This is a photograph of grandmother's aunt Emma Wilson, in ALaska. These were pictures that my grandmother had. One day we were just going through the photo album and we were looking and looking and she said, "Oh yeah, that’s my Aunt Emma." And the photo said “Aunt Emma in Alaska.” I didn’t know we had anybody as far as Alaska. I knew we had people in Kentucky and some in Missouri and Chicago and Indiana, but I never knew she had a relative that actually went to Alaska. This was in the mid-1920s. She died in Alaska. She spent the majority of her adult life in Alaska. I’m not sure what she did. I don’t believe she got married. I’m not sure where in Alaska. I’m trying to figure that out now.  

My grandmother never really said why she was there, just that she was kind of an adventurous person. But this is a real adventure: an African American woman who moved to Alaska in the 1920s! 

She was born in Kentucky, close to Irvington. She was one of her younger sisters. She would come like every 5 to 7 years and tell them stories about living in Alaska. I’m still trying to find more information about her.   

-As told by Denise English of Chicago, Ill.