Life Before the Spill

by Don Kompkoff, Sr.

I went deer hunting on Green Island with George Chernoff and my two brothers, Joe and Nick, on the day before Christmas, 1958. Deer were just starting to come onto Green Island. They had been transplanted on Montague Island by Fish and Game and were swimming over to Green Island. There were just so many deer around. They just populated that island. The wind started blowing, so we went over to this bay and beached the boat. The tide went out and that's where we sat.

It snowed that night.

We woke up in the morning, and there were deer tracks all around the boat. I had just bought a .243 rifle from Wally Brizgaloff, and I went out and tried it out. I shot a buck right away. We got three or four more deer that morning. Later, we went in the skiff over to this little cover and there were about a dozen deer standing right on the beach. My brother Joe got a rope, and he lassoed one just like in a western! I think he cut its throat after he got it up. The weather was so rough that we spent Christmas on the island.

My dad used to tell stories about bear hunting, about how they used to go inside bear dens. Someone would crawl in to see if a bear was sleeping inside. Since my father, Pete, Sr., was the smallest of us, they'd let him go in. He'd go in with no flashlight and feel around for the head. One time, he said there were three bears in a den. I guess they shot all three of them and brought them all out. They'd shoot them right in the den and pull them out. They'd clean the den up afterwards to that another bear would use it the next season. My dad said that one time he got stuck halfway in the hole, and my other brother had to push him with his legs the rest of the way.

Sometimes, I crawled in the dens, but I wouldn't go in unless I first duct taped my clothes around my wrists and ankles because there are so many daddy long-legs. There are spiders all over in there, and I didn't want them to crawl inside my clothing. I went in and pulled out a bear my brother Nick shot. I'll tell you what happened. Henry Selanoff and my brother, Nick, stuck a stick in the hole and watched it. That stick started moving, which meant that a bear was in there. My brother shot him right in the nose on the first shot. That thing just kept going around and around, wounded. Finally Nick got where he could see it again, and he shot and killed it. I had to go inside to get him. After I got in there, I tied him up with a rope, and everyone pulled him out.

Another time, my dad sent us to go get some salmon. I went out in the skiff with Nick and Joe. We didn't know the tide was going out real fast. We were fishing around Billy's Hole near Valdez. It's right inside Glacier Island. We had just got done putting all the fish into the skiff when a big brown bear came walking up to us. He walked right below us on the beach about twenty feet away. He was a mean looking thing. He looked like a wolverine. He was bow legged. Boy, he looked tough. My brother Nick said, "Don't look at him. Don't even look him in the eyes." It's a good thing he didn't tangle with us because all we had was a little .22 rifle we used to shoot salmon.

Back when I was growing up, the whole village used to move from Chenega to Nellie Juan. Everybody would go fishing on the Nellie Juan Cannery boats. They called the boats "NJs." There was a NJ 41, NJ 40, and NJ 39, all the way down to NJ 32. They were the company boats that we used for fishing every year. Each family in the village would get their own boat, which they had to maintain. They had to keep it up; they had to paint it, bottom and all, before they could go out and use it. Some of the people would stay there fishing, and some would go to Coghill Point.

We were at Pigot Point one time, and my dad built a cabin. Any place we landed, wherever my dad's boat stopped, he'd build a cabin out of driftwood lumber. When we couldn't see any more seals in one spot, we'd move on to another place, build a cabin, and stay there for another two weeks hunting and fishing.

In the wintertime, we'd go trapping. Each family had their own sections. The Kompkoff's trapping line was from this point to that point. The Evanoff's trapping line was from here to there. They were very specific areas. You couldn't go in and take over another family's territory; you couldn't trap in their spots. You had to get permission before you could go in there and use it for hunting and trapping, especially trapping because that's how they made money in the winter once the fishing season was over.

I remember that there would be four or five different families camping on the beach, and they'd go out to hunt seals. I remember my dad putting them on a piece of plywood and cutting the face off the seals. Back then they were getting three dollars apiece for them. That's how my dad was making a living off the seals, from the government bounty on them. They also had a bounty on eagle claws. They were paid fifty cents a pair. It wasn't like today when eagles are protected.

I remember how in the late 1940's and early 1950's that my dad would leave me and my brothers, Pete and Mike, with my mom. At the end of the fishing season, my dad would pick us up again. I spent quite a few times away from my mom and dad with Paul Kompkoff, Sr. We'd leave Point Pickett in the skiff and row all the way to Coghill. It took us two-an-a-half days. On the way up, we'd dig clams, hunt ducks, and gather seagull eggs. We'd also shoot bears on the beach. There was so much fish and game around back in those days. Any place you went there was just tons. We'd shoot a seal and then roast it on the beach. They call that munyuq in Aleut, which means to barbecue over a fire. We would munyuq the seal.

I remember one time when I went down to Fox Farm with my brother, Pete. We stopped in a little bay there, Fox Farm Bay. We were digging these little clams. The tide was low enough for us to get these uuqiituks, gumboots. We were digging there and then walked along the beach and found some whale bones washed ashore. Then we went to the point and shot a seal. We decided to fish for halibut and we caught one. After that, we saw a bear come down to the beach. We shot the bear, dressed it out, brought home, and hung the skin on the wall of our steam bath to dry out. That was a nice day. Although our original plan had been to dig clams and harvest some uuqiituks because it was minus tide, we ended up with all kinds of things. We brought the seal home and roasted it over a fire.

There used to be so many cockles at Coghill. I remember one time, we went up on a beach with my seven-year=old daughter, Joyce, and we just scraped the bottom of the beach there. She filled up a dishpan full of cockles in about fifteen minutes all by herself. You wouldn't have to go underneath the rocks to find them. They were everywhere. Nowadays, there are hardly any cockles over there. One time, Charlie Selanoff showed me a neat trick. It was half tide when he said, "Let's go get some cockles." You usually go only at low tide. He got this Dairy Gold butter can and tied it to a long stick with a string. You could see the cockles on top of the gravel under the water. Charlie used his contraction to scoop them right up, even though they were under water. It was a real Indian trick—how to get the clams at half tide.

The Exxon Valdez oil spill ruined my retirement plans. I was planning on retiring in Prince William Sound and living off the land. I knew where to catch halibut, where to find Dungeness crab and king crab. I knew where to hunt for deer or bear, where to find clams and cockles. But, they're not there anymore. I don't know if they are safe to eat either. There's still oil on the beaches. It's still there. I had to sell my fishing permits and my boat permit. I had to move away from the village. I didn't feel good about that at all. I would still have my permits, and I would still live in Chenega if the spill hadn't happened. It really affected my life.