Kingigin is an Iñupiat village, also known as Wales, situated at the mouth of Village Creek, on a series of ancient beach ridges separating Lopp Lagoon to the east from the Bering Strait to the west, on the Seward Peninsula at Cape Prince of Wales, about 73 miles (118 km) southwest of Shishmaref and 27 miles (44 km) southeast of Diomede, Alaska. The cape was first reported by Europeans in 1728 when Vitus Bering named it ‘Cape Gvozdeva’, probably for Mikhail Gvozdev, a Russian surveyor who made explorations in this area. In 1778, the cape was named by Captain James Cook for George A. Frederick, or George IV, the Prince of Wales at that time. In 1827, Captain Frederick W. Beechey on the HMS Blossom reported the village name as ‘King-a-ghee’ meaning ‘people of the high place’. Village Creek starts from an elevation of roughly 1,100 feet (335 m) on the northeast flank of Cape Mountain and flows generally northwest for 4.5 miles (7 km) to the Bering Strait. The western part of Cape Mountain is formed by igneous intrusive rocks that developed during the Late Cretaceous and consists mostly of tin-bearing biotite granitic. The eastern part of the mountain is formed by limestone, dolomitic limestone, and marble that developed during the Mississippian subperiod.
The prevailing currents through the Bering Strait are from the south and transport Yukon River sands northward. The shallow continental shelf across the Bering Strait and coastal nearshore areas adjacent to the Seward Peninsula have an abundance of sediments that have been reworked by ice pushed onshore by winds to form emergent landforms such as the beach ridges at Cape Prince of Wales. These landforms likely provided an attractive location for settlement by pre-historical humans migrating across the strait in open-skin boats. Cape Prince of Wales has two important archaeological sites that span the period from the Birnirk culture, followed by the Thule culture which led to the present-day Iñupiat residents. The modern settlement of Kingigin has been inhabited since at least 500 AD. Historical contact between Alaskan Iñupiat and Siberian Yupik consisted of warfare as well as trading relations and trading fairs, with some of those fairs held in Kingigin. In 1890, the American Missionary Association of the Congregational Church established a mission at the cape. In 1900, Lopp Lagoon, an important source of salmon and waterfowl, was named for William T. Lopp, a missionary among the Iñupiat and the civilian leader of the 1897–98 Overland Relief Expedition. In 1894, a U.S. Government reindeer station was organized at the cape to provide food security after walrus and other marine mammals were depleted by Yankee whalers.
The role of Kingigin as a center of regional commerce grew in parallel with the whaling industry and more people moved to the village for employment and trade opportunities. In the 20th century, this role declined and was supplanted by the communities of Nome, the site of a gold rush from 1899 to 1909, and Kotzebue, a traditional center of trade and commerce located at the confluence of two rivers. Numerous epidemics between the mid-19th and early 20th centuries took a severe toll on residents of the Seward Peninsula, and in 1918, the Spanish Influenza epidemic reduced the population of Kingigin by approximately half, including many of the best whalers. The community today retains a strong Iñupiat whaling culture, with traditional songs, dances, and customs still practiced. The lifestyle for most residents is based on traditional subsistence foods acquired by hunting, fishing, and trapping for whales, walrus, polar bears, moose, musk ox, caribou, clams, crabs, salmon, and other fish. A reindeer herd at Kingigin is still managed by local residents. The cash economy consists primarily of jobs in local government, selling arts and crafts, including carved walrus ivory and skin sewing which are marketed in Nome, Anchorage, or Fairbanks. Read more here and here. Explore more of Kingigin and Cape Prince of Wales here:
