Sadie Neakok

Sadie Neakok (March 16, 1916 - June 13, 2004)[1] or Tagiagiña was the first female magistrate in Alaska.[2][3] She served in Alaska's Second Judicial District in Utqiaġvik, Alaska.

Personal life

Her father, Charles D. Brower, was a United States Commissioner in the Alaska territory and her mother, Ahsiangatok (Asiaŋŋataq), was Iñupiaq from the Barrow area.[4][5] Her father originally moved to the Alaska to work as a commercial whaler and was the first white settler there.[5] Neakok was born in 1916.[5] One of ten children, she was sent to San Francisco, California at the age of 14 to attend high school and then attended the University of Alaska.[4][5] After graduation, she worked first in a hospital, and then as a teacher in a Bureau of Indian Affairs school and a social worker.[6][4][5]

She married Nathaniel Neakok, a whaling boat captain[5] who also worked at the Barrow Airport, in 1940 and together they had 13 children and several foster children.[4][5] As of 1989, the couple had been married for over 50 years.[5] Her oldest son, Bill, was mayor of Utqiagvik in the 1970s.[4]

In 2009, she was inducted into the Alaska Women's Hall of Fame.[7] She was the first woman elder in her Presbyterian church.[5]

Judicial career

She became a magistrate in Alaska's Second Judicial District when the territory gained statehood in 1958.[4] She ran the court in both the English and Iñupiaq languages,[4] and had to fight to allow cases to be heard in the local language when defendants did not speak English.[5] She followed Eben Hopson, who encouraged her to take the position.[6] Before a courthouse was built, she heard cases in her kitchen.[5]

Inuit advocate

As a half Inupiaq, Neakok was an advocate in Alaska and in Washington DC for Inuit causes.[4] As a child, she saw the local Naval base enforcing discriminatory segregation against the native people, inspiring her to defend them.[6] As an adult, she served on the tribal council.[6]

In 1961, in response to what she viewed as an unjust hunting law, she helped organize the town into so overwhelming the game warden that he could not enforce a law regulating hunting season.[8][6][5]

See also

References
  1. "Sadie Neakok". Fold3. Retrieved May 20, 2020.
  2. "Profiles in Change: Names, Notes and Quotes for Alaskan Women – Sadie Neakok". www.alaskool.org. Retrieved 2018-12-21.
  3. United States of American Congressional Record. Government Printing Office.
  4. Burks, Edward C. (December 13, 1971). "Her Court Is on Arctic Shores, Her Cause Is Eskimos' Rights". The New York Times. p. 50. Retrieved May 3, 2020.
  5. Blackman, Margaret B. (1992). Sadie Brower Neakok: An Inupiaq Woman. University of Washington Press. ISBN 978-0-295-97180-3. Retrieved May 3, 2020.
  6. "Sadie Neakok". Alaskool. Retrieved May 3, 2020.
  7. "Sadie Naekok". Alaska Women's Hall of Fame. Retrieved May 3, 2020.
  8. Burwell, Mitchel. ""Hunger Knows No Law" : Seminal Native Protest and The Barrow Duck-In of 1961" (PDF). Berring Straight School District. Retrieved May 3, 2020.
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