While sorting through her mother’s belongings, Doris Ray discovered a cache of letters she had written to her mother during the time she and her husband, Charles, taught in the remote Yup’ik village of Savoonga from 1951 to 1954. Located on St. Lawrence Island in the northern Bering Sea, off the Alaskan coast, Savoonga is closer to Russia than to mainland Alaska. Doris took the letters home and tossed them into a drawer where they remained for several years.

In 1957, Charles and Doris moved to Fairbanks, Alaska. Doris taught high school social studies, while Charles joined the faculty at the University of Alaska. Doris retired in 1983 and was later elected to the Fairbanks North Star Borough School Board.

After Charles retired from the University a decade later, the couple relocated to Seattle, where they embraced urban life and traveled extensively. In 2007, they moved to Horizon House, a retirement community in downtown Seattle, conveniently located near the theatres, museums, and concert halls they enjoyed.

Charles passed away in the spring of 2020, just as the COVID-19 pandemic was beginning to reshape daily life. Horizon House instituted a quarantine, closing the gym and pool, canceling meetings and programs, and advising residents to stay in their apartments.

One evening in late 2020, while chatting with a friend, Doris mentioned the old letters from St. Lawrence Island. The friend, who had visited the island, was intrigued by her experiences there seventy years earlier. He encouraged her to do something with the letters, perhaps even publish them, as they offered a unique glimpse into life in a pre-industrial hunting society. Initially hesitant, Doris eventually decided to turn the letters into digital files by typing them out on her computer, largely as a way to revisit her memories during the pandemic’s restrictive isolation. Many months later, she was finished.

The letters detailed the couple’s experiences in 1951 when, as newlyweds in their early twenties, they accepted a two-teacher appointment at the elementary school in Savoonga. At the time, the village had no airport, roads, or telephones. They were two of only three white residents in the village, melting ice for water, teaching children who spoke no English, forming close friendships with villagers who treated them like family, enduring a frightening measles epidemic, and relying on an annual supply ship while the villagers hunted walrus for survival. After discussing the idea with another old friend who had a background in publishing, Doris decided to transform her experiences into a book. She spent months writing, revising, editing, and selecting photographs to include. The result was Finding Savoonga: Letters from the Edge of America, published in the spring of 2023. The book is now available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and through independent bookstores.

Today, Doris has returned to an active routine at Horizon House, attending programs, participating in meetings, exercising in the pool, and engaging fully as a member of a vibrant community.

If you would like to learn more about how your State of Alaska retirement can allow you to enjoy a comfortable retirement, please contact the Division toll-free at or at in Juneau.

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