Last Thursday night, I sat in on a Beginning Northwest Carving class, which started that night. The class is being taught by Tommy Joseph, a well-known Tlingit carver residing in Sitka. This picture was taken at that first class and I thank Tommy as well as the class participants for allowing me to mingle with them.

I do have relatives in the class, which kind of provided inroads for me, but Tommy also knows my family and was nice enough to put up with my quizzing. I took several pictures as well as recorded some audio. The class is offered by one of our local colleges, UAS, and will run until May 6th.

Tommy Joseph is a great carver. He, along with Edward Beltran, was commisioned in 1998-99 to carve the Kiks.adi K'alyaan Memorial Pole which stands in Sitka's Totem Park at the Battlefield Site. As stated at that website, there are generally four purposes of totem poles:

• Crest poles give the ancestry of particular family.
• History poles record the history of a clan.
• Legend poles illustrate folklore or real life experiences.
• Memorial poles commemorate a particular individual.

I will follow the progress of his class to its conclusion.