Culture

Lecture presents Anchorage's role in expanding 'American Empire'

Preston Jones, associate professor of history at John Brown University in Siloam Springs, Arkansas, will present a talk about early Anchorage and its place in American expansion at 7 p.m. Thursday, July 9, at the Anchorage Museum.

Jones is the author of "City for Empire: An Anchorage History, 1914-1941" (University of Alaska Press), which presents the city as having been founded "with the American Empire in mind."

"My basic theme (in the Anchorage lecture) is the different meanings Anchorage had at the beginning in 1915," Jones wrote in an email. "What did it mean for the individuals who went there at the beginning? What did people think the new town meant for the region? What was its national meaning? Its international meaning. My emphasis is Alaska within the context of the U.S. as a growing economic and military power in the Pacific.

"I plan to end with brief reflections on the ways these hoped-for meanings have played out over time."

In the book, Jones asserts that prior to 1941, any of several other towns might have become the commercial hub of the territory and its largest and most important city.

Jones is also the author of a history of Nome during the gold rush, "Empire's Edge." He is a veteran of the U.S. Navy and the recipient of a Fulbright scholarship and a fellowship from the Pew Charitable Trusts.

Originally from California, Jones said he became interested in the history of Alaska after he married Anne Keffer, whose family lives in Anchorage. "We spent parts of our summers in Alaska," the only time of year he could do research. He stopped at the Loussac Library and started looking at microfilms of newspapers from the early 1900s.

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"About 18 months later, the book on Nome was published," he said.

Jones described "Empire's Edge" as "not so much a town history as a reflection on the ways Nome was and wasn't a 'normal' American town. It's also a look at where Nome fit into the theme of the U.S. as a rising force in the Pacific in the early 1900s." His research on Anchorage follows similar lines of thought.

"City for Empire" was followed by "The Fires of Patriotism," a study of Alaska during World War I. Jones is now working on a book about the relationship between the U.S. and the British Empire in the far northwest between 1880 and 1917.

He will be spending much of July in Alaska and Canada doing research for the upcoming book. In addition to speaking in Anchorage, he will also present a lecture in Fairbanks on Wednesday, July 15.

PRESTON JONES will speak at 7 p.m. July 9, at the Anchorage Museum at the monthly meeting of the Cook Inlet Historical Society. Free. Enter by the Seventh Avenue doors. He will talk at the Murie Building at the University of Alaska Fairbanks at 7 p.m. July 15. The topic of the Fairbanks presentation will be Alaska in World War I.

Mike Dunham

Mike Dunham was a longtime ADN reporter, mainly writing about culture, arts and Alaska history. He worked in radio for 20 years before switching to print. He retired from the ADN in 2017.

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