Alaska teacher Carrie McLain was a pioneer in the classroom at the turn of the century. Photo credit: Pubic Domain

During Women’s History Month, we pay homage to America’s pioneers in the classroom, including the many teachers who worked Alaska’s wilderness territories. One of them was Carrie McLain, who taught in Nome, Alaska, at the beginning of the 19th century.

Carrie was born on January 26, 1895, in Astoria, Long Island, New York. When she was just a child of ten, her father moved Carrie and her four siblings to the fledgling village of Nome on the ice-crusted coast of northwestern Alaska. There she grew to adulthood and became a young teacher at a pioneer school on the Seward Penninsula. During those years, she also married and reared a family of one son and three daughters. She lived and taught through a rugged existence on the frigid Alaskan frontier, and she even taught through the Klondike Gold Rush.

This Chalkboard Champion passed away on May 30, 1973, at Palmer Pioneers Home, and was buried in Nome. The city of Nome dedicated a community museum in her honor. The Carrie McLain Museum highlights the history of Nome and Western Alaska. Many of the institution’s more than 15,000 artifacts are relates to gold-rush days, including racks of mining equipment, historical documents, and photo albums.

Carrie tells the fascinating story of her provincial life in Alaska in Pioneer Teacher: Turn of the Century Classroom in Remote Northwestern Alaska. Anyone interested in learning more about her experiences should read the slender volume—it’s only 70 pages, including photographs. The book, published in 1970, can be found on amazon at this link: Pioneer Teacher. She also wrote Gold Rush Nome, which is only 46 pages in length, published in 1969, can also be found on amazon.  In addition to Carrie’s text, the volume contains 23 pages of black and white photographs.