Lillian French, neé Lucey, worked as a nurse and teacher in various communities in British Columbia, the Yukon and the Northwest Territories from the late 1930s to the 1960s, including Port Simpson, Old Crow, YT and Fort MacPherson, NWT. She was also a member of the Anglican Church Women’s Auxiliary. During her career, she collected many examples of Native handicrafts, many of which she received as gifts from her pupils and patients.
Leonard Humphreys was a member of the Sudan Civil Service. During Leonard Humphrey’s post as a member in Sudan Civil Service, he took photographs and drew sketches which he later compiled into scrapbooks. The Sudan Civil Service was a branch of the British Civil Service working in Egypt during the period between World War One and the 1950’s.
Thomas Laurie and Mildred Laurie were a married couple who managed the B.C. Packers general store in Alert Bay for many years. Their daughters Leslie and Cathie attended the first local integrated school there in the 1950s, and their son Tom was born in Alert Bay in 1962. After leaving Alert Bay in 1964 the family moved to Powell River, where Thomas and Mildred ran the Columbia Store, and then to Ocean Falls, where they managed the mill store. The Lauries later relocated to Kitimat and then to Prince George, where they ran a motel for 22 years.
Kyuquot Elementary Secondary School
The Kyuquot Elementary School, currently (2019) known as Kyuquot Elementary Secondary School, is located on Vancouver Island. The school provides aboriginal education to students grades K-12. The school is a part of the Vancouver Island West School District 084 that includes other four First Nations Schools.
Born in Kōfu, Yamanashi prefecture, Japan in 1841, Kusakabe Kimbei was one of the most successful photographers in nineteenth century Japan. In the 1860s, he assisted Felix Beato, the Italian-British photographer, who was one of the first photographers to work in Asia, and also worked with the Austrian Baron Raimund von Stillfried based in Yokohoma. By 1880, Kusakabe had opened his own studio in Yokohama. After Stillfried left Japan, Kusakabe acquired some of Beato’s and Stillfried’s negatives and made prints and told them along with his own photographs.
Kuldip Gill was born in Punjab, India; she and her family immigrated to Canada when Kuldip was five years old. The family formally settled in the Fraser Valley area of British Columbia. After working for several years in the resource industry, she pursued and obtained both a BA and MA in Social Anthropology from UBC, the latter in 1982. In 1988, she received a Ph.D. – also from UBC – after extensive travel to Fiji to research the lives of elderly Indian women there.
Kersti Krug is a researcher and writer in the field of non-profit management, and a former Director of Communications and Manager of Research and Evaluation at the Museum of Anthropology (MOA) at the University of British Columbia (UBC).
Before joining MOA, Krug was Senior Personnel Advisor to the Auditor General of Canada (1980) and Assistant Director of the National Gallery of Canada (1980-1988). Between 1991 and 1997, she worked for the UBC Faculty of Commerce and Business Administration as a researcher, instructor, and Acting Director of the Arts Administration Option.
In 1990, Krug began work at MOA. Her first position at MOA was Director of Communications (1990-1998); subsequently, she occupied the roles of Manager of Research and Evaluation (1998-2001) and director of the Certificate in Museum Studies program (1997-1998). Her work at MOA involved program development and organizational change management. Major projects included creating marketing projects, conducting visitor studies, co-creation and development of the Certificate in Museum Studies program, project management for the expansion of the MOA building, developing business plans, and grant writing.
During this period, Krug was also director of studies for an interdisciplinary graduate program in critical curatorial studies in the Faculty of Arts (1998-2001). After leaving MOA in 2001, Krug joined the Faculty of Graduate Studies as Assistant Dean, Strategic Planning and Communications (2001-2006). She was instrumental in the 2007 founding of the College for Interdisciplinary Studies, of which she became Assistant Principal, Strategic Development and Administration. Krug retired form this position in 2009 to work as a consultant.
Krug completed her MBA at UBC in 1990, and in 1999 received her PhD from UBC’s Individual Interdisciplinary Studies Graduate Program. Her thesis on managing administrative change in MOA is entitled “A hypermediated ethnography of organizational change: conversations in the Museum of Anthropology.”
Ken Kuramoto was contracted by the Museum of Anthropology in 1980 to produce the film Celebration of the Raven. At this time, Kuramoto was director of K.K Enterprises.
Karen J. Clark (née Kuil) graduated with a degree in Anthropology and Archaeology and a Teaching Certification from the University of Oregon. After completing her Master's in Anthropology, she accepted a teaching position in the Catholic Residential School of Lower Post (BC, Canada), where she moved in 1964. In 1965, she was hired by the school village to teach Indigenous children from grade 1 to 8 during the week and kindergarten on Sundays. The following year, she was transferred to Cassiar (BC, CA) where she taught the primary grades. In 1966 she was hired as the first teacher at a new school in Pelly Crossing (YT, Canada) where she taught Indigenous children who barely spoke English.
In 1967 Mrs. Clark went back to Cassiar where she married Paul Clark (a mining engineer). She continued teaching in Cassiar and, in 1968, published "Johny Joe" to help Indigenous students getting more engaged with reading.
In 1969, Mrs. Clark moved to Alaska, where she graduated in 1970 with a Master's in Teaching from the University of Alaska. That same year, she was hired at the Two Rivers School (30 miles from Fairbanks, AK, US) to teach grades 1 to 4.
In 1973, Mrs. Clark was awarded Teacher of the Year by Fairbanks and the State of Alaska. That same year, Mrs. Clark and her husband returned to Cassiar, where she was hired as a reading specialist to help teachers of the school district to teach and encourage reading among Indigenous children. In 1975, she published "Sun, Moon and Owl" with a grant from the BC Teacher's Federation.
In 1976, she took a year's leave of absence to gather materials to write a book for the Tahltan children that could be incorporated into the school curriculum. With help from many Indigenous people, she gathered materials from the Telegraph Creek area, resulting in the "Tahltan Native Studies."
In 1977, Mrs. Clark moved to Alberta, where she became the program specialist for the Rockyview school District. In 1984, she published "Language Experiences with Children's Stories" and "Once Upon a Time."
In 1988, she became principal of the Exshaw School, in Exshaw (AB, Canada), where the majority of the students came from the nearby Stoney Reserve.
Mrs. Clark retired in 1989.
After having graduated from the University of Oregon with a degree in Anthropology and a Teaching Certification, Karen, in the middle of her master's degree in Anthropology decided that she wanted real life experience with Native people. She applied to the departments of Indian Affairs in both the US and Canada and was very quickly contacted by Canadian Indian Affairs to teach for six months in a Catholic residential school in Lower Post, British Columbia, about 20 miles below the Yukon border. The following year (1965), she was hired to be the teacher of the village school teaching all Native children in grades kindergarten - 8. This was the last log cabin school in B.C. and her teacherage was an annex to the school.
The following year she was transferred to Cassiar, a mining town in northern B.C. There she taught the primary grades to both White and Native children.
In 1966, she became the first teacher at a new school that was to be built in Pelly Crossing, Yukon. All of her students were Native students, most of whom did not speak English. There was a trapping/hunting culture using dog teams only. She had the only vehicle in the village.
In 1967, she made the very difficult decision to leave Pelly Crossing to marry her fiance whom she had met in Cassiar.
For the next three years, she taught in Cassiar and in 1968 wrote the book "Johnny Joe" for her Native students, who had difficulty using the readers provided by the school.
In 1969, she and her husband made the decision to return to university and chose the University of Alaska because they wanted to stay in the north and also because the U of A had a reputation of having the best educational program for teaching Native children. In 1970, she received her Master's of Arts in Teaching and in the same year, obtained a teaching position at the Two Rivers School, a rural school about 30 miles from Fairbanks. This was a one room school and she taught grades 1-4. Having had success in her first year, the School Board decided to add another room and appointed Karen Head Teacher. Then, with another successful year, they decided to add another room. That year, 1973, Karen was awarded Teacher of the Year for Fairbanks as well as Teacher of the Year for the State of Alaska.
In 1973, she returned to Cassiar, where her husband obtained employment and she became a reading specialist helping the teachers in the Stikine School District to teach Native children. There she continued her quest to get better educational material for Native children, and obtained a small grant from the B.C. Teacher's Federation to write a book for Native children. The result was "Sun, Moon and Owl", published in 1975. This book was the most popular book requested by teachers and was republished 14 times.
In 1976, she obtained permission to take a year's leave of absence to write a book for the Tahltan people that could be used in the school curriculum. She, with the help of many Native people drove around the Telegraph Creek area to record the stories of the Elders and obtain photographs to show their culture. The result was Tahltan Native Studies.
In 1977, she and her husband moved to the Calgary area where she became a program specialist for the Rockyview School District. In 1984, she wrote "Language Experiences with Children's Stories" and "Once Upon a Time". Both books became required texts for graduate teaching students at the University of Calgary.
In 1988, she became principal of the Exshaw School in Exshaw, Alberta, which taught grades 1-9. Seventy-five percent of the students came from the nearby Stoney Reserve.
After suffering from some health problems, she retired in 1989. She continues to live in the area with her husband on a ranch located in the Foothills of the Rockies.
In spring of 1983, Karen Duffek received her Masters of Arts in Anthropology from the University of British Columbia with a thesis titled The Contemporary Northwest Coast Indian Art Market. Karen Duffek’s relationship with the Museum of Anthropology has spanned over twenty years. From 1985 through 1999, Duffek was a Guest Curator and Research Associate, during which time she worked closely with Marjorie Halpin. In 1999, she took on a role as Interim Manager in Administration at MOA. In 2000, she was hired by the Museum of Anthropology as a Curator of Contemporary Visual Arts & the Pacific Northwest. Since 1985, Duffek has published numerous articles, essays, and anthologies addressing issues in Native Art. She has written multiple exhibition catalogues, including The Transforming Image: Painted Arts of Northwest Coast First Nations (UBC Press, 2000), which she co-authored with Bill McLennan. The Transforming Image won the Canadian Museum Association’s 2001 Award for Outstanding Achievement in Publications, and the British Columbia Historical Federation’s Certificate of Merit for Historical Writing in 2000. In 2005, Karen Duffek co-edited the anthology, Bill Reid and Beyond: Expanding on Modern Native Art (Douglas & McIntyre, 2004).
As the Curator of Contemporary Visual Arts & the Pacific Northwest, Karen Duffek has curated some major exhibitions at the Museum of Anthropology, including Border Zones: New Art across Cultures (2010), and Robert Davidson: The Abstract Edge (2004).
Selig Kaplan is a professor emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley, Department of Nuclear Engineering. He and his wife Gloria have been longtime collectors of Northwest Coast First Nations artwork.
Kajima Seibei came from a wealthy business family. Kajima travelled around Japan in the late 1880s and early 1890s, and produced many photographic works that he distributed through various studios. As one of the founding members of the Photographic Society of Japan, he helped finance Ogawa Kazumasa, another important photographer from this period. In 1895, he opened a photo studio in Tokyo.
John Watt Beattie was a commercial photographer with his own firm in Hobart, Tasmania. Besides documenting Tasmania, becoming state photographer in 1896, he accumulated and published a large stock of photos as listed in his Catalogue of a Series of Photographs Illustrating the Scenery and Peoples of the Islands of the South and Western Pacific (undated but probably 1909).
In 1892 Beattie lent a camera to his friend Bishop Montgomery for a tour with the Melanesian Mission which visited Norfolk Island, the Banks and Torres groups (Vanuatu), Santa Cruz, Reef Islands, Nukapu, Makira, Malaita, Guadalcanal, Gela, Isabel (Solomon Islands), and Pentecost, Ambae, Maewo (Vanuatu). Montgomery and missionaries Welchman and Brittain took photos which were returned to, and published by, Beattie.
In 1896 Beattie himself visited Norfolk Island and made photos of the Melanesian Mission base there which are listed in his Pacific Islands catalalogue. In 1906, through Bishop Montgomery, Beattie was invited to accompany Bishop Cecil Wilson on the Melanesian Mission ship Southern Cross, from Auckland via Norfolk Island to Vanuatu and Solomon Islands. The ship went via Port Vila, Pentecost, Ambae, Maewo, Banks and Torres groups (Vanuatu), Vanikoro, Reef Islands, Santa Cruz, Makira, Ugi, Ulawa, Malaita, Gela, Savo, Guadalcanal, Isabel, Vella Lavella and Choiseul (Solomon Islands), then returned by the same route. Beattie made 1,500 full and half-plate photos and kept a diary of his tour which complements his inscriptions on the plates and the entries in his catalogue.
Josephine Gladstone (nee Wilson) was born ca. 1869. She married Charlie Gladstone on February 4, 1892. They had three children: Magaret Janet (ca. 1892), Sophia (1895), and Edgar (1897). She died in Skidegate on March 12, 1932 at 63.
Jonathan Griffin was a UBC student. In 1974 Griffin took a trip to Anthony Island in Haida Gwaii, where he took extensive pictures of the conditions of the poles at a deserted Haida village.