Visiting the Old Neighborhood
We lived in Alaska for 5 years when I was young, before moving back to California when the overcrowding from the pipeline construction forced us out of Fairbanks. My mom moved back to Alaska, to Juneau, in 1993, and my brother and his wife followed in 1994. My brother and his wife (Richard and Kathy) had never been to Juneau, so it was a huge leap for them to move there sight unseen, but they fell in love with its spectacular beauty, with the cool weather, so different than Stockton and Sacramento, and the slower pace of life in a much smaller town. As did my mom. I have been to Alaska twice since we moved back to California. In 1999, Maya and I went to Juneau to visit. She was 3 and didn’t remember anything about it. In early 2008, my mom had a heart attack and was airlifted from Juneau to Anchorage, where I spent 2 weeks while she underwent bypass surgery. Anchorage in February is cold and dark, and being there for such a stressful reason was hard. Ted had never been to Alaska, and after so many years of hearing my stories, he was interested to see it for himself.
We spent the first 2 full days of our vacation in Fairbanks.
This is the view from the back porch of our AirBnB. We went with Airbnbs instead of hotels because there were 5 of us, so it saved money and let us spend more time together, plus gave us access to a kitchen and so on. This view is of the Tanana Chief sternwheeler, which used to give river boat tours along the Chena (pronounced Chee-na) river. There is another boat on the left, which was a floating gift shop and office for the Chief. In 2021, when the water was low, the second boat froze to the mud at the bottom of the river, and during breakup it did not release. There has been some work to get it going again, but apparently it’s not complete yet, not sure if it ever will be. Anyway, it was a cool view.
My best friend when I was 8 and 9 was Aimee, who lived across the street from us. I hadn’t seen her since 1975, but through the magic of Facebook groups, we reconnected a few years ago. She lives in California, though she spends half of her time right now in Fairbanks, cleaning out her mom’s house since she died last year. We were able to get together for lunch on our first day in Fairbanks, which was AMAZING. So great to see her after all of these years, and to catch up with each other. Looking at this picture, I see so many wrinkles on my face while her skin is lovely indeed. Sigh.
After lunch with Aimee, my family and I reconvened (Richard had gone to lunch with a work friend that he rarely gets to see, and Ted, Maya, and Kathy had driven around Fairbanks a bit) and we took a tour on the Riverboat Discovery. I didn’t take very many pictures, so you will have to be satisfied with this picture taken in the early 1970s, from when we took the tour with my visiting Grandparents. The Discovery has three Riverboats, and this is the original, and not the one we rode this time. I know, I’m lame. You can see pictures by following the link above, if you are interested. The tour was much as I remembered it from when I was young. You spend time on the water, hearing about the history of Fairbanks, and then you spend some time on land, visiting a recreated Athabascan village. There you learn about how the native people lived before contact with ‘Western’ culture. (I put that in parentheses because it is the best term I could think of, but Fairbanks is pretty far West.) You also get to learn a bit about dog sled racing and watch a bush pilot take off and land from the river. It was a lot of fun.
Later, we went to dinner at a Moldovan restaurant, Soba. I’ve never had Moldovan food before, but it was delicious and we were all pleased with it. I had Zrazy, which is described as: potato cutlets stuffed with ground chicken and served with a side salad. It was delicious. I also had some Moldovan wine, a Cricova Chardonnay, which was tasty. Not sure I would seek it out, but it was good.
Soba was downtown, just a few blocks from one of our Fairbanks houses, so we walked over to take a look.
This is how the house looked when we lived there. It has since been torn down, and is now an empty field. According to Aimee, when they demolished the house, they basically expanded the storm cellar under the house and then buried everything. Weird, huh?
This is Richard and me now, 50 years later. The church next door is still there, though it is painted white now instead of red, and Aimee’s house is still there, though the houses on the other two corners have also been torn down and are now empty lots.
One thing I noticed about this part of Fairbanks was the absolute lack of traffic. None. There appeared to be the same amount of cars on the road at 2pm as at 2am. (Not that we were out at 2am, this is hyperbole, but really, you could walk down the middle of the street without really paying any attention.) If it takes 15 minutes to get somewhere, that is all distance. Even when we did hit some traffic in another part of town, it was minimal and very easy to manage. I think it would be a great place to learn to drive, much less stressful than the Bay Area, which is insane.
Our second day in Fairbanks, we had two goals. To see if we could find the site of the old homestead where we lived when we first moved to Fairbanks, and go visit the Fairbanks museum.
The problem with trying to find the old homestead is that the building itself burned down about 50 years ago, while we were still living in Fairbanks. Apparently the house was insulated with newspaper, which turns out to not be the best idea. I don’t think anyone was living in it at the time, not sure what caused the fire, maybe some cousins of mine up there smoking or something? Everyone who knew is gone, sadly.
We knew the road was Sheep Creek Road, but disagreed on how far out from town it was. We were probably 5 and 7 when we moved into town, so our memories are not great. Doing a bit of poking around, I think I was right. Richard remembered it being 12 miles out of town, and going over a couple of sets of railroad tracks. We went out pretty far, but before we got to 12 miles, realized that was too far out. I remembered it being just before the first set of railroad tracks, and turning right to go down a narrow road for about a quarter of a mile before crossing a small wooden bridge, and then there was the little house. My (admittedly limited) research is based on a story my mom told about talking to a neighbor from down the road, telling her that she had seen a local, friendly moose named Josephine, and her twin calves, and had given her a pet. This neighbor told my mom that Josephine had not had any calves this year, which frightened my mom, because one thing you do NOT do is get near a wild moose, and especially not a mother with young calves. I found an old newspaper article about Josephine, and from there looked up the neighbors, Ann Dolney and her greenhouse, which we DID see (though we didn’t know what they were or remember them), just down the road from my memory of the place. So with the help of google maps, I found this picture for you, because I neglected to take any while we were there.
With that information, I am pretty sure that the road above is our ‘driveway’. We gave it a try, going down the path that turned to the right, and came across a few houses along the way, but nothing that was as we remembered. I think the path we would have wanted to go down would be the one that went straight, though we decided it wasn’t safe to do so for a couple of reasons.
- The picture above is from 12 years ago. The path straight back is even more overgrown now, and our rental contract forbade us doing any off-roading. The pot holes we encountered on the road that went to the right were no joke, and would likely have been even worse.
- As we explored the area, I started to have misgivings about coming into contact with wildlife so far out in the middle of nowhere. Specifically moose and bears, but also mosquitos, which can be horrible out in the bush.
- We also came across some junky looking places, with lots of rusted out cars and miscellaneous furniture, which had me worrying about coming across people as well.
It turns out that the train we took from Fairbanks to Anchorage the following day went right down those tracks, so I tried to see if I could see anything from the window as we passed, but 50 years in the wilderness means that there was nothing to see. It was, however, cool to see the area, have some idea of how remote it was, and see that people do still live out in the middle of nowhere.
From there we spent a little time at the University museum, which was mostly science based, with lots of taxidermied animals, gemstones, information about the cultural history of the area, dinosaur and woolly mammoth fossils, that kind of thing. There was also an art gallery, which is more my thing. We had lunch, then went to visit Alaskaland Pioneer Park, an historical theme park that we remembered from our childhood. Mostly I remember that there was a paddle boat, the SS Nenana, and next to it an ice cream shop. The folks at the ice cream shop would give us bits of broken ice cream cones, and I would go down to the water’s edge and tempt baby ducks into my lap. Now the Nenana is run down, they are trying to raise money to restore it, and it is no longer on the water. The ice cream shop is still there, albeit smaller than I remember. A bit later, we went for a walk around the neighborhood of our Airbnb, and then Ted, Maya and I went out for a light dinner and returned the rental car, in preparation for our early departure the following day. It was a wonderful visit down memory lane. I am sad that it was cloudy the entire time we were there, so we didn’t see the northern lights that were apparently right above us. Sigh.
26 Comments
Margaret
What a delightful trip down memory lane! I would love to go back to Alaska but my friend who lived in Anchorage now lives in Olympia. I like having her closer even though it’s taken away my reason to visit AK.
J
Alaska is beautiful, isn’t it? It’s an expensive trip without a place to stay and a friend to visit though, for sure.
Zazzy
It sounds like a fun and interesting trip. But how serendipitous to find your old friend! It’s been a long, long time since I’ve visited Michigan and it would be interesting to see the old farm site and if some of the things I remember in my grandparents’ town are still there. I am amazed at how much you found from your memories.
And as you say, Alaska is beautiful.
J
Thanks Zazzy, yes, it was really great to catch up with Aimee after all of these years, and I owe it all to Facebook. 🙂
Nicole MacPherson
What a fascinating trip! It’s so interesting, I just finished the last chapter of A Tree Grows In Brooklyn and the line that stood out to me was “Eyes changed after they looked at new things. If in the years to be, she were to come back, her new eyes might make everything seem different from the way she saw it now. The way it was no was the way she wanted to remember it.” It’s so interesting to see our childhood homes and places we loved in childhood through our adult eyes. What an amazing thing to be able to do, to revisit. Too bad about the Northern Lights though. I thought it would be too early in the season to view them, but I was wrong!
J
Thanks Nicole, yes, my friend and I were just messaging yesterday about how different some things seemed because we were using young eyes. Or more accurately, the understanding of children, vs. the understanding of adults.
I also thought it would be too early to see the Northern Lights, but my sister in law looked it up online, and supposedly they were right overhead. Not that it mattered, since it was cloudy. Sigh.
Michelle
So interesting fascinating! Looking forward to your next installment.
J
Thanks Michelle, nice to see you here! I miss the days when you had a blog. <3
Tierney
I am excited about your “mini-” posts! I was in the running for a temporary job in Alaska last Summer, which would have been so cool but alas, it didn’t work out. I’m glad you had a nice vacation too. It’s always nice to have some nostalgia mixed in.
This vacation, I brought a wireless keyboard with me so I’m keeping up with posting through the keyboard and my phone! It’s a tiny screen, but it’s nice to save on the space and weight. Also, I *really* did not want to be connected to work this vacation. Not having a laptop really helps with that!
J
Thanks Tierney! Where would you have gone in Alaska? What would the job have been?
I’ve been enjoying getting caught up on the blog posts that I have missed, and love seeing of your adventures on your current vacation. I’ve only been to Amsterdam of the places you have been so far, but it is such a beautiful city, I loved it.
nance
Oh, J, this was so interesting to read. As I always tell you, you have led such an interesting life. So many of the details in this were fascinating and wonderful. I especially love the part where you got broken cones and coaxed baby ducks into your lap. What a lovely memory.
That you recall the ice cream store being larger made me smile. Indeed it was since you were much smaller. And I was so entertained at how you tied a location to the moose and her babies. I can’t wait to read more.
J
Thanks Nance, yes, Aimee and I were discussing how much bigger things looked when we were smaller. Funny how that works. Also, glad you enjoyed me tracking down Josephine, that’s such a tiny incident but it really helped to tie the location down for me.
Daria
What an interesting post! Definitely a trip down a memory lane… I loved the pictures of then and now… One day I go back to the town where I was born in Russia, one day 🙂
J
Thank you Daria! I hope you do make it back to the town where you were born one day. Do you have a lot of memories there, or were you quite young when you left?
San
Wow that must have been an emotional trip down memory lane. I am so thrilled you were able to meet up with your childhood friend for lunch. You both look lovely in the picture (wrinkles are merely lines were smiles have been – or how does the saying go? ;)).
J
Thank you San, it was a great visit! So glad to have had this experience.
Ally Bean
It’s a fascinating experience to see where you used to live and see that it is gone. I did something like this years ago and just stood there staring at what wasn’t there anymore. Kind of lost. I like your photo of you and your brother. Can’t wait to read more about your vacation back in time, as it were.
J
Ally, it was indeed kind of surreal, to see where the house had been. Down the street was the old library, which is currently empty, which was sad. We spent so much time there, it would have been nice to go inside.
Lisa of Lisa’s Yarns
What a trip down memory lane for you and your brother! I haven’t been back to my home town for 10+ years. I was in my home state this spring and summer for my grandma’s 50th bday and then to visit her again in July. But I haven’t felt compelled to drive 30 more miles to show my kids where I grew up. I think I would when they are a bit older! I grew up in a tiny town with 500 people so think they would find the tiny town interesting.
J
LIsa, I agree, if you want your kids to remember it, waiting until they are a little older is better. My daughter went to Alaska when she was 3, but of course doesn’t remember any of it.
Stephany
What a way to start off your trip to Alaska! That’s so cool that you were able to see these spots that meant so much to you as a child, and to have your brother there, too! And how neat to be able to meet up with a childhood friend!
J
Stephany, YES, it was wonderful indeed! The rest of our vacation was great, but the time in Fairbanks was the most nostalgic for sure. And it sure was great to see Aimee after so many years.
Jenny
So you lived in Fairbanks for five years as a kid? It sounds like you were 5-10 (or so) during this time period- that’s a big time in a kid’s life, I feel. You’re old enough to remember it all, and those years seem so long. Most of what I think of as my “childhood” is during those years. Anyway… I’ve never been to Alaska! I started here and I’m going to read through your whole series- it looks fascinating.
J
Thanks Jenny!
Yes, we moved to Fairbanks when I was 4 1/2, and back to California when I was 9 1/2. I considered myself Alaskan for quite a few years, and the culture shock I went through when we moved to California was kind of harsh. I wondered a bit whether that was just me remembering things wrong, moving at such a formative time in my life. When talking to my friend Aimee, though, she said the same thing. She moved to California as a young adult, and said the culture shock was pretty extreme.
J
I just received this comment on Facebook, where I had linked to this post. Joyce is a friend in real life, and was a friend of my mom’s. She lived with us in Fairbanks for awhile, and I wanted to capture her comment here. 🙂
Julie, thanks for the blog and the pix. Interesting comparing your childhood memories of Fairbanks with my young adult ones. Sad that Antler Manor is gone, as it was such a great place to live.
Actually, I also have childhood memories of Fairbanks, as my family was stationed on Eielson AFB (26 miles outside of town) in 1959/60, when I was 10. We took a ride on the original Riverboat Discovery with Captain Jim Binkley running it.
When I visited Fairbanks in ‘94, I went on an updated version of the Discovery, I think still run by the Binkley family. We met Mary Shields, one of the first women mushers to run the Iditarod — and it turned out your mom had known her! That’s Alaska for you.
~ Joyce
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