An Eskimo Discovery of an Island North of Alaska

Most or all of the party went ashore and walked about on the island. It turned out to be something like half a mile long and of nearly the same width, but with irregular outline. The main axis ran northwest and southeast, and the island was highest at the southeastern end, sloping towards the northwest. The hill (at the southeastern end of the island) was about as high as the highest land on the shore line near Barrow, which is Cape Smythe, about forty or fifty feet above sea level. The surface was rolling, and there were small ponds. The vegetation was both grass and moss, and there were boulders, some of them of considerable size, perhaps larger than a man's head. No signs of animals were noticed, and they saw no land birds. The account does not so state, but there must have been sea birds-gulls and terns-for they would be normal in September at this distance from the mainland. No driftwood was found. The accompanying photographs were taken by one of the Takpuk

Archaeology · Ethnology · Genealogy · Geography · History · Indigenous Studies and Ecology

• Arctic Ice Islands

  Open Access•Geoffrey Hattersley-Smith, L S Koenig et al.•ARCTIC•1952

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