By ALEXANDER DOLITSKY

The household of Russian Old Believers in Alaska in many ways is similar to those of the 18th-and 19th-century Siberian peasants of Russian origin. The Trans-Baykalians build their houses with constructive and decorative elements characteristic of the northern areas of Russia and decorate the interior with red, blue, green, and orange colors, using patterns well-known in Ukraine and Belorussia. The Trans-Baykal area is the only place where architectural elements mentioned in folk descriptions of the homesteads of boyars (grand dukes or Old-Russian noble­men) still survive.

Old Believers in Alaska are not exceptionally tradition-bound in their household construction. Generally, the Old Believers of Nikolaevsk live in large, one-story houses consist­ing of several rooms, a kitchen, small closets and a veranda. Several small buildings such as banya (steam baths), stoybishche (cattle house), parnik (heated green house) and toilet are within the area of a nuclear family’s house­hold. Each family household constitutes an independent economic unit and is surrounded by a solidly built fence. Furniture in the main house is quite simple, but strong and comfortable. 

Although some elements of the traditional architecture and interior design are still present within Old Believer households, modern utilities are favored and extensively used by Old Believers of all religious groupings. An altar with the family icons sitting in a small shelter, curtained with an embroidered covering, stands in a prominent corner of the front room. 

Alaskan Old Believers’ economic success can be explained by values that confer normative status on hard work, modest needs, and efficient man­agement of household resources. Old Believers value property and wealth, not as necessities in themselves, but as insurance against possible future hardship. If necessary, Old Believers often assist each other, especially within related nuclear families. Clusters of closely related families are the cornerstones of the community. 

The religious and social isolation of Old Believers in Alaska is a major determi­nant of their quasi-subsistence living conditions. Presently, in contrast to the Amish, Old Believers are not in competition with new technology, i.e., machinery, appliances, electricity, telephones, and other advances. However, Old Believers are economically, mostly agriculturally, self-sufficient. Yet, they are efficient as well. Many conservative families do not purchase food (except sugar, salt and flour) or traditional clothes outside of their community. Each family tries to guarantee its supply of food for the entire year. Their food comes largely from vegetable gardening, fishing, cattle raising, and hunting. 

The basic diet is made up of home-grown vegetables, bread and pastries made from wheat and corn, meat that is approved if it comes from an animal with a cloven hoof, fish and shellfish. Among conservative Old Believers in Alaska, animals with paws (e.g., squirrel, rabbit, and bear) are regarded as unfit to eat. None of the Alaskan Old Believers make their living from farming, primarily because of cold and long winters and the short growing season in Alaska.

Trade and exchange play a vital role in Old Believers’ daily life, penetrating the social system and holding the community together. Sometimes Old Believers buy or trade a particular essential item within their community. For example, in the 1980s, Andron Martushev’s family, residents of the Alaskan village of Nikolaevsk, supplied milk to their relatives, Fedor Basargin’s family. Similarly, Fedor’s family sold skillfully tailored traditional garments, made by his wife, Irina, to Andron and other villagers.

 Balanced reciprocity is a common form of direct exchange among Old Believers in which goods and services flow two ways. One party gives a gift to another party with an expectation of the return of a gift of equivalent value within a particular period of time. These relationships decrease and eventual­ly disappear among people who are geographically and kinship-wise remote from each other. 

Some families specialize in certain subsistence activities such as fishing, carpentry, or shipbuilding. The subsistence specialization reflects the household and structure of the farms. Often nuclear families from the same religious sect cooperate to negotiate a large construction contract from outside the village. The main economic factor of such cooperation, as a rule, is a religious solidarity among relevant Old Believer sects and factions. Normally, Old Believers do not carry out business and trade with opposing Orthodox sects.

As is the case with nearly every other aspect of Old Believers’ life, the traditions of appearance have religious significance and, historically, are deeply rooted in the medieval past. The physical type and outer appearance of Old Believers is Slavic. The Old Believers of Trans-Baykal, as well as most conservative North American Old Believers, wear clothing reminiscent of the 17^th and 18^th centuries, despite the stylistic differences of their clothes, reflecting different cultural and geographi­cal origins. Turkish and southern European traditions influenced some styles of Old Believers’ clothing, especially women’s daily dress. At baptism, however, a person is dressed in a shirt bound with a belt and is given a cross to wear around the neck. These three traditional elements — the shirt (rubashka), belt (poyas), and cross (krest)¾must be worn at all times in public. The main apparel items of religious significance are the poyas (woven belt) and the cross around the neck. These two items symbolize the bond between the bearer and Christ. The belt is not taken off except for bathing or sleeping, and the cross is not taken off except in the event of the replacement of a chain.

Men are seen with the long Russian rubashka, a tunic-like shirt girded with a poyas, a woven belt. The women wear a full dress over a long-sleeved blouse and full-length slips. Women lengthen the blouse to form a blouse/slip combination and wear a jumper (sarafan) over it, or talichka along with the ever-present peasant apron. 

The sarafan is the traditional dress of the Russian Old Believers in Alaska. It is an all-purpose piece of clothing, serving both as the every-day work dress and as the dress for formal occasions. The sarafan consists of a long skirt and a bodice with shoulder straps. It is worn with a blouse, which provides the sleeves and collar. A belt is always worn around the waist. Often an apron is worn with the sarafan, especially on more formal occasions. Unlike the talichka, the design of the sarafan has not lent itself to many modern revisions.

The talichka is a non-traditional Russian dress, a variation of the sarafan adapted in China. The talichka is never worn in church or prayer hall, and in some conservative communities the policy is not to allow the talichka on any occasion, even for casual wear. Through her choice of wearing a sarafan or talichka, an Old Believer woman makes a statement about her views on the traditional social values of the community she represents.

Children wear the adult-style clothing sized for them. Holiday clothing is more fanciful and colorful, but in the same style.

Men cut their hair, except for a fringe in front, and leave their beards untrimmed. In their religious books, they are enjoined neither to cut their hair at the temples nor to trim the edges of their beards, for to do so would be to deface the likeness of God, in whose image they were created. Old Believers believe that “…a beard is inevitably implied by the notion of man as a reflection of God.” 

Women, according to religious rules, are never permitted to cut their hair. They are not allowed to show their arms above the wrists, their legs above the calf, or any other part of their bodies in public. Unmarried women plait their hair in a single braid, and, after marriage, they keep it bound with two braids under a cap (shashmura) covered with a kerchief. The purpose of the shashmura is to hold the hair in place; women’s hair is long — sometimes past their knees. When they wash it, they braid it into two braids and wrap it around their head while it is still wet.

Hence, in the town, on the streets and in residential areas, one is treated to the frequent sight of Russians, resembling peasants of yesteryear, non­chalantly going about their business.

For Old Believers, appearance becomes highly symbolic of one’s attach­ment to the group and one’s place within society. Traditional dress becomes identified and integrated with a total way of life, and the manner of dressing becomes one of the most important elements of their collective consciousness and representation.

Alexander B. Dolitsky was born and raised in Kiev in the former Soviet Union. He received an M.A. in history from Kiev Pedagogical Institute, Ukraine, in 1976; an M.A. in anthropology and archaeology from Brown University in 1983; and was enroled in the Ph.D. program in Anthropology at Bryn Mawr College from 1983 to 1985, where he was also a lecturer in the Russian Center. In the U.S.S.R., he was a social studies teacher for three years, and an archaeologist for five years for the Ukranian Academy of Sciences. In 1978, he settled in the United States. Dolitsky visited Alaska for the first time in 1981, while conducting field research for graduate school at Brown. He lived first in Sitka in 1985 and then settled in Juneau in 1986. From 1985 to 1987, he was a U.S. Forest Service archaeologist and social scientist. He was an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Russian Studies at the University of Alaska Southeast from 1985 to 1999; Social Studies Instructor at the Alyeska Central School, Alaska Department of Education from 1988 to 2006; and has been the Director of the Alaska-Siberia Research Center (see www.aksrc.homestead.com) from 1990 to present. He has conducted about 30 field studies in various areas of the former Soviet Union (including Siberia), Central Asia, South America, Eastern Europe and the United States (including Alaska). Dolitsky has been a lecturer on the World Discoverer, Spirit of Oceanus, andClipper Odyssey vessels in the Arctic and sub-Arctic regions. He was the Project Manager for the WWII Alaska-Siberia Lend Lease Memorial, which was erected in Fairbanks in 2006. He has published extensively in the fields of anthropology, history, archaeology, and ethnography. His more recent publications include Fairy Tales and Myths of the Bering Strait Chukchi, Ancient Tales of Kamchatka; Tales and Legends of the Yupik Eskimos of Siberia; Old Russia in Modern America: Russian Old Believers in Alaska; Allies in Wartime: The Alaska-Siberia Airway During WWII; Spirit of the Siberian Tiger: Folktales of the Russian Far East; Living Wisdom of the Far North: Tales and Legends from Chukotka and Alaska; Pipeline to Russia; The Alaska-Siberia Air Route in WWII; and Old Russia in Modern America: Living Traditions of the Russian Old Believers; Ancient Tales of Chukotka, and Ancient Tales of Kamchatka.

A few of Dolitsky’s past MRAK columns:

Read: Russian saying: Beat your friends so your enemies fear you

Read: Neo-Marxism and utopian Socialism in America

Read: Old believers preserving faith in the New World

Read: Duke Ellington and the effects of Cold War in Soviet Union on intellectual curiosity

Read: United we stand, divided we fall with race, ethnicity in America

Read: For American schools to succeed, they need this ingredient

Read: Nationalism in America, Alaska, around the world

Read: The case of the ‘delicious salad’

Read: White privilege is a troubling perspective

Read: Beware of activists who manipulate history for their own agenda

Read: Alaska Day remembrance of Russian transfer

Read: American leftism is true picture of true hypocrisy

Read: History does not repeat itself

Read: The only Ford Mustang in Kiev

Read: What is greed? Depends on the generation

Read: Worldwide migration of Old Believers in Alaska

Read: Traditions of Old Believers in Alaska

Read: Language, Education of Old Believers in Alaska

By LINN MCCABE

As most Alaskans know, the Alaska House of Representatives has been in disarray for at least the last six years. Recently, a couple of conservative legislators attempted to provide leadership in a move to restore some order to the chaos by moving to table several dilatory “intent-language-only” budget amendments offered by members in their minority caucus.

Two of the amendment sponsors took exception to the motions. Their activist friends, and the affiliated entities they operate, such as Alaska Right To Life, and Alaska Gun Rights (affiliated with National Association for Gun Rights—NAGR), began to attack the legislators who moved to table amendments.

The activists posted intellectually dishonest content on social media, and created inflammatory flyers which they circulated from their booth at a local gun show. They even went so far as to show up in Juneau, where they intimidated staffers in their zeal to publicly attack the two legislators who made the motions; attacking only these two legislators, despite overwhelming affirmative votes by most members of their caucus.

All of those associated with the attacks, including the two legislators whose amendments were tabled, have been trained by the Foundation for Applied Conservative Leadership, or FACL.

FACL, which was founded by Mike Rothfeld, along with NAGR, claim to be ultra-conservative Christian organizations attempting to change the political landscape for several years through political activism.

What they do, however, is hardly conservative, nor do its practitioners appear to adhere to the most important elements of the Christian faith. FACL teaches that, in order to bring other conservatives in line, you must hold them accountable and cause them to feel pain when they don’t vote or behave as you wish.

It is a type of binding caucus; pain is applied by FACL activists through “confrontational politics” with a goal of exposing the politician who went against their “champion.”

The term “confrontational politics” was first used by Senator H.L. Richardson several years ago as a means by which conservatives could counter Saul Alinsky tactics of the left, but the tactic has been subverted by Rothfeld as a means of attacking fellow conservatives.

A recent article by Lance Roberts implies that the two FACL-affiliated legislators whose amendments were tabled are “actual conservatives (those who do something, not just those who speak conservatively).” 

The facts, however, defy this statement. A simple review of much of these FACL-affiliated lawmakers’ legislation does, in fact, expose a lack of will for these bills to become law. It is the two FACL-trained legislators who are not doing the necessary work. 

Missing from most, if not all, of their legislation, are other elements required to move it along: There are no sponsor statements, sectional analyses, or requests to the committee chairman for a hearing. Some of these bills, which are being used as a bludgeoning tool against other conservatives, were introduced as far back as spring of 2021. Their lack of action on the bills they filed, leads one to ask why they were put forward in the first place. And yet, those bludgeoning the non-submissive legislators accuse them of not signing onto the legislation.

Legislators know that if they sign onto legislation early in the process, they run the risk of being associated with legislation that morphs into something else during the committee process, as those in the majority are likely not friendly to their cause.  

Regarding the budget amendments last month, one FACL-affiliated legislator was the sponsor of over half of the amendments; 47 of the 88 budget amendments offered came from one legislator, and 19 of those were intent language only. Amendments and work from the legal department is not free; it costs the state a significant amount of money.  

One of the budget amendments that FACL activists have used in wielding their attacks was an amendment that aimed to strip pay from the commissioner of DHSS if any state funds were used to pay for abortion. Any legislation that is designed to target a specific employee in state government for punishment is wildly unconstitutional and violates the separation of powers clause(s.) Had it been constitutionally viable, it would have been rendered moot by the passage of the prior amendment which provided that no state money could be used to fund abortions. 

Many legislators over the past several years have been the victims of the confrontational techniques of the FACL-trained activists and have refused to caucus with any legislator who has used these tools against them. The whole reason that Republicans are not in the majority is because three Republicans refused to caucus with the representative who has been the face of FACL in the Legislature. Reaching a majority and acquiring leadership positions, including chairmanships of committees, is all a numbers game—a game of addition, not subtraction. Any move away from the caucus, regardless of the strength or weakness of political leanings, is a step toward relinquishing movement on any conservative legislation. FACL acolytes have been great friends to the Left in recent years. 

A lawmaker who is trained in FACL tactics will introduce the most stringent legislation or amendments possible on a topic in order to get other conservatives “on-the-record” voting a certain way. One of the most-used topics for this purpose is abortion legislation; maybe even legislation that would provide for the arrest of the girl who has an abortion and charging her with murder.

Pro-life legislators (whose districts will not tolerate voting for arresting the girl) who vote against the legislation are then labeled as not being pro-life. The activists who align with the FACL lawmaker will then use the voting record against targeted lawmakers to call them out on social media and elsewhere.

This burn-the-house-down mentality, using the application of low-information rabid activists, has created division, making the FACL movement best friends with the Left; the Left doesn’t need to lift a finger to take advantage of this division to propel their agenda forward. 

This week the Republican minority caucus expelled a member. This is nothing new; this same FACL “champion” legislator has been [clarification] censured by the House because of comments deemed racist, and has been previously stripped from committees for alleged unethical conduct. What is new, however, is that conservative Republicans have had enough. They are apparently finished with FACL and any attempts to control the entire body with incessant and dilatory motions, “filibuster” style comments in committee and on the floor, and other tactics; as well as the intimidation applied by his co-FACL activists used to cause “pain” for those who push back. 

I attended FACL training two years ago, and have several friends who have also attended the training. Many of us have distanced ourselves from FACL as we came to recognize that their tactics do not align with our faith, or even true Republicanism. There is no love and grace in these techniques and frankly they are ineffective on legislators in the minority. For example: What is the point of holding a legislator accountable when he or she chairs no committees, and has virtually no say in the outcome of legislation. 

These techniques create divisiveness and a constant churn of freshmen legislators. Republicans will never get to the majority if FACL tactics continue. This is the purpose of the Fairbanks resolution introduced at the Republican Convention. Because FACL tactics are now so well recognized by many conservatives, the resolution passed by an overwhelming majority. 

The Legislature belongs to all Alaskan’s; it does not to belong to FACL, and it is not the property of any individual legislator or their activists. FACL tactics, and the Republican fratricide they espouse must be eliminated so Alaska can move forward. We must get back to the people’s business.

Linn McCabe of Big Lake is married to Rep. Kevin McCabe and has been through FACL training.

By LANCE ROBERTS

There have been some interesting developments in the broken Alaskan House minority caucus. This is supposed to be the caucus of the conservatives, but there are only a few holding the line. These developments have culminated in an Alaska Republican party resolution that has set the stage to purge actual conservatives (those who do something, not just those who speak conservatively) from the party. Here is what happened.

The House was debating next year’s budget on the floor. As usual, there were many amendments to be brought up. The conservative ones are usually voted down by the democrat/rino majority, but sometimes to play conservative for their districts some of the libs will vote yes on one and it gets across the line. This year a new liberal scheme emerged from those in the minority who don’t stand strong on conservative principles.

A number of amendments were made by the conservatives that were pro-life, pro-gun and even an anti-vax mandate one. A pair of the faux conservatives did something not seen before, where they voted to table those amendments. This is the way to kill an amendment without letting it get talked about and voted on. Instead of letting the democrats vote against it and take the hit, they did the democrats dirty work for them. After their constituents let loose on them, informed of the travesty by Alaska Right to Life and Alaska Gun Rights, they hamstered an excuse out that they didn’t think “intent” language should be in the budget. Two things on that:

1. Intent language has always been in the budget, it’s part of how the legislature directs the money being spent.
2. They never removed any of the Democrat’s intent language, they only stopped any conservative intent language from being put in the bill that would have protected life, gun rights and medical freedom.

The bad legislators doubled-down and attacked the most conservative groups in the State because they had let their constituents know about their tactics. One, the most vocal, Kevin McCabe from Big Lake even made a House speech calling a staffer corrupt because they were involved with both groups.

This all then culminated at the 2022 Alaska Republican Party State Convention. A surprise resolution was brought up at the very end with no time to really digest it. It attacked the group Foundation for Applied Conservative Leadership (FACL), a large political organization that has passed or removed many, many laws nationwide and helped many good conservatives to be elected. After some lies, the resolution finally got down to saying

“Therefore, be it resolved, that no financial support or party endorsements, from any part of the AKGOP, be given to any candidates who are practitioners of the egregious and divisive activist principles and processes of the Foundation for Applied Conservative Leadership. “

Let me tell you what the number one principle that FACL teach is: inform constituents of how their officials vote. Yep, that’s all that happened and that’s what they want to stop. They want no one telling their constituents what they are doing in the Juneau bubble. They’ve stated publicly before they are voting with an eye towards elections, NOT to hold up the conservative principles they campaigned on.

So, what does that lead to? Well now we have an incumbent protection program. Since any challenger will want to address the record of his opponent, but that is a FACL technique, the incumbent can try to get his party support stopped. This opens up a new McCarthyism, where you can be targeted because you hold strong to your beliefs and tell people what a legislator is actually doing. It’s also very subjective and ill-defined, and will only intensify divisions within the party.

I’ve been to many FACL classes myself, and find they are the absolute best for actually teaching you how politics works. The responses of those bad legislators are exactly what I was taught they would do when confronted with their votes.

I, myself, will hold more of the classes in Alaska and continue to let people know how their legislators voted, and if that means that I have to lose party support because of my principles then I’ll live with that. At least I’ll be able to live with myself, knowing that I let people know what is really going on. While most reading this aren’t involved with the details, I would just ask you to support the proven conservative candidates who are trying every day to pass good bills and amendments, like the two being targeted directly by this action, David Eastman and Chris Kurka.

Lance Roberts is an engineer who was born and raised in Fairbanks and is a former member of the Fairbanks North Star Borough Assembly.