Inukins (Eskimo Stories of Little People)

[ns...@aurora.alaska.edu]

#759 ACAD3A::FBSIGN Thu 23 Dec 1993 18:57:12 ( 119/ 4903)

INUKINS HARRASS NORTHERNERS
By Leo F. Kay
Arctic Sounder

KOTZEBUE - Kenneth Ashby no longer hunts or does the other rigorous chores of
younger men. He is satisfied to spend his days lulled by the shifting seasons
under the brow of the spectacular mountains near his home on the outskirts of
Noatak.

But when Ashby tells visitors about the day in 1938 he and his brother Bruce
fetched water on the Noatak River, the frail retiree becomes an animated one-
man theater, re-enacting a strange fight scene and slim escape.

He was 24 years old when Inukins, this area's version of leprechauns, grabbed
the brothers. The "wild people" were dressed in caribous skins and wore bowl-
style haircuts, he remembered Friday during an interview at his small house.

Eventually during the struggle, the little people were distracted by a head
bobbing up and down on the horizon. It was the young men's grandfather coming
to their rescue, Ashby says.

But it was only after Ashby feigned throwing a rock did the brothers escape
from the persistent Inukins that summer day on the Noatak, he says.

Lucky,too, the brothers fended for themselves. Ashby says his grandfather
ending up knocking himself out cold when he slipped on an icy rock and fell
on his head.

"After that, our grandfather told us to always leave them alone," he says.

More than 50 years years later, according to some local folks, this
mysterious
group of little people are still harrying them whenever they wander too far
from towm.

One man in town recalls an encounter with the Inukins back in 1949, but
refuses to give his name for fear of "them reading the story and coming after
me."

He says he and some friends saw one outside town and decided to chase it in
hopes of pushing it in the water.

"We never got close enough to see it," he says, adding all he could make out
of the elusive figure was that it was "small."

"That was many years ago, and I haven't seen any since," he says, looking
over his shoulder. "They still might be hiding someplace."

But Ashby is not afraid to tell his stories. The same summer of his narrow
escape, his sister Victoria chased away a couple of Inukins who were trying to
steal salmon off her rack up the river.

Nine years later, Ashby once again had a run-in with the Inukins.

This time he and a bunch of relatives were camping about 70 miles up the
river on a hunting trip. Two people slept in a tent and the rest of the crew
stayed in the small boat for the night.

It wasn't long before they heard stomping in the dry birch leaves.

The men got up and looked around. Nothing.

"They were playing hide and seek with us," he says.

The little people trailed them all the way down the river back to Noatak,
taunting the men by staying just out of their reach. This time, Ashby says,
residents were going to stand their ground. So they posted guards around the
village to fend off the tiny intruders.

The Inukins, apparently foiled, whistled code messages to one another and
retreated into the Bush.

Ashby swears his two encounters with the Inukins are true stories - the
only ones he'd vouch for.

But Ashby and his wife, Ruth, are quick to point out they don't believe
everything they hear.

Ruth Ashby says she recently heard several rafters ask townfolk if they
had ever heard of little people out on the river. The boaters said they saw
a group of small, naked men dancing around the fire a few miles up river.

"Sounds like a bunch of gnomes or something from a fairy tale," says and
laughs.

As late as week, Ruth Ashby once again heard a tall tale about Inukins
sightings in Noatak. And this time, she was supposedly the subject of the
little people's attention.

According to the rumor floating around the village, she singlehandedly
fought off a group of Inukins trying to make off with her "snow-go."

The true story, she says, is that she heard some strange crying in the
middle of the night, which stirred the dogs to howls. She went to inspect
, shining her light towards the noise. It carries off into the evening air.

But she never concluded it was Inukins that night.

"Some of the stories the kids make up just aren't true," she says.

Yet Ruth Ashby maintains there are strange small people running around
the ara, and worries about children being out at night.

"I wonder if they're not runaways, or spies or something," she says.

Her husband, a veteran Inukin battler, interjects with advice: "If you
encounter them, warn them by throwing a stick or a rock at them."

An then there are the Imukkokins.

According to Ashby, these folks are only about two feet high and have
vicious, fang-filled mouths, which wrap from ear to ear. He's encountered
them, too.

Thse creatures are so small, Ashby says, they can make an entire parka
for their baby out of a caribous ear.

But that's a different story...

Part 2

KOTZEBUE ELDERS SHARE TALES OF HAIRYMEN, LITTLE MEN

Following are stories about
Hairymen and little men told by
some of the Kotzebue Senior
Center elders.

A STORY TOLD BY FLORA PENN
This is something that happened to me and my friend one time. Once another
lady and myself went on a trip up the Noatak with Norman Jones. When we
stopped
at Lena Sours' camp to pick berries we saw a little man. He was just sitting
on the root of a driftwood tree smoking a pipe. He had a little pipe like a
little barrel with a narrow handle. He had a pointed head, a big nose and
pointed ears. We tried to hide and watch him for about an hour, he just smoked
and looked around. Suddenly he jumped up and began to run towards the high
mountains.

Old stories say that the little people used to stay with the big people long
ago. Until one time a little person's child was playing with the big people's
kids. Just playing and a dog gobbled up the baby of the little person. Ever
since then the little people could never stay among the people.

A STORY BY HANNAH NEWLIN
Once a pilot named John Tupkouk told of seeing an Inukin settlement high up
on the mountains above Noatak but behind Kobuk. Very high up where it looked
one couldn't climb to. He said he could see the Inukin people in the settle-
ment on the mountain side.

Saul Shiedt told a story about one summer when he was hunting caribous. He
was skinning the caribous, concentrating, trying to get the work done, because
he had lots to do. He heard someone talking Eskimo. He was all alone so he
started looking all around but saw no one. The he looked down and there was a
little man about three feet high talking Eskimo. Saul could understand him
and they startd talking. Saul had a gun, something like an old 30-30. You
had to use a rod to load it. The little man was shorter than the barrel of the
gun. He came up just under the tip of the gun. They talked about that gun and
the little man's weapon, a bow and arrow. Saul tried to pull on the bow but it
was strong he couldn't pull it. After a while Saul told him to get what he
wanted from the caribou. That Inukin only wanted the fatty part from under the
bone of the knee. That's all. There's another story about Ferguson's old saw-
mill near Selawik. Kids used to play around there one summer. That summer the
kids saw some little men at the saw mill. I don't know what they were doing.

A STORY BY LENA SOURS
A long time ago around the mouth of the Noatak River I had to stay alone in
my camp. Some people left me there to go to Kotzebue. I had lots of dogs.
One female dog, my son's Tommy Sours' dog. A police dog, or she was a German
Sheperd. This dog started going around and around. Around and around she went
barking at my feet.

Those inukun, those little people in my tent. I had a gun so I yelled real
loud "I got a gun." I said. "I got a gun. I'll kill you yet." They went and
pukuk, dig around in my stuff, my parky. I tried to scare them. "You try to
make trouble I'll shoot you yet," I said. They went away.

A STORY BY JOE SUN
I hear about this up there but I never tried to look into it. People from
Maniilaq River had some things tos ay about it, though.

I hear from my parents in the Maniilaq area that there was this man hunting.
He had a real rifle. (Not the old kind that you had to load through the barrel
with a rod.) He saw a caribou he wanted to get close to, to have a shot at it.
He saw another person trying to hunt this caribou too. When this man, a big
man, got close to shoot the caribou it changed into a little man. The big man
jumped at the little man who escaped and began running and climbing up the
mountain.

These little man are strong. They hunt and catch whales that come to the
mouth of the Noatak. When a big man a little man fight for the whale the lit-
tle man will always win.

There's another story. There were three normal in a boat and two little
people in another boat on the Maniilaq river. They collided and the two lit-
tle men sunk and drowned in the deep water. They turned to stone. Big rocks
that can still be seen in the deep water side by side. It's hard for people
our six to pass through them. Those two take revenge. It's fast water. You
have to go between the rocks because it is to difficult to steer around them.

A STORY BY BOBBY WELLS
This was told to me by my mother. In the Squirrel River there are two big
rocks in the water. When it's deep water you can barely see them. The story
is that these rocks were two dwarfs turned to stone and when the water is deep
it's very dangerous because you can barely see them.

In the Nome area they are called the I think its spelled like Ishigot..
Or liek wording.
===
Ghost Wheel - ns...@acad3.alaska.edu
also 1@9714 WWIVnet..

[mikepol...@gmail.com]

My mother is from shishmaref and there are plenty of stories I have heard while there. I've been told they leave little holes, with piles of only the skins of blueberrys, I have seen them before while berry picking, they look as if the inside have been sucked out.