Northwest History. Alaska. Eskimos.

• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 1937
• Subjects: Eskimos; reindeer; Uncle Sam; Washington; Santa Claus; the Roosevelt administration; Alaska; native Eskimos; commercial; financial transaction; frontier drama; warfare; the Government service; Congress; Lomen family; the United States; the Department of Interior; the Hoover Administration; Siberia; Northwest; Pacific > History > 20th century; Indian; Pacific; eskimo*
• Online Access: http://content.libraries.wsu.edu/cdm/ref/collection/clipping/id/91070

Back To Eskimos Go Reindeer As Uncle Sam's $2,000,000 Gift. Back to Eskimos Go Reindeer As Uncle SanVs $2,000,000 Gift WASHINGTON, Sept. 4-"Santa Claus" -- one more in the guise of the Roosevelt administration -- has bought back his reindder. It cost him $2,000,000 to get them, out President Roosevelt's approval of the "reindeer bill" providing for the purpose of all reindeer in Alaska owned by whties, brings an end to a generation of intense hostility between native Eskimos and commercial white interests and gives them all back to the Eskmos. The tale behind this financial transaction belongs to the last act in the frontier drama between native and white invader. From 1914 until now Alaska has witnessed factional troubles at times approaching open warfare in intensity which find their parallel only in the earlier days of cattle-rustling in the west which made the ingredients of legend. Some laywers in the Government service are of the opinion that the reindeer have always belonged legally to the Eskimos for whom they were originally purchased and imported from Siberia. They believe that white ownership of larger herds of reindeer is of doubtful legality, and that the owners should have been forced to surrender them to the Eskimos through court action. But Congress and the Administration has been disposed to overlook whatever shadow of legality may fall on the Lomen family's ownership of about one-fourth of all the reindeer in Alaska and hand over to them and their associates the sum of $2,000,000 to extinguish once and for all any claims of white ownership. From now on all reindeer belong to the Eskimos. Their control, use and commercial exploitation will be vested in the Indian bureau. Reindeer were brought to Alaska between 1892 and 1902 by the Government to provide a source of food and clothing for the Eskimos to replace other dimishing sources. The stated intention at the time was that the animals should be used exclusively for the benefit of the Eskimos. However, it was not long before white interests saw a possibility of developing a market in the United States for reindeer meat and began acquiring herds. There are estimated to be between 600,000 and 1,500,000 reindeer in Alaska now, of which about one fourth belong to the Lomen interests. Considerable money was spent in attempting to develop the market for reindeer meat, and Lomen herds were handled as a strictly business proposition. In many cases herds were grazed jointly, Eskimos' herds with Lomen herds. The result was increasing suspicion and hostility. Eskimos charged that they were being cheated of their rightful property that at the round-ups the Eskimos lost the best animals in the general herd. Disputes arose over ownership of herds and over grazing lands. Whites in Alaska split vehemently between partisans of the Lomens and partisans of the Eskimos. The latter group claim that the natives were robbed, cheated and exploited in Alaska in the twentieth century just as unscrupulously as the Indians of the West were cheated and robbed in the states in the nineteenth century. Lomen defenders maintain just as stoutly that the Lomen interests were true benefactors not only of Alaska but of the Eskimos for whom they were trying to open up new markets. Whatever the merits of the dispute, it became too intense for comfort. The Department of the Interior began an investigation under the Hoover Administration which reached its conclusion only this week when President Roosevelt signed the measure which will buy out the white interest and give all the reindeer back to the Eskimos.