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As Alaskans, we take great pride in our unique culture and the breathtaking beauty of our state. Yet, hidden within this beauty is a pressing issue that affects a significant part of our population: our seniors. Today, I want to address the multifaceted challenges they face, including voting rights, economic security, access to quality health care, social justice, and educational opportunities. We must unite to advocate for meaningful changes that ensure our seniors receive the respect and support they deserve. Voting rights: Alaskans must be...
Frances Perkins was tough as nails. She had to be. She was the first woman ever to serve in a presidential cabinet. Perkins was Secretary of Labor from 1933 to 1945 under President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Her beat was workers, immigrants, and the creation of Social Security. She was determined, focused, and did not suffer fools. According to her Wikipedia entry, one time she got in a spat with Alfred P. Sloan, the chairman of the board at General Motors. During a United Auto Workers strike, she...
After months of heating our homes through Alaska's long, cold winter, now is the perfect time to check that everything works safely. Your heating system has been working hard, and a little attention now can prevent fires and keep you warm through the rest of the winter and into spring. Wood stoves and fireplaces need regular cleaning to work safely. Creosote builds up inside the chimney when you burn wood. This black tar-like substance is dangerous because it can catch fire. If you've been using...
My husband, Gary, passed away in December 2025 at the Palmer Veterans and Pioneers Home -his residence for almost four years. The staff graciously told me to take all the time I needed to remove his belongings from his room. Above his bed was a beautiful quilt made by his grandmother-a lady I never met. It is a requirement that only lightweight items be placed on the wall above a bed at the Pioneer Home...a precaution for earthquakes. On the wall in his bathroom was a lovely Alaska-themed lap...
Anchorage's oldest unsolved murder happened 105 years ago this month when the town's first police chief was gunned down as he tried to get a handle on illegal activities like prostitution, bootlegging, and gambling. An eyewitness account of crime in the railroad town founded in 1915 comes from Kenneth Gideon, author of "Wandering Boy," who visited the town as it began to grow along Ship Creek. Along with describing the proliferation of prostitution, Gideon noted: "The government had decreed...
The light is coming back, and that's a good thing. But if you're not instantly heartened by the returning light and are dreading the next few months of cold and dark, this is what I've learned about coping with winter. Get outside. It doesn't matter what the temperature is or how strong the wind is blowing. Make it a point to get outside. Ideally, you'll spend 20 minutes walking or doing more vigorous exercise. If you're less than mobile, can you stand on your porch and look at the stars on a...
Welcome to 2026. As this new year starts, on behalf the Senior Voice Team, I express our thanks for the gifts through the cash, the subscriptions, and the advertising opportunities that you have allowed Senior Voice to be part of. Your donations allow the Senior Voice to have skin in the game by cost sharing in the production of the newspaper with our corporate donors. Without you, meeting the terms of the grant would not be possible. Again, thank you for your choice to invest in the Senior Voice. In 2026, office hours will be weekdays from...
My cell phone rang late (9:45 p.m.) on a 2025 November night. I did not recognize the number, but have learned to pick up as it could easily be in regard to my husband's health. The voice at the other end said he was so and so with the Palmer Police Department. My mind immediately warned "scam." But I didn't hang up. The "officer" wanted to know if I was missing anything. "Not that I know of," I replied. "Did you do any shopping at the Palmer Fred Meyer store this evening?" Yes. "Did you get...
Emily Morgan, a 47-year-old Red Cross public health nurse, played an instrumental role during the deadly diphtheria outbreak in Nome, 101 years ago this month. The crisis began when children with sore throats and tonsillitis symptoms rapidly succumbed to the illness. Morgan, drawing on her experience with diphtheria from her nursing work in Kansas, was among the first to recognize the telltale signs of the disease after being called to attend 7-year-old Bessie Stanley. Despite the family's...
Editor's Note: National Centenarian's Day was Sept. 22. The day honors those who've celebrated 100 birthdays or more. We're publishing several profiles of people who have hit this milestone this fall. The Alaska Commission on Aging is working with the Governor's Office, Pioneer Homes and Long Term Care Ombudsman to celebrate Alaska's centenarians. This interview was made possible thanks to the Alaska Commission on Aging. A lot of Alaskans of a certain era can recall driving up the Alcan, their...
Do you have fond memories of hanging out and listening to vinyl records when you were young? Maybe you still have some in a box in your attic, collecting dust. Or perhaps you still listen to them. Records are back in style. And they're not just popular with people who are nostalgic for days gone by. Introduced in 1948, the "long-playing" (LP) record format dominated the music industry until the late 1980s when they were largely replaced on store shelves by compact discs (CDs). Long forgotten by...
The only reason I attended the 2024 Colony High Christmas Bazaar was to purchase the most recent Tundra comic book. I had tried in August at the Alaska State Fair, but at the Tundra booth, Chad Carpenter told me they weren't back from the printers yet. So, when I learned that Tundra would be one of the vendors at that bazaar, I circled the date on my calendar. As I drove to the school shortly before the 10 o'clock opening time, the sun was peeking out to the left of Pioneer Peak in all its...
Elementary school students will get to enjoy cross country skiing thanks to an initiative of the Nordic Skiing Association of Anchorage and the Anchorage School District. The nonprofit created a kit called the Ski Mobile that was built to be shared among 60 Anchorage schools. The Ski Mobile includes 30 sets of skis and boots to fit children in grades 3–5. The kit was inspired by a group that organizes NSAA ski events. It was championed by 2018 Olympic gold medalist and cross country skier K...
Following the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, and the American retaliation strike on Tokyo by the Doolittle Raiders in April 1942, Japanese leadership began searching for ways to ext end their bombing range across the Pacific Ocean. Soon, Alaska found itself on the front lines of an unusual, silent, aerial assault. From late 1944 to 1945, Japanese fu-go balloon bombs found their way to the Last Frontier's shores. The fu-go ("fūsen" is the Japanese word for balloon and...
Editor's Note: National Centenarian's Day was Sept. 22. The day honors those who've celebrated 100 birthdays or more. We're publishing several profiles of people who have hit this milestone this fall. The Alaska Commission on Aging is working with the Governor's Office, Pioneer Homes and Long Term Care Ombudsman to celebrate Alaska's centenarians. This interview was made possible thanks to the Alaska Commission on Aging. Genevieve Armstrong, known as Jean, has lived long enough to see airplanes...
Dear editor, I look forward to getting my copy of the Senior Voice every month. There is so much information in each copy. I have saved them for some time. I always look for Maraley McMichael’s columns first so imagine my delight in seeing her on the cover of the October issue I received today! Thank you. Mona Painter Dear editor, The Matanuska-Susitna Valley is a place of natural beauty; lakes, rivers, and streams have long been at the heart of our community’s way of life. As our population grows and ages, and with new senior housing bei...
One intrepid postman set out from Nome in November 1905 with his team of dogs, led by a wolf, on a 15-month odyssey that would test his resolve and capture the public's imagination. Eli Smith, a seasoned mail carrier from Nome, embarked on an epic 8,000-mile trek to Washington D.C., all to settle a high-stakes wager. Born around 1855 in Wisconsin, Smith led a life of adventure long before his famous mushing expedition that would test the limits of human and canine endurance. He worked various...
I bought my first computer in the late 1980s. I paid $1,200 for a used Kaypro. It was the size of a sewing machine carrying case, had sturdy all-steel housing, and it weighed 26 pounds. The manufacturer didn't have the nerve to call it "portable." We proud Kaypro owners called it "luggable." I sidled up to the evolving technologies over the decades because, as a practical matter, I thought they could help me be a better educator and communicator. And now: artificial intelligence (AI). Yes, it is...
My husband Gary and I were snowbirds back in 2009. Having left our kids' families in Colorado, we headed to Texas by way of Branson, Missouri. We found a nice RV park in Carthage to park our truck and travel trailer, which was only 15 miles from LaRussell, the small-town home of one of my dad's good friends, Jim Brock. I wanted to go to Jim's house to visit and give him a program from Dad's memorial service, rather than enclose it in our Christmas card to him. Jim and Dad worked together at...
The Alaska Moving Image Preservation Association (AMIPA) and Doyon Foundation will co-present a fundraiser screening of “Spirit of the Wind” a 1979 film about George Attla. The event is in recognition of November as Alaska Native/American Indian Heritage Month. Shot on location in Fairbanks, the film follows Attla from his life as a young Athabascan trapper in rural Alaska, to a tuberculosis diagnosis that meant years in sanitoriums in Tanana and Sitka and how he goes on to become a champion sprint dog musher. The film will be screened at 4 p...
The motto of the Salvation Army, "Sharing is Caring," applies well to the Salvation Army Family Store in Fairbanks. On a recent fall day, along with the first snow of the season, three MASST participants gathered with Capt. Jon Tollerud, store manager Penny Turnbull, and three other volunteers. The crew was reorganizing the entire thrift store, closed for the week, for a grand reopening in October. It was clear that they had already done loads of work over the past weeks and months. Winter was...
Nov. 1-30 National Family Caregiver Month Set aside to celebrate and recognize the efforts made by family members caring for loved ones as they age. Nov. 1-30 National National Native American Heritage Month. As early as 1916, when New York became the first state to declare an “American Indian Day,” efforts have been made to acknowledge the many contributions and achievements of Native peoples. In the 1970s it was a week. In 1990, Congress passed and President George H. W. Bush signed into law a joint resolution designating the month of Nov...
Esteline "Estie" Moe, who has lived in Alaska since 1947, turned 103 this summer, celebrating her birthday with neighbors and family. When asked what the key to a long life is, she simply says, "You have to milk cows." Estie was raised on a farm in northern Minnesota, the eldest daughter in her family, and did chores alongside her father and two brothers. With 40 cows on the farm, she would milk ten cows every morning before breakfast and every night after school, shovel manure, and stack hay....
A visit to Norma Alderfer's home shows a woman who is meticulous-in her recollections, her style, her graciousness. She welcomed two visitors on a sunny day in July dressed in blue pants and a cream-colored sweater with a matching necklace, her red lipstick on and a neat stack of letters and mementos ready to share. From Kansas to Alaska At 101, Norma can tell you all about her childhood in Arkansas City, Kansas, the beloved only daughter of a couple who raised a daughter to be a doer. She worke...
Monday, Nov. 24, 2025 Online via Zoom https://alaska.zoom.us/j/82305144805?pwd=S0VIdzNCWE03Z2prMFk4V1ozWUwyZz09 The OPAG board of directors meets at 12:30 p.m., followed immediately by the annual meeting....
