50 Years Ago (or thereabout)
From the Polar Star, April 14, 1956

Murie Expedition to include two from university Science Dept.
by Alan M. Courtright

A University of Alaska biological science professor and one of her former students will accompany the 1956 Murie expedition to the Sheenjek River area.

Dr. Brina Kessel and George Schaller will participate in the four-month trip to the remote region more than 125 miles north of Fort Yukon. Schaller received degrees in vertebrate zoology and anthropology from the university last year.

Dr. Olaus J. Murie, widely known biologist and wildlife artist familiar to many Alaskans, organized the Sheenjek River expedition to investigate wildlife of the area, about which little is known.

Besides Drs. Murie and Kessel and Schaller, Mrs. Murie and two or three other persons will go on the expedition.

Mrs. Murie hopes to arrive in Fairbanks in time for the May 14 university commencement exercises. The former Margaret Elizabeth Thomas was the first woman to graduate from the university. She received a B.S. degree in business administration in 1924.

Dr. Kessel said the expedition will gather in Fairbanks late in May. The members will leave for the study area shortly thereafter by chartered airplane. Dr. Murie selected Dr. Kessal and Schaller because of their knowledge of interior Alaska birds and mammals.

25 years ago
From the Northern Sun, April 17, 1981

‘Muckers' headed south
by Barbara McConnell

Five University of Alaska Fairbanks students will participate for the first time in the annual mining contest held this year in Butte, Montana. Professor Chris Lambert, head of the Department of Mineral Engineering, said team captain Theresa Stokes, Don Carlson, George Seuffert, Thor Bergstrom and Tom Colbourne will compete with students from a dozen other mining schools in the April 24-26 competition.

"Mucking" is a mining term meaning "loading ore." Four contest events – jack-leg drilling of holes for explosives, hand drilling vertical holes with a four-pound hammer, laying rail and mucking a cubic yard of material – are planned.

Contestants are student members of mining schools from Colorado, Montana, New Mexico, Missouri, South Dakota, Idaho, Arizona, and Utah. The winner of last year's contest is the sponsor for next year. UAF students are encouraged "to get neither first place, not last place" this year, Lanbert said. The host this year is Montana-Tech.

Each team will also be taken on a tour of Anaconda mining properties in Butte, Montana.