Anchorage Daily News

NUNAM IQUA

POPULATION: 201 (2007)

LOCATION: On a south fork of the Yukon River, about nine miles south of Alakanuk, 18 miles southwest of Emmonak on the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta and 500 miles northwest of Anchorage. Previously called Sheldon Point.

DESCRIPTION: A Yup'ik Eskimo village where almost 94 percent of the residents are Alaska Native or part Native and where commercial fishing (24 residents hold permits) and subsistence activities are the primary means of support. A few year-round jobs with government organizations and the private sector exist. Subsistence activities and trapping supplement income. Salmon, beluga whale, seal, moose and waterfowl are harvested. There is one school, attended by about 75 students.

HISTORY: Nunam Iqua was historically the location of summer fish camps, due to its location near the Black River. In Yup'ik, the name means "end of the tundra." A man called Sheldon owned and operated a fish saltery at the site in the late 1930s and early 1940s. The saltery was later operated by Northern Commercial Co. The village was first measured in 1950 by the U.S. Census, which recorded a population of 43. The city of Sheldon Point was formed in 1974. In November 1999, residents voted to change their name to the City of Nunam Iqua.

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