King Islanders honor polar bear with celebration

By Laura Robertson

King Island tribal members celebrated the harvest of a polar bear on July 8.

For generations, King Islanders have been polar bear hunters, honoring the harvest of a polar bear with a community celebration of its life, marked by dancing, eating and gift-giving.
Last week, another celebration was held, to honor a polar bear taken at Woolley Lagoon at the end of June.
“Everybody got together and we celebrated,” said Caroline Agiaviniq Brown, the aunt of one of the hunters, Jared Wiggins. Brown organized much of the ceremony with the help of her family and the tribe’s Elders.

In the past, King Island members celebrated the harvest of polar bears. In 1987 such a celebration was held when Raymond Paniataaq and three hunters, the late Henry Stanislaus, Stan Penetac and Edward Muktoyuk Jr., caught three polar bears.
Paniataaq remembers the night of celebration as “very exciting and very tiring,” he told the Nugget. At that night, Paniataaq and the hunters had to dance every dance the drummers sang.

Brown said she “vaguely” remembered that last celebration. One hunter had wolverine headbands, and there was polar bear meat given to the guests.

Successful hunts by two other hunters, Teddy Pullock and Charles Pullock, later resulted in separate celebrations.

In late June, Jared Wiggins and Jeff Ellanna were camping at Woolley Lagoon when they encountered a polar bear. Wiggins fired first, and then Ellanna fired, too.

They brought the bear back to Nome to process, getting help from their families and community as well as Ben Jack, the cultural arts instructor at Norton Sound Health Corporation’s Wellness Center. The family was outside working on the hide for days.
“Those boys had fun trying to cut the bear up,” said Kuni Ellanna, Jeff’s mother. She joked that they were pros “like doctors.”

When Wiggins and Ellanna harvested the polar bear, Paniataaq consulted with other King Island Elders and they decided to host a celebration again.

Last week’s celebration was different from the one in the 1980s. Wiggins didn’t dance every dance—his brother Jeff couldn’t make it, he said, and it didn’t feel like a celebration without him.

But the core of the tradition was still there. The night began with prayers for the food and for the dancing and the drums. Next, there was a potluck at 5 p.m., complete with fry bread, salmon and Eskimo ice cream.
After everybody was done eating, the chairs were rearranged to make room for dancers.

The four hours of dancing were interrupted only so the family could give gifts to the Elders attending. They gave out apples and oranges, needles, wax thread, hand-crocheted dish cloths, rope and snacks for the children. 

The Alaska Nannut Co-Management Council, which represents 15 Alaska tribes with historic cultural ties to polar bears, called the harvest “fantastic news” on their Facebook page, but did not respond to a request for comment as of press time.

As for what the polar bear was doing at Cape Woolley in late June, the answer may be simple.
“The sea ice in the Chukchi Sea is lingering this year,” said Gay Sheffield, adding that it wouldn’t have been hard for a polar bear to swim or walk from the Bering Strait to Woolley Lagoon. It was probably looking for a dead whale or a walrus carcass to eat on the beach when Wiggins and Ellanna came upon it, she said.
“If there is sea ice, don’t rule out polar bears,” said Sheffield.

This story has been edited to reflect corrections to the story printed in the newspaper.