Celebration

Ahead of Celebration in 2016, Dennis Jack of Angoon organized a canoe group with seven veterans paddling. This year, the combat veteran says there’s 22.

More than a hundred paddlers navigate about a dozen canoes toward Juneau for this year’s Celebration. Those with the One People Canoe Society paddle from their Southeast Alaska towns to Juneau. To keep everyone safe, support vessels run alongside these canoes to provide emergency care or just shelter from the storm.

Dance groups, artists, canoe paddlers and traditional food experts are gearing up for Celebration 2018, June 6-9 at Juneau’s Centennial Hall.

Southeast Alaska’s Tlingit culture doesn’t stop at the Canadian border. An Inland Tlingit group from up the Taku River has strong connections to Alaska.

The Celebration canoes have arrived, and KCAW’s Emily Kwong and KTOO’s Jennifer Canfield were among the hundreds there for it at Sandy Beach.

“We don’t want our youth to think that our culture is a static culture (and) that it doesn’t change,” Sealaska Heritage Institute President Rosita Worl.