Book Creator

That's Just the Way It Was

by Students of Minto School

Cover

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Elder
Lloyd Charlie

Interviews & Video Transcription
Teacher: Mickey Kenny
Kanye J, Grade 6
Roland S, Grade 6
Clayton W, Grade 8
Mercedes F, Grade 9
Aiden W, Grade 10
Kaiyuh J, Grade 10

Narration
Chad R, Grade 8
Robbie D, Grade 8
Kanye J, Grade 6
Mercedes F, Grade 9

Page Illustrations
Teacher: Peggy Bruno
Instructional Aide: Lynnessa Baker
Page Illustrations (continued)
Tayla B, Grade 2
Brielle B, Grade 3
Reese G, Grade 4
Jonathan D, Grade 5
Maddison F, Grade 5
Andrew D, Grade 7
Robbie D, Grade 8
Clayton W, Grade 8

Thanks To
Principal Vicky Charlie and Superintendent Kerry Boyd for their leadership in making the Minto Book Slam possible.

Book Slam Project Management
Steve Nelson, Project Coordinator, Consortium for Digital Learning, Association of Alaska School Boards
Cheryl Bobo, Site Facilitator

© 2019 Yukon-Koyukuk School District
Moving Minto
After annual patterns of erosion and flooding, the people of Old Minto decided to relocate the village in 1969. There were a few sites being considered, all offering different environments and conditions. The selected site, our current home, is well protected from river erosion atop a bluff at the edge of Minto Flats.

The relocation didn't change lifestyles in major ways, but it did make things a little harder for running dogs. Old Minto had easier access to fattier fish and more protected woods for running dogs out of the winds coming across the flats. 
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Read by
Kanye
1.
Dogs were for work. They used the dogs for hauling wood and trapping. They also used them to travel. Once they had to take someone to a medivac in Nenana. It was -50 degrees. Lloyd said, “Dogs took care of us.”
That’s just the way it was.
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Read by
Mercedes
2.
Later, dogs were trained for racing. You either chose to train your dogs for sprint races or for mid-distance races. The mid-distance races were the Cantwell 110, The Gold Miners 140 in Nenana, Backwoods 70 in Nenana, and Lloyd’s favorite was the Tour de Minto each year. You had to choose what kind of team you wanted to race. Sometimes the kind of dogs a person had determined what races they would do. That’s just the way it was.
Lloyd explains what was used for dog bedding.
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Read by
Mercedes
3.
Trap dogs had to be trained to run faster and longer without stopping.
Lloyd ran Huskies for mid-distance racing on his team. They were not very good for sprinting. Later, many racers started to run hounds on their teams because they were faster. They get colder so you have to feed more and provide them with grass bedding, which you gather out in the flats. That’s just the way it was.
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Read by
Chad
4.
There was no store bought dog food in the early days of Old Minto. Most people fed their scraps to dogs. Lloyd said, “I had a friend and I gave him some dogs and he fed them moose, sheep, and caribou. They grew to be as big as wolves.” The meat was not cooked, they just give it to them raw. They grew big and strong. That’s just the way it was.
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