Here’s one of the more unusual things we found on our Alaska cruise: in a town marked by state business and tourism, the star attraction was a tiny Russian Orthodox Church, on a hillside street above downtown.
Things are not always what they might seem. The logical explanation for a Russian Orthodox Church in Alaska would seem to be that it’s a remnant of Russian settlement before the U.S. bought Alaska—and yet, the Russians never settled in that part of the future state.
As it turns out, St. Nicholas was built and attended by Tlingit people, native Alaskans, who had encountered Russian trappers and missionaries in other parts of Alaska; the Bible and Orthodox ritual had been translated into Tlingit.
In the 1890s, a prominent Tlingit leader went to Sitka, where an Orthodox church existed, and brought one of its priests to Juneau, where he had convinced others to join him in converting. Several hundred Tlingit joined, and a church was needed.
The Orthodox Missionary Society in Russia sent plans, icons, and other interior fittings for the church, in so-called “Russian Colonial” style. The Russian Orthodox metropolitan for North America came from San Francisco for the dedication in 1894. By that time, the Tlingit had been joined by a number of already-Orthodox Serbian miners.
The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973, and is still an active congregation.
No explanation offered whether this is a joke, or simply where they store it.
If Saint Nicholas is a small gem, here’s the other end of the spectrum. Alaskans repeatedly told us that their state had the state capital with the most beautiful surroundings and the ugliest Capitol building. Here it is, along with its even-less-attractive state office building.
