Hundreds of Sitkans embraced the rain on October 18, lining Lincoln Street for the annual celebration of Alaska Day.
The multi-day festival included everything from formal balls and concerts to the annual pie sale and beard contest, and culminated in the Sitka Historical Society’s seventh annual Brewfest.
The state holiday commemorates the day in 1867 when Alaska was formally transferred from Russia to the United States during a ceremony atop Noow Tlein, or Castle Hill.
For the last six years, many have begun to recognize “Reconciliation Day” on October 18, with a mourning ceremony acknowledging the sale of stolen Tlingit land from one colonial power to another. Between traditional sorrowing songs, Yeidikook’áa Dionne Brady-Howard spoke to the crowd of about 100 people at the ceremony.
“I would take the parade not as a celebration of the day that our property and our land that we hold so dear was transferred by someone who didn’t own it to begin with,” she said. “I just took it as an opportunity to celebrate all the people in the parade and our community, to celebrate what it means to be Sheet’ka, and to celebrate what it means to be Indigenous.”
