Changes and Exchanges

Archaeological evidence indicates that by the 1820s, the Kigirktaugmiut of Herschel Island had trade goods from Russia. They travelled annually to Barter Island in Alaska with furs, sealskins, and oil which they traded with the Alaskan Inuvialuit for iron, knives, and beads. The Inuvialuit of Herschel Island were quite familiar with European trade goods even though they were unfamiliar with the peoples and their cultures.

An Inuvialuit, Nuligak, remembered his first encounter with white men when he was a young boy,

"The sailors we met always had something in their mouths, something they chewed. It so intrigued me that I kept staring at their jaws. One certain day that 'thing' was given to me. I chewed - it was delicious. It was chewing gum. From that day I was able to
recognize some of these white men's things."

The presence of the American whalers on Herschel Island 1889-1908 depleted the natural resources and disrupted the traditional subsistence patterns of the Mackenzie Inuvialuit. Traditionally, the Inuvialuit of Herschel Island were primarily fishermen so the whalers traded with the inland Nunatarmiuts of Alaska and the Gwitch'in for caribou and with the Herschel Island Inuvialuit for fish.

The whalers brought canned and dried foods with them. To prevent scurvy, a disease caused by the lack of vitamin C, they relied on fresh meats and fresh vegetables. A whaling ship with 35 men might consume over 9 tons of fresh meat during a winter. The whalers traded tea, flour, sugar, candy, chewing tobacco, firearms and ammunition, knives, files, whaleboats, small stoves, clothing, combs, soap, hand sewing machines, lines, whaleboats, harpoons and matches, metal cooking pots, matches, scissors, sewing needles, thimbles, canvas, calico, looking glasses, accordions, phonographs, records, and phonograph needles.

In return, the Inuvialuit traded fresh caribou, moose and fish, white fox skins and other furs, ducks, whalebone (baleen), ivory, winter clothing and footwear, and "curios".

The Inuvialuit taught the white men how to survive in the North. Captain Bodfish and his crew started out wearing heavy woollen clothing of all kinds to combat the frigid
temperatures and were perplexed at the native attire. As Bodfish explained...

"… we formed the opinion that the natives didn't know how to keep warm. But before the end of the first winter we adopted the native dress altogether, and provided outfits for all the men. Such clothing was light and perfectly comfortable. We never dressed otherwise from that time on for Arctic weather."

The winter outfit included a caribou skin shirt, knee-length pants, and stockings with the hair turned in against the skin. For outdoor and colder weather a second suit of caribou clothing was worn over top with the hair turned outside. A calico cloth shirt pulled over the skin jacket kept the snow out of the hair during storms. Snow boots of sealskin or whale skin completed the outfit.

The Inuvialuit also taught the newcomers how to run dog teams, travel on snowshoes, hunt, and trap. Without these new skills, many would not have survived.

Though the white man introduced new technologies and market and credit economies to the Inuvialuit that made their lives easier, the white man also introduced liquor and new diseases which had profound negative effects on the lives of the native people.

Before 1888, few whites had visited the western Arctic and the Inuvialuit had not built up immunity to common European illnesses. The whalers brought venereal diseases, measles, and influenza. The Inuvialuit had no resistance to these diseases and died in appalling numbers. By the mid 1890s, the effect on the population of the Mackenzie Inuvialuit was evident.

Some whalers spent nine months of the year locked in the snow and ice at Herschel Island. While time was spent preparing the ships for winter moorage and later for the summer whale hunt, much time was spent with little to do. Boredom, loneliness, and disease took their toll on the whalers. Alcohol often aggravated these situations for them.

Captain Bodfish held the superstition that men who gave liquor to the natives would not enjoy good fortune. As a result, liquor was not included in his list of trade goods though it was brought along on the voyage for medicinal purposes and special occasions. All did not hold this outlook, and many ships arrived with cargos full of liquor for trade. The only law on the Island (the North West Mounted Police did not arrive until 1903), was imposed by the ships' officers, many of whom were not exactly "law abiding citizens" themselves.

In the early years liquor flowed quite freely on Herschel Island. It was sold or traded for furs, walrus ivory, bone, and female companionship. As a result, drunkenness, rape, abductions, assaults, murder, and suicide all occurred from time to time.

Things began to settle down with the arrival in 1893 of Reverend Isaac Stringer. By 1894, many ship captains began to bring their wives and children. The newly established social clubs barred intoxicants.