AUTHOR’S NOTE: Thirty-five-year-old Rex Hanks homesteaded in the Happy Creek valley in 1946. He remained a bachelor until 1953, when…
Rex Hanks served in World War II, then left his home state of Washington and came to Alaska to seek new opportunities
AUTHOR’S NOTE: Happy Valley resident Rex Hanks began his own private cemetery in the winter of 1951. By the end…
AUTHOR’S NOTE: This first chapter of the Rex Hanks story includes many other individuals and numerous actions and transactions. It…
By Clark Fair
It had been a good vacation, the first time in a decade that Sophia Grönroos had been outside of Alaska….
AUTHOR’S NOTE: W.R. Benson, in his mid-50s when he and wife Mable moved from Seward to Homer in 1943, seemed…
AUTHOR’S NOTE: W.R. Benson was a mover and a shaker throughout his life, but particularly so in Alaska. After he…
On Nov. 23, 1941—just two weeks before the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor—it was bitterly cold in Seward. According to…
AUTHOR’S NOTE: Three siblings (Floyd, Lawrence and Verona) from the Keeler family of Oregon came to the Kenai Peninsula to…
AUTHOR’S NOTE: Floyd Nelson Keeler, eldest son in a family containing 12 children, was arguably the least well-understood of the…
AUTHOR’S NOTE: The first of the three Keeler siblings to travel from Oregon to the Kenai Peninsula for a chance…
AUTHOR’S NOTE: Verona (Keeler) Wilson and her husband Don moved from rural Oregon to Soldotna in 1951, about the same…
