Totem Bight State Historical Park

Address:9883 N Tongass Hwy
north of Ketchikan, Alaska
Tel: (907) 465-4563

Totem Bight State Park is the result of a U.S. Forest Service program designed to salvage and reconstruct the Native Alaskan Totem Poles that were left behind to erode when native communities were forced to dismantle. The program, which taught young artisans the art of carving and decorating totem poles, enabled the art and history of the Tlingit and Haida to remain alive - and thrive. The park itself is part of the Tongass National Forest, both a temperate rainforest and the largest National Forest in the U.S. The natural beauty of Alaska is visible within the cedar monuments, which the natives used as their written language and in the Clan House, a reconstruction of the original structure used to house the native community of 30-50 people during the winter months. This park of silent storytellers is a rich and unique piece of Native and American history and should not be missed.

With the growth of non-Native settlements in Southeast Alaska in the early 1900's, and the decline of a barter economy, Natives moved to communities where work was available. The villages and totem poles they left behind were soon overgrown by forests and eroded by weather. In 1938 the U.S. Forest Services began a program aimed at salvaging and reconstructing these large cedar monuments. By using Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) funds to hire skilled carvers from among the older Natives, two things took place: young artisans learned the art of carving totem poles, and totems which had been left to rot in the woods were either repaired or duplicated.