Gordon Pullar, Ph.D. - President

Gordon L. Pullar is the son of Olga Vasilie Rossing, who was born in Woody Island village and raised both in the village and in the Baptist Mission. His maternal grandparents were Vasili Shmakov and Afanasiia Rysev of Woody Island. Vasili Shmakov, as a small child, was the object of a contentious custody battle between the Baptist Mission and the Russian Orthodox Church shortly after the Baptist Mission was established on Woody Island in the early 1890s. His grandmother's parents were Sophia Pestriakov and Vasili Rysev. His family tree contains other names associated with Woody Island such as Skvortsov, Milovidov, and Chanaka. His mother, Olga Rossing, was the first high school graduate of Longwood School on Woody Island in 1934. Following her graduation she was sent to the lower 48 to attend college. She met his father, Gordon R. Pullar, while she was attending Bellingham Normal School (now Western Washington University) in Bellingham, Washington.

Pullar is an Assistant Professor and Director of the Department of Alaska Native and Rural Development in the College of Rural Alaska at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. He has been involved in tribal self-determination and cultural revitalization efforts for more than two decades. His dream is to hold a tribal retreat on Woody Island as a way to reunite Woody Island people and develop a sense of cultural pride.

He served six years as President and CEO of the Kodiak Area Native Association; seven years on the Board of Directors of the Alaska Federation of Natives, where he was a member of the Legislative Committee that worked toward securing amendments to the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act; and two years as Chairman of the Board of the Alaska Native Foundation. He is a founder and past President of the national Keepers of the Treasures: Cultural Council of American Indians, Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiians, an organization formed to address the protection of indigenous cultures and has represented the organization at the United Nations in Geneva. He is currently the Chairman of the Steering Committee for the Arctic Studies Center at the Smithsonian Institution and President of the Koniag Education Foundation.

He holds a BA in Anthropology from Western Washington University, a Master of Public Administration degree from the University of Washington, and a Ph.D. in Organizational Anthropology and International Studies from the Union Institute. He has published articles on cultural identity, cultural revitalization movements, Alaska Natives and archaeology, repatriation, and other issues related to Native Americans. He has given presentations throughout the United States as well as in Canada, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Russia, and Switzerland. He is currently conducting ethnohistorical research for the Native Village of Afognak.

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