Hi, welcome to my site. It's construction was required for completion of Anthropology 220--a Yukon College course on sub-arctic ethnology.

I will be discussing the cultural continuity of the Northern Tutchone of the Pelly Crossing region of the Yukon (the Selkirk First Nation) To do this I need to first share some of the material taught in the course.

Understanding a few of the cultural characteristics of aboriginal sub-arctic peoples will help you to understand the history of this region, and to interpret other material you may come across in your northern web travels.

The most obvious characteristic of sub-arctic peoples is that they live in the sub-arctic. While there is considerable debate among scientists as to where the boundaries of this region should be drawn, a good definition is: the wooded zone between discontinuous Arctic tundra and the economic timber limit of the boreal forest. In North America this zone stretches from Alaska to Labrador, with a great deal of variability in vegetation,climate, geology, and phsyiography.This vast region can be further divided into four phsiographical subregions.

The traditional territory of the Selkirk First Nation (and most of the other 13 Yukon First Nations) is contained within the most physiographically complex of these regions, the Cordillera. For class purposes we defined it as "the array of valleys and mountain ranges between the Mackenzie Lowlands and the Yukon River plateau."(suplementary lecture notes)

It is important to remember that the sub-arctic is semi-arid, and has a frost-free period of only 40-60 days. This means that aboriginal inhabitants were unable to practise agriculture, and instead followed a way of life known as hunting and gathering. Peoples following this lifeway depend on hunting to survive, and to a lesser extent fishing and the gathering of plant stuffs. However, it is crucial to keep in mind that they are primarily HUNTERS. This is their most important characteristic, and the basis of their social organization.

Hunting peoples follow the animals they depend on. They live in small nomadic bands, travelling throughout their territority in a scheduled pattern known as the "seasonal round". In the winter when game is scarse they break up into groups of single family units and disperse throughout their hunting territory. In the summer when the living is easier they gather together at fish camps, or favoured hunting grounds, to work together, to socialize and to renew kinship ties.

For thousands of years the ancesters of the Selkirk First Nation followed such a pattern, gathering at summer fish camps at the confluence of the Yukon and Pelly rivers, to catch salmon, and trade. When the Europeans began to arrive in the historic period the natives adapted to their presence, yet managed to maintain their traditional relationship with the area.

I obtained the following historical summary from the documentary Fort Selkirk-Voices of the Past, a joint production of the Selkirk First Nation and Yukon Heritage Branch:

At the time of contact the Northern Tutchone were part of an extensive aboriginal trade network stretching across the western sub-arctic, but their most important trading partners were the Coastal Tlingit people known as the Chilcat. From them the Northern Tutchone received Russian trade goods.

The Hudson's Bay Company wanted to capture this interior trade and in 1848 sent Robert Cambell to establish Fork Selkirk. However, the Northern Tutchone continued to trade with the Chilcat because they offered better prices.

In 1852 Cambell built a larger and better supplied Fort Selkirk. The Chicat, fearing they had lost their competitive advantage waited until the Northern Tutchone people were away hunting and burned down the fort. Cambell wanted to rebuild, but the company decided against it.

This ended white settlement in the area until 1889, when Arthur Harper set up his own trading post to supply the growing number of prospecters drifting into the region. The post developed into a small settlement that thrived for over sixty years, serving as the supply center for smaller posts up the Pelly and Macmillan rivers. Harper had built a few small cabins for visiting trappers and Northern Tutchone people began to build their own at the edge of town, staying in them when then weren't out on the land.

The Klondike gold rush brought thousands of gold seekers to the territory, hundreds of whom sought their fortune on the Pelly river. By 1899 Fort Selkirk boasted a police detatchment, churches, a lumber mill, and a number of hotels and saloons. A two hundred man contingent of the Yukon Field Force was stationed at Fort Selkirk for a year to protect Canadian interests from American stampeders. This was the most disruptive element the natives had yet encountered. The soldiers were often drunk, and often engaged in disorderly conduct. Daily they would fire artilery shells at the cliff face across the river.

With the end of the gold rush, the population of Fort Selkirk, dwindled, but it remained an important center for the Indians. Though they spent most of their time on the land following their seasonal round, many also engage in wage labour jobs such as supplying firewood for, and labouring on the steamboats that still plied the river. Children attended school intermittently, when not on the land with their parents.

In general white people in positions of authority seem to have been both respectful and respected. Education and religious instruction was offered to the people, but not forced on them.

Fort Selkirk for the most part remained an enjoyable place for the Northern Tutchone people to gather to socialize and celebrate with family and friends between stints on the land. Some of the elders recount fond memories of dancing at the Christmas parties thrown by the owner of the general store.

The steamboat era ended in the 1950's with the construction of roads connecting Dawson and Mayo to Whitehorse. Fort Selkirk was abandoned, and the people of the Selkirk First Nation moved first upriver to Minto, then settled permanently in Pelly Crossing.

It is significant that when the aboriginal people of this area organized politicaly to pursue land claims, they chose to name themselves the Selkirk First Nation, a name first given to the area by a white trader. It is nice to see some evidence of whites and aboriginals living together, without the Indians coming to resent the experience.

Today Fort Selkirk is preserved as a living cultural heritage site, visited by both river tourists, and Selkirk First Nations members, who wish to keep their culture alive.

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