Kotzebue

It was the 4th of July and we were in the Iñupiat town of Kotzebue, the largest community in Northwest Alaska.  Kotzebue is on the Chukchi Sea north of the Bering Sea and opposite Russia, some 50 kilometres north of the Arctic Circle.  Before the Europeans came it was a major Arctic trading port between the Russians and the Iñupiat Eskimos who traded in fur, skins and seal-oil, and later in gold. Trade increased with the arrival of the whale boats and missionaries.