Belkofski is an abandoned Aleut Unangan village situated on the south coast of the Alaska Peninsula between Belkofski Bay to the southwest and Volcano Bay to the northeast, about 62 miles (100 km) southwest of Sand Point and 11 miles (18 km) east-northeast of King Cove, Alaska. The name comes from the Russian ‘Selo Belkovskoe’, derived from ‘belka’, meaning ‘squirrel,’ referring to the Arctic ground squirrel. Volcano Bay was named in 1880 by William H. Dall of the US Coast and Geodetic Survey, for its proximity to Pavlof Volcano. The village was built on a level glacial moraine composed of volcanic rock fragments ranging from coarse boulders to fine sand and silt. This moraine overlies bedrock of the Belkofski Formation, dating from the Middle Miocene or Late Oligocene, which comprises sandstone, siltstone, and conglomerate with layers of tuff and volcanic breccia, predominantly red, pink, and purple in color. North of the village, the Moss Cape pluton intrudes the Belkofski Formation. Formed around 3.2 million years ago during the Early Pliocene, it consists of granodiorite and quartz diorite. In the Pleistocene, a vast glacial complex covered much of the Alaska Peninsula and extended onto the submerged continental shelf of the Gulf of Alaska, possibly calving directly into the Pacific. The western Gulf may have been ice-free by 17,000 years ago, potentially allowing early coastal migration along the Aleutian Archipelago and the Alaska Peninsula. Archaeological evidence shows human settlement on the lower peninsula over the past 5,000 to 6,000 years, likely by sedentary communities sustained by rich marine resources.

Fur traders learned of the rich sea otter grounds along the southern Alaska Peninsula in 1762, when an Aleut slave aboard Stepan Glotov’s ship showed the Russian’s where they aggregated. In 1771, Ivan Solov’ev led the first Russian expedition to survey the peninsula for people and resources. He encountered several hundred Aleuts and vast numbers of sea otters. Having already killed Aleuts in the Aleutian Islands in retaliation for attacks on Russian ships, Solov’ev resumed his violent methods on the peninsula before fleeing in 1772. Later expeditions, including those of Captain James Cook and the Billings-Sarychev Expedition, had more peaceful interactions with local inhabitants. Nonetheless, reports of abundant sea otters drew intense interest in the region. Sea otters were the primary driver of Russian expansion into the Aleutians and the Alaska Peninsula. Aleut hunters from the Shumagin Islands were conscripted to harvest sea otters from offshore islands along the peninsula. In 1808, they were organized into artels—work groups—based on Sanak Island. Each artel was led by a Russian baidarshchik, or captain, and supplied by Russian and Aleut employees. Using traditional methods, hunters approached quietly in baidarkas (kayaks) and speared the otters. High-producing hunters, especially Creoles—those of mixed Russian and Aleut descent—gained status in the Russian-America Company. By 1823, company administrators feared sea otters had been overharvested. They imposed conservation measures, including quotas, seasonal limits, traditional techniques, refusal to buy females or pups, rotational hunting grounds, and ultimately, the relocation of the entire Sanak Aleut population to Belkofski.

The Alaska Purchase in 1867 transferred the territory from Russia to the United States. Under American administration, Sanak Island was resettled, and the waters near Belkofski became the center of the sea otter trade. By the 1880s, Belkofski was the region’s most important village, with three stores reportedly stocked with goods imported from San Francisco. The first Russian Orthodox church was built in 1843; it was replaced in 1880 by the Holy Resurrection Church, modeled on the 1732 Church of the Resurrection on the Mosva River near Moscow. The church was richly decorated with bells and icons. In 1880, Belkofski was described as perched on a bluff on the southern slope of a mountain. Most houses were brightly painted frame cottages built by fur trading companies for Aleut hunters. Within a decade, sea otter pelts collected at the station fell from thousands to dozens annually, as the animals were hunted nearly to extinction. A school opened in 1901 and closed in 1976. As revenues from sea otters dwindled, residents turned to trapping foxes, bears, wolves, and land otters, and to commercial cod and salmon fishing. A salmon cannery built in 1913 in King Cove offered stable employment, prompting many Belkofski residents to relocate there or to Sand Point. By 1980, only 10 residents remained. When the last families left, they took the church bells and iconostasis to King Cove, 12 miles (19 km) away by boat, where Saint Herman Church was built in 1984. In 2015, the Rasmusson Foundation funded a 30-foot (9 m) Elders’ Bell Tower to house the seven historic bronze bells, the largest of which is 35.5 inches (90 cm) in diameter and weighs about 850 pounds (386 kg). Today, Belkofski is used as a summer fishing camp by King Cove residents and other Unangan people. Read more here and here. Explore more of Belkofski and Alaska Peninsula here: