THE SKAGWAY NEWS.
THE SKAGWAY NEWS
May 8, 2020
May 8, 2020
Sk a g w ay, A l a s k a
Meet the graduates
The Class of 2020 looks ahead PAGE 6
Fish this!
Page 1
$1.50
An unexpected adjustment PAGE 8
What’s buzzing?
Melinda’s bee lessons PAGE 4
‘A Skagway kid just won the Pulitzer’ By Melinda Munson It took years for Skagway School graduate and journalist Kyle Hopkins to get The Anchorage Daily News (ADN) to hire him. When they did, he earned them a Pulitzer. Hopkins led a team from the ADN, in partnership with the nonprofit newsroom ProPublica, on a year-long investigation into rural Alaska where one in three communities has no local law enforcement officers. The series, entitled “Lawless,” explores isolated villages combatting high rates of sexual abuse, violence and suicide with no access to first responders. Hopkins’ team discovered that in some communities where officers were hired, those officers were convicted felons with a history of violence that would make them ineligible under state law to be hired as a security guard. Hopkins’ connection to Skagway started in 1991 when his father took over as Skagway School’s superintendent. Hopkins was a freshman. “I didn’t love to write in high school,” Hopkins said. What he did love was basketball. “I lived for basketball and basketball season. If I had lived in a big community, basketball would not have been an option for me,” he said, citing his five-feet, seven-inch frame. To stay at the top of his basketball game, Hopkins joined track. Track and basketball
Photo by Bill Roth, Anchorage Daily News
Rebecca Palsha high fives her husband, Kyle Hopkins, after learning he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for community service.
coach Jeff Kasler “loomed large” in Hopkins’ high school experience. “I became a full-on runner. It was because of Jeff Kasler,” said Hopkins, who went on to run track for the University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF). He still runs today, albeit a little slower. Another of Hopkins’ loves is reading. At UAF, he tried to settle on a major so he could get a job “where someone would just pay me to read.” Publishing seemed like a good fit. He took a journalism course as an introduction. “After that first journalism class, I just never wanted to do anything else,” Hopkins said. He applied to be The Skagway News’ intern in 1998. “When he went off to UAF, I had no inkling he would end up majoring in journalism,” said Jeff Brady, Skagway News owner from 1978 For the latest news and updates, follow us on Facebook, Instagram
to 2015. “So when we found out he wanted to apply for The Skagway News internship, we sort of tossed out all other applications to make room for the local kid.” Brady remembers Hopkins as a skilled interviewer. “He already knew everyone in town and it was easy
for him to approach people. Looking back, I think this actually was an inherent trait that he nurtured over the years and certainly played a large part in how he was able to win over the trust of those many sources in the ‘Lawless’ series.” When Hopkins covered the
Dyea to Dawson centennial race on the Chilkoot Trail for The Skagway News, he forgot his sleeping bag. “I’m pretty sure he carried one when the ADN hired him later to cover the Iditarod,” Brady said. Hopkins graduated from see BACK page
Cruise ship visits dwindle, more cancellations By Gretchen Wehmhoff A few weeks after reducing their Alaska cruise fleet by 75%, two major cruise lines pulled the plug on the rest of the season in Alaska. Princess Cruises announced on its website Wednesday that, “Due to reduced air flight availability, the closure of cruise ports in regions around the world and other factors impacting travel…” they would be cancelling all Alaska cruises. The Emerald Princess and Ruby Princess
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were the last two ships left in their Alaska line-up. The cruise line is also cancelling all remaining European and Transatlantic cruises, as well as summer cruises to the Caribbean, Canada and New England. Princess is also cancelling Pacific cruises in July and the fall. Princess had earlier discontinued all land excursions in Alaska. Holland America announced this week that all Alaska, Europe, Canada and New England voyages will
be put on “pause.” The cruise line previously cancelled all Land-Sea Journeys through Alaska and Yukon. This follows Carnival’s announcement in April that the Carnival Spirit would not sail to Skagway this season. The Covid-19 pandemic has seen the Skagway cruise season dwindle to a thin schedule of sailings. Recent cruise line announcements, along with Carnival’s retreat, take two dozen more ships out of Southeast Alaskan waters. see BACK page
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