50 Years Ago (or thereabout)

From the Polar Star, Sept. 28, 1956

Geist Returns With the Bones

Otto William Geist, Research Associate in paleontology at the University of Alaska, returned to campus this week with approximately three-quarters of a ton of Pleistocene mammal material he collected in the Seward Peninsula and Norton Sound areas.

His activities included an unscheduled encounter with five grizzly bears which started to enter his camp then departed after a moose, much to Geist's and his native helper's relief since they were armed only with two small calibre rifles and a shotgun.

Using Nome as a base, Geist flew to Candle and collected at Mud Creek and Utica on the Imnachuk River where he obtained his best material. This included an incomplete mammoth skull at Utica, and one at Mud Creek which has both the molars and tusks intact along with the mandible. Also at Utica, Geist collected a good series of superbison and muskox cranial material. At Elephant Point he secured a fairly good horse skull.

By bush plane he flew to Solomon, Haycock, White Mountain, Golovin, and Koyuk on Norton Bay.

From Koyuk, Geist took a boat trip with a native helper to the fossil bearing muck banks between Inglutalik River and Ungalik. He collected "very desirable" material during the three days he collected along the beach.

25 years ago:

From the Northern Sun, Sept. 25, 1981

State Troopers Realign Coverage of Campus

By Leone Thierman

There is no longer an Alaska State Trooper specifically assigned to the University of Alaska-Fairbanks campus as an outpost.

"What has been proposed is a replacement of the campus trooper position with what appears to be as good, if not better, service," said Dale Florian, director of security for the university.

Discussions in the past few weeks have concentrated on the issues of who pays for the service, what is the best utilization of manpower, who patrols the campus and if the current campus security staff can perform the same service.

Captain Don Lawrence, detachment commander of Interior Alaska State Troopers said, "The troopers will now be covering the campus on a 24-hour basis seven days a week, 365 days a year." Under the new system of coverage there will be troopers cruising the campus during the times when there was no one assigned before.

"My concept is better coverage and a faster response time," said Lawrence. Previous procedure for calling a trooper to campus for assistance outside of regular working hours required campus security contacting the assigned officer first. If he was unable to be reached campus security could then contact the Alaska State Trooper dispatch office for another officer.

Dale Florian is a commissioned peace officer and is authorized to perform all the duties that a trooper can perform. "The system we have now of full-time people augmented with student officers is superb," Florian said. "I wouldn't have gone along with the idea if I thought it wouldn't work out."