Google Doodle celebrates Alaska Native and civil rights leader with tie to Bellingham
The Google Doodle on Wednesday, Dec. 30, honors a Tlingit tribal member from Alaska and civil rights leader who attended college in Bellingham.
The Doodle features Elizabeth Peratrovich as illustrated by Michaela Goade, a Tlingit artist based in Sitka, Alaska, according to Google.
Peratrovich played a leading role in the passage of the first anti-discrimination law in the U.S.
“On this day in 1941, after encountering an inn door sign that read ‘No Natives Allowed,’ Peratrovich and her husband — both of Alaska’s Indigenous Tlingit tribe — helped plant the seed for the anti-discrimination law when they wrote a letter to Alaska’s governor and gained his support,” Google writes.
Both attended what was then the Western College of Education, the predecessor to Western Washington University, in Bellingham.
Her efforts were spurred by the discrimination she and husband Roy experienced as Alaska Natives, according to her biography on the National Indian Council on Aging website.
“In 1941, while living in Juneau, Alaska, the Peratroviches encountered more extensive social and racial discrimination against Alaska Natives. They had difficulty finding housing and often saw signs banning Native entry to public facilities throughout the city,” the bio reads.
Together they helped draft and push for the passage of Alaska’s Anti-Discrimination Act of 1945, which was signed into law nearly 20 years before passage of the U.S. Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Peratrovich’s moving testimony was credited with convincing what was then the Alaska territory’s Legislature to pass the measure.
She was born July 4, 1911, in Petersburg, Alaska, at a time of “extensive segregation in the territory,” Google writes.
Her Tlingit name is Kaaxgal.aat. She is a member of the Lukaax̱.ádi clan of the Raven moiety.
She died Dec. 1, 1958, at age 47.
Goade drew on Peratrovich’s testimony for her illustration.
“When drawing Elizabeth, I was particularly inspired by her famous testimony given to the Alaska Territorial Legislature in 1945. I wanted to show her in action as she delivered her powerful speech. Additionally, Elizabeth belonged to the Lukaax̱.ádi clan (a Raven Moiety), so I knew I wanted to include Raven and incorporate elements of traditional Formline into his design,” Goade said in the writeup on Google.
“In Tlingit creation stories, Raven was the one who brought daylight to the world,” Goade says.
This story was originally published December 30, 2020 at 2:26 PM with the headline "Google Doodle celebrates Alaska Native and civil rights leader with tie to Bellingham."
