Hope Happenings

Fayrene Sherritt /Turnagain Times Actress Elizabeth Ware mesmerized the audience as she told the story of “Libby”. The feeling of “being” with Libby, as the first non-native woman to go to St. Paul in the Pribilof Islands, took no time at all and the story was fascinating as presented by Ms. Ware.

By Fayrene Sherritt
Turnagain Times Hope Correspondent

Hope Inc. Special Meeting June 25
Thursday June 25 Hope Inc. will hold a special meeting at 7 p.m. at the Hope Social Hall. Please mark your calendars to attend this important meeting as a quorum is needed to allocate funds to various community projects. Also on the agenda members will be voting for the new Hope Cemetery policies.

Hope/Sunrise presented “Libby, Diary of an Alaska Pioneer”
The Hope/Sunrise Historical Society hosted the performance of the play, Libby, Diary of an Alaska Pioneer, on June 6. Elizabeth Ware created a spell-binding performance of Libby that held the audience spellbound taking them back to 1879 as she told the story of Libby Beaman.
The actress ‘became’ Libby Beaman; an 1879 woman constrained by a corset, floor-length skirt with bonnet. She sat with her trunk and photographs and wove stories about her winter on Alaska remote Pribilof Islands.
Libby Beaman (1856-1932) lived on the Pribilof Islands over the winter of 1879-1880. She was the first white woman on the islands. Learning that there was no teacher for the Aleut children, she taught school. Libby was a fervent diarist, a skilled sketch artist, and avid beach comber. Years later, her granddaughter published the diary entries, letters and sketches as Libby. This is the Hope/Sunrise Historical Society’s first presentation of a play.

Hope’s Wagon Trail Festival and 5-K Run
The Wagon Trail activities will be held July 18 & 19 in Hope. Saturday’s events will kick off with a Pancake Breakfast at the Hope Social Hall. On Sunday the 5-K run will start in front of the Hope Social Hall at 11 am. Pre-registration applications can be obtained by contacting Linda Graham or registration for the run will be available at 9 a.m., the morning of the race. Along with the race, there will be a BBQ, a Bake Sale and the Raffle Drawing will be held after the run approximately at 1:15 p.m.
There are 34 items on this year’s prize list and the top items include a rifle and a shotgun each valued at approximately $400, a “Stained Glass Flowers” quilt which is on display at the Hope Library Gift Shop and several $200 gift certificates plus much more. The $2 raffle tickets are available at Alaska Dacha, Bear Creek Lodge/Dinner House, Grounds for Hope, Black Bear BnB, the Hope Library Gift Shop, the Hope Museum, Sherritt Fine Arts Gallery and at Sweet Mo’s Ice Cream and Candy. Each weekend the tickets are also available on the front porch of Tito’s Discovery Café.

Forest Service holds public meeting on Resurrection Creek restoration project and mining operation
June 13, the US Forest Service held a public meeting and field trip on the Hope mining operation at Resurrection Creek.
In the morning, a two-mile round-trip hike to view the completed Phase I Resurrection Creek Restoration Project and discussion of restoration concepts was held. Later in the morning a short hike to view the project area for Phase II took place. This new area is north of the Resurrection Pass trail bridge.
In the afternoon, everyone met at the Hope Social Hall for an update on the status of the project. An informal discussion was held with a question/answer session between the Forest Service personnel and the interested parties. The new Seward District Ranger, Travis Moseley, lead the discussion. The Forest Service shared maps of the purposed area.
The Forest Service is working together with Hope Mining Company on the restoration project and the mining items of historic nature. It is the hope of the Forest Service to have a 20-year plan with Hope Mining Company in place by the end of the year.

Marcus Mueller, Land Mgt. Officer for KPB reports the following
Road construction in the two new Borough subdivisions is progressing, though the typical late frost has made for a slow start. The Borough is working on lining up the installation of electric (Chugach Electrical Assoc.) and phone (ACS) utilities lines which will begin when the road building is completed.
Currently the airport gravel pit is a work in progress. Overburden materials are moving in the pit; these materials will end up being consolidated, capped and dressed to create a new slash lay-down area.
A new circle drive configuration has been established which will become the basis for a new, more manageable working face that will develop as gravel is removed for road construction. The end result will be a more user-friendly site for future community gravel supply and slash disposal.
On the paperwork side of things, one of the two State surveys has been completed and recorded and the other is at the State for “final review”. An ordinance to create “Local Option Zoning” for the lots in these subdivisions is being put together and will go through a public process starting in July or August. The zoning will include “Mixed Residential” and a handful of “C-3 Commercial” lots.
As to the land sale, the word is out informally, the Borough is planning to propose a lottery land sale for February 2010. This means that the land sale ordinance will come forward sometime during the fourth quarter of the year along with a brochure spelling out the details for participation. The lots will be professionally appraised to establish sale prices.

Hope is part of new National Heritage Area
Per the KM-TA Corridor Communities Association recent publication, in March 2009 President Obama signed into law a bill that designated the Kenai Mountains-Turnagain Arm (KM-TA) as a National Heritage Area. The Kenai Mountains-Turnagain Arm National Heritage Area is one of 49 Heritage Areas across the nation and Alaska’s first.
This new area highlights the experience of the Native Alaskans, Russians, explorers, gold miners and settles who traveled by various means through the branching valleys and over the waters of this rugged mountain corridor. Communities in the corridor include Bird/Indian, Copper Landing, Girdwood, Hope, Moose Pass, Seward and Whittier.
The corridor crosses one of the earliest mining regions in Alaska Russians left evidence of their search for gold along the Kenai and Russian Rivers as well as the Kenai Mountains near Cooper Landing. In 1895, a rich discovery of gold at Canyon Creek set off the Turnagain Arm Gold Rush, bringing 3,000 gold seekers into the area. A second gold rush in 1898 brought 7,000-10,000 prospectors into the Cook Inlet. Many communities in the corridor sprung up as a result of the gold rush. For more information about KM-TA visit a KMTA museum or ask a bookseller for Trails Across Time: History of an Alaska Mountain Corridor, by Kaylene Johnson.

Community Food Bank
The Hope Christian Church Food Bank is open Wednesdays 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. Any residents needing to take advantage of the food pantry, outside the regular hours, please contact Burgins at 782-1002.