Summary: | Caption on image: Loring, Alaska PH Coll 247.814 Naha Bay indents the west coastline of Revillagigedo Island. A Tlingit name meaning 'land of the distant lakes', Naha Bay is the final outlet for a chain for six lakes ending with Roosevelt Lagoon. This lake system produced a run of sockeye salmon which supplied a saltery started in 1883, by The Alaska Salmon Packing and Fur Company. Most of the work was done in a long warehouse near the outlet of Roosevelt Lagoon. The place was called Loring and the name became official in 1885, when a post office opened. This was the only post office in southern Southeast Alaska until Ketchikan started to grow. Loring was the first stop for steamers from Portland or the Puget Sound area. Then in 1888, a cannery was built further out the bay at the present site of Loring. All summer long the place was alive with activity from the cannery and sailing ships from San Francisco with supplies. Eventually steamers delivered supplies and carried canned salmon back to West Coast ports. The cannery grew and by 1897, it put up the largest pack of any Alaska cannery. A modern cannery was built in 1901 yet runs started declining in 1913. It operated until about 1930 when the equipment was removed and the cannery dismantled. Today only a handful of families maintain residence in the remote and private setting of Loring.
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