Rural Alaska

A group of Utqiagvik beachcombers unearthed an ancient ivory tusk

A group of friends at a beach near Utqiagvik found a piece of prehistory jutting up through the sand at the water's edge earlier this month.

"My sons and a group of their friends were at the beach. It was a beautiful day out. The water was like glass — not many waves at all," said Heidi Ahsoak. "We were catching these little fish that come once a year in the summertime and they're like 2 inches long. They wash up on the shore and we catch them with our hands. The boys were walking along and one of the boys saw something in the water."

At first, he thought it might be an old piece of driftwood.

"Another one of the boys saw it and recognized it was a tusk, but he didn't have rubber boots on," she recalled. "Three of the boys ran into the water and grabbed it. It was in about 2 or 3 feet of water."

Aaron Silatqutaq Leavitt, Gregory Edward Tuutaq Alasuraq Overbay Jr., Mark Francis Uyuguaq Ahsoak, Jeslie Akootchook Kaleak III, Andrew Keerik Kaleak, and Jonas Silatqutaq Ahsoak all started to pull and out came a large tusk.

It's 8 feet, 5 inches long with a diameter of 1 foot, 7.5 inches at its widest point. Ahsoak estimates it weighs around 125 pounds.

"I'm pretty sure it's in almost perfect condition," she said. "You can see the tip and where it would go in the base."

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She's been calling it a mammoth tusk, but her husband thinks it's from a mastodon, she said.

While researchers say mammoth tusks and bones are more commonly spotted in Alaska, mastodon remains have been found in the far north as well. This particular specimen hasn't been tested yet to determine from which type of animal it came.

"My husband is an avid beachcomber. As soon as the summertime hits and the waves start to wash things up, my husband is on the beach. He finds a lot of artifacts. He's found a wooden spoon that is ancient. It has this smell of history to it. He found a little ivory doll one time, maybe an inch long. He's found snow goggles," Ahsoak said. "To see my sons and their friends find this once-in-a-lifetime piece of history that my husband has been searching his entire life for is amazing. I was in awe."

As soon as the boys, who are all between the ages of 10 and 12, unearthed the tusk, she called her husband in disbelief.

"I was yelling at him (over the phone), 'You need to get down to the beach right now.' He was panicking thinking something happened to the kids," she said. "As soon as he walked up we backed off and his eyes were huge. He was amazed."

The Ahsoaks are storing the tusk in a safe location until all of the families can agree on what they'll do with it.

The boys and their families have discussed both selling the tusk and splitting the money all around or donating it to the museum in town.

"We're trying to keep it local here on the Slope so our kids can see it. It's part of our region's identity. It belongs to the region. We don't want it to go to the Smithsonian and never see it again," Ahsoak said. "We want to keep it so our kids can grow up and see it, along with their children and grandchildren."

Finding a tusk in such good condition is rare, and for Ahsoak, it represents more than just a interesting scientific discovery.

"It's such a blessing. It's just so awesome they found that. It doesn't happen to everybody. It's important to all of us so that these boys know that what belongs at home stays at home. This isn't just for artifacts found, but it's their history — their cultural history. This is a piece of home. This is a piece of them," she said. "Maybe one of their ancestors saw this animal walking around. To me, it takes them back to the root of who they are as Iñupiaq boys."

Ahsoak, who is white and traces her own lineage in a different direction from that of her husband, said this find has reminded her of why she loves this place she and her family call home.

"It makes me appreciate so much more the life we live. I chose to marry an Inupiaq man who has taught me so much. He's brought me up. We've been together since we were teenagers and he's taught me so much. I have that feeling of belonging in this culture. But with my culture, I don't have that feeling of belonging," she said.

"So, the fact that my sons and their friends are able to hold something that goes back thousands of years that connects them to their ancestors and their culture — it's the most amazing feeling that they are able to know, they're able to see, they're able to touch their history," she added.

This story first appeared in The Arctic Sounder and is republished here with permission.

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