Читать книгу Racing Toward Recovery. The Extraordinary Story of Alaska Musher Mike Williams Sr. онлайн

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He really knew what he was talking about on this subject. He said we should try to go to the best schools that have the best education and provide the best opportunities. “Try to get as much education as you can so you can protect what we have,” he said. “We’re going to be challenged for our way of life.” His generation did not get a similar education and many could not read or write, nor could they understand these government policies that were popping up.

He was right. The Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act was implemented in 1971. The act was signed into law by President Richard Nixon and formalized land dispersal in Alaska to twelve Native corporations and 200 village corporations. A few years later the Alaska Pipeline opened and began pumping oil from the North Slope of Alaska not far from Barrow. Congress passed the Endangered Species Act in 1973 and that affected Alaska Natives’ hunting and fishing prospects. The Molly Hootch Case resulted in a consent decree in 1976. That came from a lawsuit filed by Alaska teenagers that provided for more education in villages. New high schools were built all over. If that had become the policy a decade earlier I never would have had to go live in Wrangell or go to school in Oregon.