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Photo from a circa 1906-07 U.S. Department of Agriculture report on Alaska’s agricultural experiment stations Hardy Galloway cattle, from Scotland, were transplanted to the agricultural experiment station at Kenai in 1906. The Kenai Station’s main quarters can be seen in the background.

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The experiment: Kenai becomes an agricultural test site — Part 4

AUTHOR’S NOTE: A presidential executive order in January 1899 had set aside 320 acres of land near Russian…

This U.S. Department of Agriculture photograph, from the 1903 report on Alaskan agricultural experiment stations, shows some of the buildings at the Kenai Station, including the superintendent’s main quarters, at far left.

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The experiment: Kenai becomes an agricultural test site — Part 3

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Presidential Executive Order #148, in January 1899, had set aside 320 acres of land near Russian…

This 1903 photograph of mostly Kenai residents shows (back, far left) Hans Peter Nielsen, first superintendent of Kenai’s agricultural experiment station. Nielsen began work at the station in 1899 and resigned at the end of the 1903 season. (Photo from the Alaska State Library historical collection)

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The experiment: Kenai becomes an agricultural test site — Part 2

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Presidential Executive Order #148, in January 1899, had set aside 320 acres of land near Russian…

The historic marker in front of this building at 502A Overland Avenue in Kenai identifies the structure as the former headquarters of the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge and the site of the former Agricultural Experiment Station, 1899-1908. Photo by Clark Fair

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The Experiment: Kenai becomes an agricultural test site — Part 1

Individuals deciding to explore Kenai’s historic district might start their journey by turning off the Kenai Spur Highway…

John W. Eddy was already a renowned outdoor adventurer and writer when he penned this book in 1930, 15 years after the mystery of King David Thurman’s disappearance had been solved. Eddy’s version of the story, which often featured wild speculation and deviated widely from the facts, became, for many years, the accepted recounting of events.

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King Thurman: An abbreviated life — Part 6

AUTHOR’S NOTE: The fate of King David Thurman, a Cooper Landing-area resident, had finally been learned in February…

James Forrest Kalles (shown here with his daughters, Margaret and Emma) became the guardian of King David Thurman’s estate in early 1915 after Thurman went missing in 1914 and was presumed dead. (Public photo from ancestry.com)

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King Thurman: An abbreviated life — Part 5

AUTHOR’S NOTE: King David Thurman left his Cooper Landing-area home in late July 1914 for another season of…

Emmett Krefting, age 6-7, at the Wible mining camping in 1907-07, about the time he first met King David Thurman. (Photo from the cover of Krefting’s memoir, Alaska’s Sourdough Kid)

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King Thurman: An abbreviated life — Part 4

AUTHOR’S NOTE: In 1913, King David Thurman, a Cooper Landing-area resident who often seemed one step ahead of…

This is part of the intake data entered when, in 1913, King David Thurman began his 50-day sentence in the Seward Jail for violating Alaska’s game laws. A 1911 attempt to nail Thurman for such a violation had failed.

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King Thurman: An abbreviated life — Part 3

AUTHOR’S NOTE: King David Thurman, a miner and trapper who lived and worked in the Cooper Landing area…

Photo from Marshall Scull’s 1914 memoir, Hunting in the Arctic and Alaska Ferdinand “Fritz” Posth, left, poses with two Dall sheep heads and fellow guide/packer William “Wild Bill” Dewitt at a cabin on upper Killey River in the early 1910s. When King David Thurman was arrested for a game violation in 1911, Posth testified against him, but some jurors discounted his testimony and declined to convict Thurman.

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King Thurman: An abbreviated life — Part 2

AUTHOR’S NOTE: King David Thurman came to Alaska seeking gold. One of the earliest specific records of his…

The cover of Alaska’s Sourdough Kid, a memoir concerning the early life of Emmett T. Krefting, authored by Krefting and his son, Michael D. Krefting. Emmett met and befriended King David Thurman during the first decade of the 20th century.

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King Thurman: An abbreviated life — Part 1

A probate court met in Seward on Jan. 28, 1915, to determine the fate of the personal property…

The George Navarre Borough Building, seen here in December 2011, stands on Binkley Street, but the initial decision to seat borough government in Soldotna — much less what shape that government would take — were not forgone conclusions.

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No Simple Matter: Finding the borough a home — Part 6

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Creating a borough government was no easy feat for the citizens and officials of the Kenai…

In this old Cheechako News photo, officials consider an early display map of the Kenai Peninsula Borough, 1969.

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No Simple Matter: Finding the borough a home — Part 5

Time and money are always tricky ingredients in government projects.

Dolly Farnsworth was another driving force in the early days of the borough. She housed the borough’s first administrative efforts in her own bookkeeping building — initially for free — and assisted borough clerk Frances Brymer with early efforts in taxes, assessing and accounting. (Clark Fair photo)

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No Simple Matter: Finding the borough a home — Part 4

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Kenai Peninsula citizens had voted to create a second-class governing entity called the Kenai Peninsula Borough,…