Thomas Rivers with a seal harpoon he made with his brothers. They learned traditional crafting skills through one of CANHR’s programs. Rivers has found it difficult to open up to adults about his struggles with suicidal ideation. “I’ve been depressed since I was about 10. All I'm really good at is hiding it,” he explained. After losing two uncles and several friends to suicide, Rivers found refuge in his relationships with his siblings. He credits those bonds as his reasons for being alive.

Remnants of the St. Mary's Mission Boarding School, which was built in 1894 and ceased operations in 1987 after a string of suicides.

Sebastian Cowboy is one of the few remaining Elders in St. Mary's to have attended the Mission school, where he saw one of his peers take their own life in the dormitory. That trauma came flooding back decades later when he lost his oldest son to suicide. “I think I was in a coma for three days. I didn’t know where I was,” he recalls. For Cowboy, healing came through finding ways to share his grief with his community. “I’d been holding it too long. It needs to come out.”

Panik John (right) teaches her granddaughter Bernadette Wiseman (left) how to process a baby seal using a traditional Uluaq knife at their home in Toksook Bay, Alaska. Panik and her husband Simeon lead CANHR’s programs and research projects in Toksook Bay, including Qungasvik.

Simeon John speaks about Qungasvik with a group of students at the Lower Kuskokwim Dance Festival in Tununak, Alaska. “I don’t like to think of it as a program. A program is something that has an ending,” he explains. “I want to say Yuuyaraq [a Yup’ik way of life].”

At the Lower Kuskokwim Dance Festival in Tununak, students are given opportunities to learn about mental health programs alongside a range of cultural activities such as Yup’ik singing and dancing.

James Joseph (left) and Albert Simon (right) scout for game on an ice floe several miles offshore of Hooper Bay, Alaska. Both have lost close friends to suicide. Despite seal hunting being identified by CANHR as a protective activity they’d like to support, the organization has had trouble getting funding for it over liability concerns.

A river bisects the village of Nunapitchuk in Alaska’s Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta. Located along the Bering Sea, the Y-K Delta has the highest rates of suicide in the United States. It is one of the country’s most remote regions, with no physical infrastructure connecting its villages to the national road system.

CANHR lead investigator and Qungasvik community organizer Simeon John goes to collect water outside his Maqi (steam house) near his home in Toksook Bay, Alaska. Historically, he says that the steam bath has played an important role in mental wellness within the community by providing neighbors with spaces to gather and share their concerns.

A group of soldiers from the 1st Brigade Combat Infantry Division march in formation outside Bassett Military Hospital at Fort Wainwright in Fairbanks. In 2021 there were 17 suicides in the Division, giving it one of the highest rates among a military unit nationwide.

Command Sgt. Maj. Joe Gaskin, of the 1st Brigade, 11th Airborne Division at Fort Wainwright in Fairbanks. Gaskin was no stranger to suicide when he arrived in Alaska, having experienced three suicides within his brigade during his tenure at Fort Carson, Colorado. There have been seven confirmed suicides within his brigade since his arrival.

First Sgt. Heather Thomas was one of the senior military officials who collaborated with CANHR to help design a training program for young leaders in the 11th Airborne Division. “Nobody really teaches you how to have those hard conversations, or what's going to help prevent people from hurting themselves,” she says.

Soldiers from the 11th Airborne Division examine a jar of smoked salmon during a class at a local folk school in Fairbanks. These community outings are designed to help young soldiers build connections with their peers and their cultural surroundings in Alaska.

Freshly painted headstone markers sit onstage at the Paimiut Tribal Council building in Hooper Bay, Alaska. In February, two young people in the village died consecutively by suicide. The tribal council building hosts a weekly practice for a traditional Yup’ik dance group - one of many activities supported by the Qungasvik program that experts believe help bolster community mental health.

Dominic Hunt holds a catch from a blackfish trap on the Yukon River near Emmonak, Alaska. Dominic and his wife Lala are community volunteers with Qungasvik who help organize traditional subsistence activities like ice fishing and tool crafting. “Growing up, I rarely heard about suicide”, says Hunt, reflecting a view that’s echoed by many Elders who were alive prior to the era of residential boarding schools. It wasn’t until his own brother died by suicide that Hunt was first confronted by the issue head-on.