by Anjuli Grantham
In 1911 and 1912, Kodiak
businessman W.J. Erskine set out to answer a potentially lucrative question:
did the waters around Kodiak have enough halibut to justify the creation of a
Kodiak halibut fishery? One dead engineer, one volcanic eruption, a greenhorn
crew, and 170,000 pounds of frozen halibut later, Erskine had an answer.
 |
W.J.
Erskine, Kodiak entrepreneur
(Kodiak Historical Society,
P-368-40) |
Within the Baranov Museum’s
collection is Erskine’s remarkable report, outlining the goals, the methods,
and the results of two seasons of prospecting for halibut in the vicinity of
Kodiak.
Financed by the Alaska
Packers Association, two gas powered schooners, the Metha Nelson and the Hunter,
tested both whether Kodiak had the abundance of halibut to warrant the creation
of the infrastructure to support a fishery, and if San Francisco consumers
could be enticed to eat frozen halibut.
This report is significant
for many reasons, not least of which is the fact that the Metha Nelson was one of the first boats in the Pacific Northwest to
experiment with the onboard freezing of fish. But before looking at this report
in terms of fisheries history, let us look at the connection between these
fishing experiments and the eruption of Novarupta Volcano at Katmai on the
Alaska Peninsula.
That 1912 season started off
unlucky. The Hunter arrived in Kodiak
on May 6, and immediately departed to Nuka Bay for ice. Before arriving to
their Kenai Peninsula destination, however, the engineer died. The engine
stopped working. They sailed back to Kodiak, scrambled to find a competent
engineer, and returned to chip ice off glaciers.
On May 27, the Hunter left for Uganik Bay on the west
side of Kodiak Island. There they would fish for bait herring. Unfortunately,
their seine was too short, so they headed back to Kodiak, got a larger seine,
and sailed again for Uganik. Finally, on June 6, 1912, with enough ice and bait
on board, the Hunter was ready to
head for the halibut grounds. That very day, the largest volcanic eruption of
the 20th century exploded on the Alaska Peninsula, showering ash on Kodiak
Island. Erskine writes in the report, “…the Hunter
left for the halibut ground east of Marmot Island, but before reaching there,
was overtaken by the fall of volcanic dust and put into Izhut Bay, where she
remained until June 10th.” Halibut fishing would have to wait.
The Metha Nelson remained moored at the town’s dock, next to the
Revenue Cutter Service’s vessel, Manning.
Reading accounts from the time of the eruption, one is struck by the fact that
people were relatively certain that they were going to die. Landslides of ash
swept away houses. The weight of the ash collapsed roofs. The caustic,
ash-filled air made breathing impossible. For this reason, after two days of
ash fall, the community determined they had to make a run for it. Navigating
only by sound and touch, all Kodiak residents made their way to the wharf. The
crew of the Metha Nelson unloaded the
halibut it had already secured, and Kodiak feasted.
 |
The
halibut schooner Hunter shines bright amid Kodiak's
ash-covered landscape in
the days following the eruption.
(Kodiak Historical Society,
P-357-28) |
“[We] managed to feed a crowd
of panic stricken people a good hot meal of boiled halibut, boiled potatoes,
hard tack and tea. Some of them had not touched food for two days and it seemed
they would never stop eating. Tubs full of halibut disappeared like magic,” Erskine
wrote to his mother a few days later. Now that they were fed, the whole town
crowded aboard the Manning, and
headed out to sea, where it was hoped they could breathe and where they were
certain they would not be buried in ash. Soon after, the sky began to clear,
and they returned to the wasteland that was Kodiak.
Erskine was elected chairman
of the Kodiak Relief Committee and commandeered the steamer Redondo. He left immediately to Seward,
the location of the nearest wireless station. Kodiak’s had burned to the ground
during the eruption. There he dispatched telegraphs to Washington D.C.,
Washington State senators, and his business and political connections in San
Francisco issuing a clear message: send relief funds immediately. His original
telegraphs are within the Erskine family’s Katmai scrapbook, also within the
Baranov Museum’s collection.
 |
All
of Kodiak crowded on the Revenue Cutter
Service's Manning during
the Katmai eruption
(Kodiak Historical Society, P-89) |
One telegraph was issued to
the Alaska Packers Association: “... if you have any messages for Canneries
send them to me immediately here and will make every effort to deliver. I have
seasons bait frozen and believe can continue Halibut fishing provided fresh
water is available. In places drifts of ashes are thirty feet deep and
aparantly [sic] fish in streams and lake suffered greatly.”
The Metha Nelson and the Hunter
continued fishing for halibut once the air had cleared. Erskine was right – securing
bait became very difficult, as the ash fall led to the choking of rivers and
streams, impacting herring and salmon migration patterns. Nonetheless, at the
end of the season, the crew had caught tons of halibut and one important
question had been answered. Did Kodiak have enough halibut to warrant the
development of a halibut fishery? Yes. However, there was an even more
important question yet to be answered. Could Kodiak develop the infrastructure
necessary to supply consumers hundreds of miles away with halibut? Check back later for an
answer!
