Wasilla is a community with no sense of community, a town devoid of town soul.

Yet - Wasilla is my home and if I am lucky it will be until I grow old and die. Despite its horrific failings, it is still made of the stuff of any small city: people; moms and dads, grammas and grampas, teens, children, churches, bars, professionals, laborers, soldiers, missionaries, artists, athletes, geniuses, do-gooders, hoodlums, the wealthy, the homeless, the rational and logical, the slightly insane and the wholly insane - and, yes, as is now obvious to the whole world, politicians, too.

So perhaps, if one were to search hard enough, it might just be possible to find a sense of community here, and a town soul. So, using my skills as a photojournalist and a writer, I hope to do just that. If this place has a sense of community, I will find it. If there is a town soul to Wasilla, I will document it. I won't compete with the newspapers. Hell no! But as time and income allow, it will be fun to wander into the places where the folks described above gather, and then put what I find on this blog.

 

by 300...

Anywhere within a 300 mile radius of Wasilla. This encompasses perhaps the most wild, dramatic, gorgeous, beautiful section of land and sea to be found in any comparable space anywhere on Earth. I can never explore it all, but I will do the best that I can, and will here share what I find and experience with you.  

and then some...

Anywhere else in the world that I happen to get to, such as Point Lay, Alaska; Missoula, Montana; Serenki, Chukotka, Russia; or Bangalore, India. Perhaps even Lagos, Nigeria. I have both a desire and scheme to get me there. It is a long shot. We shall see if I succeed.

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Tuesday
Apr212009

Transition: Wasilla to Barrow, where I see watersky

DateTuesday, April 21, 2009 at 10:27PM

This is what it was like in my yard before I left. It looks to me like Kalib is playing, "harpoon the whale." Hmmm... and there's Muzzy, pretending to be a whale.

It was really hard to leave him.

I had seat 9A, no one sat in 9B and Steve Scarpitta occupied 9C - the aisle. Steve is the assistant principal at Alak School in Wainwright and arrived for the first time in December, when the sun was down for 24 hours a day. He was enthralled by the mysterious beauty.

Now the sun is up most of the day and very soon will be for 24 hours. Steve also has a home in Homer, where he and his wife run Halycon Heights Bed and Breakfast, where you can get your own hot tub and sit there and soak while viewing a magnificent glacier. He recommends August, on the day of the full moon, as a prime time to visit.

Before moving to Alaska, Steve taught inner city kids from Los Angeles who were on the verge of dropping out or not making it. And now he is in Wainwright, Alaska, seeing a world and society unlike any that he had ever before been in. It is not always easy for him, especially with his wife running the business down in Homer, but he says he loves Wainwright.

He loves Alaska, every bit of it, and if you visit him at his inn in Homer, where he will spend his summer, he will pass on that love.

He had been up all night working and so he needed to get some sleep on the airplane.

Back in Barrow - the view from the second floor of the Top of the World Hotel.

A girl looks out the very same second story window where I took the previous picture.

The Arctic Ocean's Chukchi Sea. That dark area in the clouds is called "watersky." It is the reflection in the clouds of a lead open water in the sea ice below. People like to see watersky this time of year - because open water means bowhead whales.

All the umiaks are ready.

AuthorWasilla, Alaska, by 300 | Comment2 Comments |
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Reader Comments (2)

If only you could bottle and sell Kalib's cuteness!

Thanks for posting the link to the Halcyon Heights Bed & Breakfast. It was a fun link to visit, and if I am ever in Homer I will stay there.

April 22, 2009 | Unregistered CommenterMissSunshine

I had the pleasure of meeting and staying with Steve & his lovely wife Juxia, in Homer for 3 weeks. We were celebrating our 50th anniversary. This couple exhibit love for others and also their love for Alaska. I f you have the privledge of meeting these two, consider yourself blessed. My wife & I love them and someday hope to return to see them.

April 30, 2009 | Unregistered CommenterRod Tanner

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