Crossroads Alaska/Siberia

Winter 2021-22, FORUM Magazine

IN MARCH 1990, a party of six American “museum people”—curators, academics, researchers—boarded an airplane in Anchorage, bound for the Soviet Far East outpost of Provideniya. It was the era of glasnost and perestroika. The Soviet Union would dissolve as a nation 20 months later. The Americans’ trip can be measured on two timescales: the relatively brief moment of transition and turmoil in the USSR; and the immemorial span over which the Native peoples of Siberia and Alaska forged cultures, thrived, and persevered through the ebb and flow of colonial empires. 

It was this longer horizon that attracted the American scholars. Taking advantage of the new openness in the USSR and travel funding from the Alaska Humanities Forum, they planned to work with their counterparts in Siberia to launch a trans-Pacific exhibition of northern Native cultures. Unlike previous efforts, the exhibition would be designed to travel to the towns and small cities in Siberia and Alaska where these cultures evolved. 

Among the party were William W. Fitzhugh, a curator of anthropology at the Smithsonian Institution; Darlene Orr, director of the Carrie M. McLain Memorial Museum in Nome; and Valérie Chaussonnet, a pre-doctoral fellow also at the Smithsonian. The three recorded their impressions of the trip and of conditions in Siberia; excerpts are printed in the following pages. These were first published in the Forum’s newsletter, “Frame of Reference,” and in the catalog of the ensuing exhibition, called Crossroads Alaska/Siberia, and known to its creators as “mini-Crossroads.” 

"Large-Crossroads” was Crossroads of Continents: Cultures of Alaska and Siberia, a huge exhibition produced with collections from Leningrad, New York, and Washington, DC, and intended to travel to urban museums in the US and USSR. Although it toured in the US (including Anchorage) in 1988, large-Crossroads never reached the Soviet Union due to the deterioration of economic and security conditions there. Instead, the Smithsonian’s Arctic Studies Center conceived the more nimble and locally-focused exhibit, gathered allies, and embarked to Siberia on the journey of discovery. 

While the team had a rudimentary itinerary and some contacts among Soviet museums, the trip turned into a marathon of opportunity. “We ended up going more places than the initial itinerary,” Chaussonnet wrote in an email. “It was a matter of getting permission to fly into locations, which was what our Soviet colleagues did for us.” Fitzhugh concurred: “We were pretty sure something would work out. Russians can be very inventive.” 

Russian curators and archaeologists, facing challenges of life in economic and political uncertainty, were stimulated by the initiative, and likewise the Americans, for whom the museum collections and Indigenous knowledge of Siberia were unfamiliar. “We collaborated with numerous local scientists, many of them Alaskan and Siberian Natives, in forming the exhibit,” Chaussonnet reported. “Mini-Crossroads was a step in the direction of where the Smithsonian Arctic Studies Center was heading, with a true partnership with Native Elders and researchers.” 

“The project cemented many Beringian connections that developed and flourished to today,” Fitzhugh agreed. 

Fitzhugh’s detailed journal of the trip is reproduced here in a condensed form that eliminates curatorial detail in favor of local color. When it appeared in the newsletter in 1990, Chaussonnet contributed an addendum to offer her somewhat different perceptions of the Soviet Union. Finally, Darlene Orr, who is Siberian Yupik and grew up on St. Lawrence Island, authored an overview of Siberian Yupik life for the exhibition catalog, published five years later. 

Crossroads Alaska/Siberia was a success, traveling to a dozen towns in Alaska by 1995. An eleventh-hour dispute over Russian customs fees threatened to condemn mini-Crossroads to the fate of its larger namesake, but intervention by an Alaska trade delegation and a steep discount provided by Aeroflot secured the exhibition’s transport to Siberia, where it visited four sites in 1997. 

In addition to the first research trip, the Forum supported a suite of educational materials and docent training for Alaska host museums. At the Pratt Museum in Homer, Crossroads Alaska/Siberia was accompanied by visiting Koryak (Native people of Russia’s Kamchatka peninsula) dancers and craftspeople. 

From her home in Sitka, Orr recently reflected on the trip to Russia, one of 14 she made during a career in linguistics and ethnobotany. “It was really a positive experience and trip,” she said. The team didn’t know what they would find in Siberian collections until they got there. “It was all a surprise. It was fantastic, just really incredible seeing all these objects we didn’t have access to [in the West]. We had free reign of the museums. We got to go in back, anywhere we wanted.” 

Orr remembered an encounter that took place in Novosibirsk. “One of my favorite pieces was what is called the ‘Nefertiti of the Amur.’” It’s a Neolithic clay figurine, dating to 4,000–2,000 B.C., and thought to be a shaman’s helper or a household guardian. “To hold that in our hands was incredible. They gave us little replicas of it, and I still have mine.”

Published 1995: Darlene Orr, Siberian Yupik life, US/USSR

AS A SIBERIAN YUPIK growing up on St. Lawrence Island in the Bering Sea, I heard stories of the Ungazighmiit, the other Siberian Yupik people who lived in the forbidding Soviet Union. But nothing that I heard prepared me for my first meeting with one. For forty years the Cold War had cut off all communication and travel in the Bering Strait region. Before then, since time immemorial, the Siberian Yupik had moved freely and frequently between St. Lawrence Island and the coast of Chukotka in Russia, a distance of only 40 miles. When the “Ice Curtain” came down, the two halves of the Yupik population were cut off from each other, but the mountainous Soviet coast constantly reminded St. Lawrence Islanders that there were friends and kin on the other side. 

It wasn’t until 1988 that we began to rediscover those ties, when the Soviet government allowed a “Friendship Flight” from Alaska to the port town of Provideniya in Chukotka. I was among the twenty Yupik passengers on that flight. Shortly after I stepped off the plane, a Native man came up to me and said in Yupik, “I’m from the Kivak clan. Which clan are you from?” I was speechless. Here was a man from a different country, speaking my Native language, telling me he was from the same clan I was. 

That trip was the first of many exchanges between the two sides. Today [in 1995], Yupik people can travel back and forth without visas.

Demographics and language 

On the American side, most Yupik people live on St. Lawrence Island, 200 miles off the Alaskan coast and 40 miles from the Russian mainland. Two villages are on the island, Savoonga and Gambell, each with a population of 550. In Chukotka, the communities with dominant Yupik populations are Sireniki and New Chaplino. Sireniki has a population of 800, of which a little more than half are Yupik; in New Chaplino most of the 500 residents are Yupik. New Chaplino used to be the traditional coastal village of the Ungaziq (Chaplino) but in 1958 the Soviet government saw fit to move it inland. The Russian Yupik were made to live with fluctuating boundaries shared by Russians and Chukchi. The Chukchi and Russian people have become the majority in an area that was once occupied by Yupik alone.

Forced relocations and the presence of other cultures have had an adverse effect on the Yupik (Chaplinski) language. Today [in 1995] virtually no one under the age of 30 speaks Chaplinski. Although literacy in the Native language began in 1932, it was subject to many changes under Soviet policies. Chaplinski was used to teach Russian and to disseminate Communist beliefs. The younger generation of Chaplinski speakers has been affected by Russian pronunciation. Of course, they say we’re the ones who have a strange accent. 

Unlike Chukotka, few people on St. Lawrence Island are non-Yupik, and most islanders still speak Siberian Yupik. However, with the introduction of television, VCRs, and radio, English is quickly becoming a major force of change in the language and culture.

Economics and spirituality

Another aspect of Yupik life that differs on both sides is the economic base. On St. Lawrence Island, Yupik still practice subsistence hunting and fishing, with much the same traditional patterns of distribution. Technologically, American hunters are more advanced than their Russian counterparts, having the latest models of boats, outboard motors, snow machines, and all-terrain vehicles available to them. On the Russian side, equipment is often antiquated or homemade. Under the Soviet system, all equipment belonged to collective and state farms. On these cooperatives, chosen members of a community have the job of hunting, fishing, trapping, and fur farming. They are paid in cash and in kind.

With the collapse of Communism, life in the former Soviet Union has been changing at a breathtaking pace. While good things can be said for its demise, the totalitarian system actually helped to maintain one aspect of Yupik culture: spiritual beliefs. On St. Lawrence Island, the first missionaries arrived in 1894, exerting their influence to replace the Native religion with Christianity. They succeeded. On the Soviet side, the Yupik retained more of their Native beliefs because Communism proved to be an inadequate replacement. Spiritual beliefs were also reinforced by old Russian customs.

Recently in Provideniya, visiting the family of a deceased friend, I brought Native food with me. The family put some food aside to be placed in a fire so that the spirit could partake of it. Another practice I observed was the placing of a pot in the middle of the deceased person’s living room to keep evil spirits at bay.

Traditional spiritual customs are still observed on the Russian side, where Christianity hasn’t had much influence. Such traditional practices have ceased on St. Lawrence Island. With the increased travel to Russia now, missionaries have been bringing their Christian message to the Yupik villages, and it has had a warm reception from some people. At present, with a depressed Russian economy and low morale, almost anything from America is seen as wonderful.

Upheaval and optimism

Under Soviet rule, traditional ivory/bone carving and Native dancing were transformed into an economic resource. Carvers work in a cooperative where they perfect their craft under a master (often a Chukchi), and dancers perform as a professional ensemble. Compared to Yupik dancers from St. Lawrence Island, Russian Yupik dancers look very dramatic and polished. But most people don’t realize that they are trained to be professional dancers. On St. Lawrence Island, anybody can dance if they want, as it is a form of recreation and not livelihood.

Carving on the island is still done on an individual basis, too, as a means of bringing in cash. A controversial source of cash is the selling of ancient artifacts dug up at traditional village sites around the island. This method of getting quick money now holds an attraction to Yupik on the Russian side. This is especially true since the country’s economy has been in upheaval, and any means of extra income appears good.

Life for American Yupik is better in terms of access to material goods, but that does not necessarily guarantee a higher quality of life. In fact, many people on St. Lawrence Island are on some form of government assistance. (Russian Yupik also received government assistance, but were required to hold a job in return.)

The younger generation of Russian Yupik is now making an attempt to speak their Native language again, and there is great interest in cultural exchange on both sides. We see changes from the reunification of this culture, and we also see the effects from forty years of separation and acculturation, yet we can only guess what the future holds for the once homogenous Siberian Yupik people. ■

Published 1990: William W. Fitzhugh, Notes on a Siberian Museum Tour

March 11/12 — Provideniya: A complete surprise, warmly received
An hour’s traverse of ice-choked Bering Strait brought us to a wide steaming shore lead off the Siberian coast and the rugged sawtooth mountains of the Chukchi Peninsula. [...] We were struck immediately by the geographic closeness of Alaska and Siberia here. From a point in the middle of our flightline we could see St. Lawrence Island, Seward Peninsula, the Diomedes, and Chukotka. It is inconceivable that people here would not have significant contact and share similar adaptations, that different cultural patterns could coexist without convergence or interchange.

Within minutes (but a day later, March 12) we passed over the coastal watch towers and landed at the regional center of Provideniya. Our appearance apparently was a complete surprise to local officials, who had heard nothing of our arrival. Nevertheless, we were warmly received. [...]

Faced with considerable material difficulties living in this remote Arctic outpost, Provideniya residents have developed an intense interest in Alaska affairs. [...] Attraction to the east is enhanced by access to Alaska television stations, videotapes and recordings, as well as the new travel opportunities. To Provideniyaites, Nome is the nearly next door throbbing culture center of the Western World where everyone has pick-up trucks, snow machines and VCRs. It’s like the old days of the gold rush. [...]

March 13–14 — Anadyr & Khabarovsk: Meeting Valerii, sharing literature
The flight to Anadyr took about 90 minutes and followed a rugged and submergent coast. [...] There were some surprises, one of which was the appearance of Valerii Shubin as the rear hatch of our cargo aircraft swung down onto the frigid tarmac. Nattily under-dressed in beret and vinyl safari jacket but brisk of action and proficient at cutting through red tape, Shubin quickly steered us through the formalities. [...] Trucks piled high with loads of butchered reindeer occasionally rumbled through town.

We spent an exciting morning inspecting the exhibitions and collections at the Chukchi Regional Museum with Director Natalia Pavlovna Otka and Curator Anton Tynel, both Native Chukchi. [...] While in the museum we were blitzed by radio and TV teams. Darlene’s Yupik was a big hit.

We presented the museum with copies of the Inua and Crossroads of Continents catalogs and other literature, as we did at other locations in Siberia, and received copies of their publications; this sharing of literature enabled us to build a small library of regional publications that are often hard to find elsewhere in the USSR or North America. [...]

In the afternoon we left Anadyr and flew to Khabarovsk, a major urban center and Aeroflot hub on the lower Amur River. [...] The hotel was busy with Japanese and Korean tourists and businessmen; outside, on the river, fishermen were catching smelt through the ice.

March 15 — Khabarovsk: Negotiating the exhibition

We began the Khabarovsk program with a tour of the fine old Khabarovsk (Arsenev) Museum while Shubin and others tended to our visas for the other cities we needed to visit. [...] It was decided that a visit to Yakutsk would be impossible, as there was no host available. (Host museums or institutes had agreed to pay our local hotel, food, and program expenses and the Aerofiot tickets to the next city. Ticketing was a major problem because it required repeated negotiations over the hard currency rule Aeroflot had just installed for foreign travel inside the USSR, and single-day service.) [...]

In the afternoon we had the first of two collective meetings with the assembled curators to discuss our proposed archaeological exhibition. The message we had earlier received from Director Otki in Anadyr was repeated strongly by this group, all of whom [...] direct or curate collections in museums run by the Ministry of Culture. Their reaction was that an exhibition limited to archaeological materials would be of limited interest to their museums for it would draw few visitors, even in large cities. Since the clientele would be largely Russian (Russians number 95% of the population of the Far East) a show dealing only with Native prehistory would not be very popular. To interest the larger population, we would have to include ethnographic displays, especially of contemporary Alaska cultures.

This presented us with a dilemma. What the Soviet side wanted was a substantial ethnographic show, in effect a slimmed-down Crossroads [of Continents] exhibition. [...] For us to mount a project duplicating [large-]Crossroads was clearly impossible. What we had proposed was a small exhibition in 10-15 small freestanding cases, without complicated installation or conservation problems, for viewing in less than 500 sq. meters. After considerable discussion, we suggested a compromise. Perhaps the proposed exhibit could include a small number of ethnographic items together with a larger number of archaeological specimens in the regional culture displays, together with views of traditional ethnographic and modern Native life seen as graphics, arts, photographs, music, and video. This plan received widespread support and seemed to offer a workable and interesting solution. [...]

Upon return to the museum we discovered our visas for Magadan and Novosibirsk had been approved, showing how quickly local visas can be arranged for cities formerly closed to foreigners.

March 16 — Sakhalin: Tickets, food, lodging
Early morning walk along the Amur. Fishermen were making their way to the ice-fishing spots while others were following paths to villages across the river. In another few days the ice will become too dangerous for travel. Later, discussions continued about the content and organization of the exhibition, and plans were made for the remainder of our stay, including the ever-difficult task of obtaining Aeroflot tickets. [...]

Our departure for Sakhalin was through the Intourist lounge, which provided a small cafe and clean restrooms, some with toilet paper. Valerii Pereslavchev was carrying a package of frozen chicken bought in Khabarovsk, one of the few signs of food problems noticed during the trip. The flight took an hour. [...] [We] were installed in a comfortable suite in the local Intourist hotel. There were no spaces available in the dining room, so room service sent up meals and Roger and I dined in the comfort of our suite watching televised political debates.

March 17 — Sakhalin: Grass-roots Political Activity
The Sakhalin Regional Museum is housed in a Japanese ornamental-style building dating to 1937. Before the Russian occupation, it housed a large ethnographic and archaeological collection, most of which were taken to Japan at the time of the Russian occupation. Today its collections are being rebuilt from local donations and by archaeological expeditions. [...] Other galleries include a well-designed display of ethnography, displays on natural history and marine life, regional industry and history, and the obligatory but seldom visited “red room” of Soviet history and themes. [...]

After lunch we discussed the exhibit project with Director Latyshev and staff, lapsing for long periods into discussions of perestroika, American life, museums, and other issues. Here, as in many places we visited, Soviet citizens have been mobilized by glasnost and are taking an active personal role seeking new paths to the future. Grass-roots political activity is rampant: television broadcasts covering political discussions, panel discussions by rival political candidates, and commentators’ analyses are on the air daily. [...]

March 18 — Sakhalin: A Russian thaw
Sunday began with a sightseeing tour to Sokol and Takoe, two Late Paleolithic archaeological sites. [...] I spent the afternoon roaming through the town park, watching hardy souls take “polar bear” swims in ice-filled pools while others gathered the spring’s first pussy willow shoots and enjoyed the warm sun.

March 19 — Vladivostok: The plan solidifies
Monday morning solidified the progress made to date on the exhibition plan. With the assistance of a Japanese computer in Valerii’s office we modified the draft protocol Valerii had written and enjoyed a moment of triumph as we sealed the undertaking with an exchange of gifts, photographs, and signatures. [...]

By mid-afternoon Roger and I were en route by air to Vladivostok, where we were met and driven (raced) to our quarters, a dramatically-situated Intourist hotel overlooking the entrance of the harbor. [...] Spread across rolling hills, Vladivostok, only 130 years old, is often referred to as the “San Francisco” of the Soviet Far East. Its physical setting, cultural activity, and rapidly developing economy gave us reason to believe the claim. It was also the only city we visited where we noticed the amorous activity of its inhabitants (to each other). [...]

The visit was capped by an evening reception hosted by Director Galina Aleksandrovna Aleksiuk, of the Primor State Joint Museum. [...] Director Aleksiuk noted that we were warmly welcomed as the first American museum people to visit Vladivostok and hoped that our meetings would open new doors to cooperative enterprises. For our part, we were impressed by the quality, independence, and originality of the Vladivostok museum community.

March 20-22 — Novosibirsk: Meet the "Beattles"
Powers and I had only been in Vladivostok for six hours before we found ourselves back in the airport with our reunited group for a 2 a.m. flight to Novosibirsk. [...] Alexander Konepatskii, Director of the Institute Archaeology and Ethnology Museum, gave us an excellent tour of the museum and allowed us to photograph any of the exhibit specimens we desired. [...] We decided to use a number of the specimens in our exhibit, among them Paleolithic artworks (figurines and animal carvings), Neolithic microblade inset lance points, and other materials. [...]

The social program included an interesting evening Olga Pavlova, Darlene, and I spent at the Novosibirsk Ballet production “Beattles” (heavy on Che Guevara and views of Western violence and sleaze, but clearly indicating the teen-compelling aspect of Western culture and music). However, the highlight of our visit was a restaurant banquet (postponed a day due to lack of “spirits”) in which vodka masquerading as tea added decorum to obstructive national alcoholic regulations. Later, Olga entertained us in her home where such charades were unnecessary. The wee hours found us on a midnight Aeroflot ride to the high steppes of Chita, and on to Khabarovsk.

March 23 — Khabarovsk
In Khabarovsk for the day [...] spent in casual activities, visiting the museum and resting.

March 24 — Magadan: Archaeological show and tell
Another midnight flight; we’re like owls by now (but get no sleep by day!). Arrived at 9 a.m. in Magadan to find Dick Jordan looking very Russki in a new fur hat. [...] We heard highlights of Jordan’s adventures with the American gold mining consultants who got him into Magadan, and the KGB who tried to get him out. Then we got established at the airport hotel and left for Magadan, 40 minutes away by bus. In Magadan we were treated to a full program of archaeological “show and tell”. [...]

March 25/26 — Magadan and Anchorage: Successful conclusion
Our second day in Magadan began with a bus tour of the Magadan coastal region, where we also found family skiing and ice fishing a popular passion despite inclement weather. The group reassembled for a final dinner at the Magadan Restaurant, enjoying discussion about our project and the many new opportunities opening for scholarly contacts. We were especially pleased to have met such an active and open group of young archaeologists here. All agreed to assist us with the exhibition.

This concluded our program in Siberia. We had a spectacular departure, rising up over the city of Anadyr and its snow-covered hills, out over the Gulf of Anadyr and along the mountainous coast south of Provideniya. We had a glimpse of St. Lawrence Island to the south, the Diomedes to the north, and soon crossed Norton Sound and the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta and the Alaska Range, and dropped down into the Anchorage Basin. ■

Reflection, 2021: William W. Fitzhugh

Looking Back on Crossroads Siberia 

RE-READING MY NOTES on our tour of Russian Far East museums brings forth a host of memories, as well as thoughts about Beringian exchanges and interchange today. Our little band spent two weeks visiting towns and cities in a part of the world that had been closed to Westerners for most of the 20th century. We were very aware of the pioneering nature of our visit, occurring as part of the front wave of glasnost and perestroika. The (then) Soviet Far East was alive with anticipation of change in peoples’ lives, economy, and politics. There was a great spiritual mobilization underway, and our proposed mini-Crossroads exhibit was taken up by Far East museums as a vehicle to energize scholarly, personal, and Indigenous contacts that could not be dreamed of just a few years earlier.

As I think back on this extraordinary tour I am struck by the contrasts between our expectations and on-the-ground reality. We had no visas when we entered the country and could have been expelled. Although we had little prior communication with the museums or cities we visited, within a day or two of our arrival, Valerii Shubin had arranged visas, Aeroflot tickets, and local arrangements by our host museums and institutes. Everywhere we received “royal treatment”—fine lodging, meals (even banquets), tours of exhibits and collections, and cultural events.

Beneath the veneer of the paternalistic colonial Soviet mentality toward Indigenous peoples, we were impressed by the vitality of Native culture. Everywhere we met small groups engaged in preserving and passing on knowledge of traditional arts, literature, and language. Museums were producing exhibits addressing the errors of Stalinism and the gulag camps and had taken the lead in opening new vistas, serving as places for discussion, and entertaining private economic initiatives to support their formerly state-only finances.

Our visit was successful in ways we could not imagine. While the large-Crossroads exhibition never made it to Russia, the Siberia-Alaska mini-Crossroads exhibit moved forward “under the radar” and was seen by many museums, first in Alaska and then in the Russian Far East—making its peoples the sole Russian beneficiaries of the entire Crossroads venture. Another important result was a collaboration with the Japanese to produce the joint Ainu: Spirit of a Northern People exhibit (1999-2000) at the Smithsonian. The Russians had refused to let Ainu and Japan be included in the two Crossroads exhibits because of the controversy between Russia and Japan over the Kuriles. So, we did our own US-Japan exhibit to complete the story of north Pacific peoples and cultures. ■

Published 1990: Valérie Chaussonnet, Like a Country at War

THE MARCH 12-26 MUSEUM RESEARCH TRIP in the Soviet Far East and Novosibirsk was my first direct contact with an area which has been central to my own research since 1985. I share with Bill his positive feeling about what has been accomplished. I was, however, disturbed by the low morale of the country in general, and this somehow gave my vision of the trip a different tinge. 

As I gather my trip notes I seem to have enough material for a whole book—a sad book. To Bill’s description of the convivial and congenial moments of our expedition I will add observations based upon conversations I had. My conversations were different, probably, due to my speaking Russian and using it to ask a lot of questions, and thanks to both my status and my being a woman (allowing me to be more easily taken into confidence). 

I was told of countless economic and social problems. I noticed a dramatic change in the discourse of the Soviets about the USSR, by comparison with my previous trips and longer stays in this country. This discourse does not seem to be as much a consequence of glasnost, or the ability to speak out, as it does a result of increasing problems related to perestroika [economic reform]. I noticed myself much harsher living conditions (and I was told it was no worse than in the rest of the country), and, more important, a total delusion or lack of perspective concerning the near and far future. 

In my past experiences I heard many times from friends—intellectuals—that even though the material situation was difficult, this was not the most important thing (the philosophical implication being that material possessions are not everything). This remark was not made to me even once during this trip, which I think shows the extent of the economic problem. And what I was told about (and noticed) was a general lack of motivation and hope for the future. The enthusiasm and kindness shown by our museum colleagues in regard to our project was remarkable. Probably this project offered them an opportunity to accomplish something. We heard regrets that it is difficult or impossible to find exhibit designers and museum conservators; there is no paper to print booklets, catalogs, brochures. 

I heard so much bitterness, worry, and even fear about the future, that these two weeks were heavier than my continuous six months of Soviet experience eight years ago. I also saw more adult people cry in this short period than ever before. It vaguely felt like a country at war. In fact, several people shared with me their fear of a civil war; we heard that there were last year 30% more applications for permanent emigration out of the USSR than the previous years. ■

DARLENE ORR: At the time of the trip, Orr, who is Siberian Yupik, was director of the Carrie M. McLain Memorial Museum in Nome. She returned to Russia for linguistic and ethnobotanical studies with the University of Alaska and National Science Foundation. She serves on the board of the Friends of the Sheldon Jackson Museum.

WILLIAM W. FITZHUGH was a curator in the Department of Anthropology at the Smithsonian Institution. He is currently a Smithsonian senior scientist; curator of North American Archaeology; and director of the Arctic Studies Center.

VALÉRIE CHAUSSONNET was a pre-doctoral fellow in the anthropology department of the Smithsonian Institution. She spent 11 years working on the Crossroads projects, including exhibits, catalogs, publications, and touring and lecturing with the show. She is now a fine artist and divides her time between Austin, Texas, and Aix-en-Provence, France.

VALERII SHUBIN was vice director of the Sakhalin Museum in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk. He was the local coordinator for the American visitors, acting as a “fixer,” providing introductions to other institutions, and authoring the protocol that established Crossroads Alaska/Siberia.

JAMES DIXON, RICHARD JORDAN, and ROGER POWERS made up the rest of the American party. All three were archeologists with the University of Alaska.