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Alaska Film Archives

About the Collection

Over the past half century, the University of Alaska Fairbanks has built the largest collection of archival films in and about Alaska. The collection combines hundreds of donations of film and videos to UAF by individuals, organizations and institutions. Materials range from professional productions to amateur home-movies, made in and about Alaska from the earliest days of filmmaking through today. Since 1993 these materials have been held by the Alaska Film Archives, a unit of Alaska and Polar Regions Collections & Archives in the Elmer E. Rasmuson Library. Films and videos selected for this portal project are a sampling of the thousands available for checkout on DVD through the Rasmuson Library. Unless otherwise noted, items are presented here in their entirety, unedited and uncut. Short, popular clips from the collection can be viewed on our YouTube channel. Read more about the Alaska Film Archives.

1 to 5 of 5 Objects
[Dawson Cooper collection]
[Dawson Cooper collection]
This footage features the Ice Carnival puppy parade and regular parade in Fairbanks, people at a wedding in a private home, people hauling boxes on a dog cart, a fishwheel, interior river scenes, a town on a riverfront, Ft. Yukon scenes, river scenes, flower gardens, people in a house, sled dog races on Chena River, teams passing under a foot bridge on Noyes Slough, downhill skiing on Birch Hill, a parade in the summer, hockey at Griffin Park ice rink, the Ice Carnival throne, an unidentified woman, a stack of logs, a walking dragline, conveyor and mine scenes in Ester, columns of smoke from a forest fire, the KFAR transmitter building, people on a picnic, the midnight sun, a car on a narrow road, mining equipment, car travel filmed from inside the car, airplanes, placer gold mine operations, sluice box clean-up, a box with gold amalgam, a dredge operating, a flower garden, and tomato plants.
[Fairbanks ice carnivals and aviation]
[Fairbanks ice carnivals and aviation]
This footage features the 1929 Fairbanks Ice Carnival Queen contest, a flight with Ed Young, a film shot by Dan Lhamon, Howard Hughes in Fairbanks in August 1938 during his 1938 Around the World Flight in a Lockheed Super Electra, a Pan American airplane, a Pacific Alaska Airways airplane, a Wien Alaska Airlines airplane, and the 1948 Ice Carnival sled dog races. According to George Lounsbury, approximately the first five minutes of footage is a Lounsbury family film, and it contains images of George's mother in the late 1920s. Scenes of Howard Hughes were from a film obtained from Earl Pilgrim. Scenes of Russian airplanes, Juneau, and Nome were films from Dan Lhamon and Rod Wolff. The remainder is film George Lounsbury received from his brother, but the origin is unknown, and the Lounsbury family does not appear in that part of the film.
[Lounsbury film collection 1]
[Lounsbury film collection 1]
Footage includes children, rotary snow plow, men outside F.E. company building, downtown Fairbanks, a dredge, Pacific Alaskan Airways (PAA) hangar and people leaving, the Cleary City Post Office, people posing, Billy Roots bus (?), Cleary Summit roadhouse, men with a caterpillar tractor, small cat train in front of Service motors, Fairbanks streets, Jimmie Mattern signing autographs at PAA Hangar at Weeks Field, Mattern's airplane “Texan” and Russian flying boat at Weeks Field during search for Sigismund Levanevsky, people departing Fairbanks on Alaska Railroad (ARR), Richardson Highway Transportation Company bus, steamship travel in Southeast, a gold dredge and thaw field, MST Company bus , boys at Fox, woman with a horse at Cleary Summit roadhouse, a boy with shovel, Chena River spring break-up, dog races, Sigrid Seppala wearing parka, Winter Carnival Parade, and dog races.
[Lounsbury film collection 4]
[Lounsbury film collection 4]
AAF-10856 includes aerial views of Nome, the Nome waterfront, aerial views of the Seward peninsula, a mining operation, a truck pulling a long length of pipe, Mirow Air Service Loening flying boat airplane, a dredge operating on the Seward peninsula, a Pacific Alaska Airways Lockheed Electra, a Caterpillar and power shovel working at a placer gold mining operation, men cleaning up gold in a sluice box, various views of placer mining operations, a small riverboat, brief views of Palmer, a hard rock mining operation in Hatcher Pass, an aerial tramway operating, an Alaska Railroad bus on rails, aerial views of Copper Center (?), aerial views of Fairbanks, a Northern Commercial Caterpillar shop on Second Avenue in Fairbanks, the interior of an office, railroad travel and family scenes, Ice Carnival Parades in Fairbanks, Ice Carnival dog races and activities on the Chena River (during 1940, 1946, and 1950), a barge trip with the riverboats Idler and Mudhen taking barges with Caterpillars and other equipment, and a Cat train during winter hauling freight through a wooded area and cross country to Wiseman. Additional film has suffered water damage. Footage includes Lounsbury boys, a village along the ocean, family and farm scenes taken outside of Alaska, winter scenes in Fairbanks, boys shoveling off a roof and playing in snow, and a family posing for photos. According to George Lounsbury, approximately the first 30 minutes are Dan Lhamon and Rod Wolff films ending with the parade sequence. The next approximately 15 minutes are Johnny Repo (sp?) and Walter Rasmussen (sp?) films beginning with the boat sequence and ending with views of the Third Rail at Wiseman. The remainder of the reel is Lounsbury family films beginning with footage of a mine at Ester Dome and scenes at Kotzebue followed by a family visit to Iowa.
[Lounsbury film collection 8]
[Lounsbury film collection 8]
Footage includes people on Fairbanks streets (including Joe Crosson with a bowtie), people on a bus, a bus trip on Steese Highway in the winter, children on a street, men outside of the F.E. Company building, a rotary snowplow in operation, Ice Carnival or Winter Carnival parade floats, winter bus travel, Fairbanks street scenes, a woman with puppies, men outside of a building, a woman with a baby, men with a dead wolf, men outside of Billy Root's Transportation Company in Chatanika (?), people standing next to a bus, men pushing a car at a gas station, cars and trucks along a road, men outside of the F.E. Company building, people posing on Fairbanks streets, trucks travelling along a road during winter, a crowd lining Cushman Street, sled dog teams, Leonhard Seppala, and a Caterpillar plowing a road.