Kachemak Bay Archaeologist Documents Remote Sites

On a blue-sky day last August, a helicopter took off from Homer and flew northwest over Kachemak Bay. On board with the pilot were two photographers and Janet Klein, a longtime Alaskan and one familiar with the archaeology, history and culture of the Kachemak Bay region.

Funded by an Alaska Humanities Forum mini-grant, Klein had the helicopter for the better part of a day. Her goal was to document remote archaeological sites with aerial and ground photographs.

The locations included Silver Creek, a shallow, narrow and winding streamlet that runs from a small, unnamed freshwater lake at the end of a tidal flat to China Poot Bay, located in traditional Dena'ina Athabascan fishing and hunting grounds, about four miles from the Homer Spit. Although just a mile in length, Silver Creek supports a healthy annual run of silver salmon, as it has for many centuries.

 
The abundance of natural resources in the Kachemak Bay region has sustained human populations for more than 8,000 years, making it a wilderness trove for field archaeologists like Klein, the Homer-based author of The Archaeology of Kachemak Bay as well as dozens of scholarly articles.

“The cultural resources of this region include evidence of previous human settlements and activities,” Klein wrote in a catalogue of university and museum collections of Kachemak Bay artifacts.

“These resources, such as village sites, rock paintings, shell middens, refuse piles, and fish traps are unique and finite. They provide a fascinating chapter in the story of Kachemak Bay.”

In The Archaeology of Kachemak Bay, Klein predicted that someday a fish trap would be discovered “in a creek like Silver Creek.”

Interviewed via E-mail this month, Klein cited James and Priscilla Kari's classic reference book Dena'ina Elnena, Tanaina Country as one of the reasons for making her Silver Creek prediction. "They stated that in the old days the Dena'ina people caught salmon by damming small creeks with rocks or stick fences called hchit," Klein said. 'And, Shem Pete said about the same in his book: 'Salmon were also caught in basket traps and weirs in small streams and lake outlets. The Dena’ina especially used these latter methods for harvesting silver salmon in late August and September during fall hunts.'"