Richard McKinley
Juneau resident Richard McKinley died on March 7, 2008, at Bartlett Memorial Hospital in Juneau. He was 76.
Born Aug. 8, 1931, in Hoonah, to Jim and Margaret McKinley, he was an Eagle from the Wooshkeetaan Clan. His Tlingit name was Ch'eet klein, and he was from the Nu Hit Clan House. He was a T'akdeintaan Yadi and Chookaneidi daach x'aan.
He was raised in Hoonah and Tenakee, and like most families from Hoonah, they migrated to Excursion Inlet in the summertime.
He was a teacher in the Bureau of Indian Affairs school system teaching at Stevens Village, Sand Point and Fort Yukon in the Interior. He later came back to Southeast and taught at Marie Drake Junior High School. He also taught in Hoonah and coached the Hoonah Braves basketball team. He worked with children at risk and made them successful students when other teachers had failed, his family said.
In 1988, he worked for Tlingit-Haida Central Council as a senior program coordinator and later as a social services associate, retiring in 2000. He was called upon numerous times for interpretation of the Tlingit language when elders were having difficulty communicating at the office.
He was also a fisherman when he was home in Hoonah. There were many, many stories from those fishing trips.
He was a shareholder of Sealaska Corp., Goldbelt and Huna Totem Corp. He was enrolled to Tlingit-Haida Indian Tribes and was also a member of Alaska Native Brotherhood Camp 2.
He was also a member of the Mount Edgecumbe "Outlaws," basketball players, for which he was called "Slasher." Members of the Outlaws were eventually selected for the Hoonah basketball team. He played ball for the Mount Edgecumbe Islanders, and they took the championship for Mount Edgecumbe School.
He was preceded in death by his parents; sister, Linda Brown; grandmothers, Jessie Price, May Howard, Emma Mills and Martha Howard; grandfathers, Andrew Jack, Marion McKinley and Renner McKinley; uncles, George Anderson, George Johnson and Sandy Johnson Sr.; uncles, Gilbert Mills Sr. and Eli Hanlon Sr.; and aunts, Katherine Mills, Sue Brouillette and Mary Wilson.
He is survived by his brothers, Alfred and LeRoy McKinley, of Juneau, Ray Howard, of Hoonah, and James McKinley Jr., of Anchorage; sisters, Priscilla Mooney, of Washington, Hazel Hope, Stuart Joyce Jacobs, Ida Rabbat and her husband, Carlos, Rita Marvin and her husband, Carl, and Violet James, of Juneau; aunts, May George, Marie Shodda, Katherine Grant and Ida Beierly; uncles, Sam Hanlon Sr., John Howard Sr., Frank Jack Sr. and Bill Horton; numerous cousins, nieces and nephews.
Memorial services will be held at 7 p.m. tonight at the ANB Hall in Hoonah. Funeral services are scheduled for 1 p.m. Thursday also at the ANB Hall.