Despite the late-April falling snow, the Glacier View room at the University of Alaska Southeast was full of warmth and color for the final installation of the Edible Art of Place series Friday morning. The featured speakers were Helen Watkins and Gerry Williams, both of whom had contributed to other presentations in the series. This presentation was the most interactive of the bunch, with each woman offering activities and morsels for the audience to try.
A group of Kake students visited the Juneau Empire Wednesday afternoon as part of the All Alaska Academy, a program of SERRC that helps secondary students explore different career options.
The week-long program brought a group of Kake middle and high school students to Juneau and included education on employer expectations, career options, education options, job seeking skills and a day of putting it all together, including mock interviews.
“Cancer’s not the worst thing you can get,” warned Michael George Patterson, a Juneau resident who has become a spokesperson for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in their new anti-smoking campaign. Patterson knows first hand, as he was diagnosed with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disorder (COPD) at age 44.
Ask anyone in town, Bill Overstreet was beloved and admired by all, even those he argued with. The Empire once named him one of 25 people who had the most impact on Juneau.
“If he saw something that he thought was worthy of Juneau, he would really work to make whatever the situation was come about,” Jean Overstreet said in a phone interview from Arizona, where they spend winters, “He always wanted things to be better for Juneau.”
Former Juneau mayor and advocate for keeping the Capitol in Juneau Bill Overstreet died Monday at around 4 p.m., six weeks after suffering a stroke, Laraine Derr told the Empire Monday evening.
It didn’t take long for the room to fill with the pungent aroma of dried seaweed and herring roe. On the table sat a bag of dried red seaweed from Yakutat, traded for herring roe, as well as bags of herring roe and jars of seal fat with the oil already rendered from it, hooligan oil and seal oil. The third Edible Art of Place presentation was bound to make an impact.
Nestled among many thousands of books, antique maps and other unique publications, one can find Dee Longenbaugh at her desk, ready to offer direction in the search for a book or to share some of her encyclopedic knowledge on any number of topics. Mostly, Longenbaugh specializes in the history of Alaska, former Russian America, and maps, but the petite septuagenarian has been around the world by plane, train, automobile, boat and book.
Genetic Advantage, an all-girl robotics team from Thunder Mountain High School, advanced to the state competition, competing March 8 and 9 against 35 teams from across Alaska.
It’s not spring yet in Juneau — that may have made the spread of devil’s club stalks on the table at the front of the Glacier View room at the University significantly less intimidating. Each stalk was the color of dried glass and densely covered with delicate but sharp spines. Libby Watanabe, an Alaska Native dietician who now works in healthcare administration at SEARHC, expected everyone to get hands-on with the devil’s club.
It was a coin flip that made all the difference. Michael Kohan, now a wildlife biologist for the Department of Fish & Game, said she was on a walk with a friend at Spaulding Meadows, trying to make a decision about whether to go to medical school or go into the Peace Corps when the decision was made. The Peace Corps won out.
Volunteering with the Peace Corps is dependent on a lot and Kohan said she can’t be certain there would be another time in her life that would work out.
