Between 1900 and 1930, a family-run photography studio in Nome, Alaska produced one of the most detailed visual records of Arctic Indigenous life ever assembled in the United States. The Lomen Brothers documented Yupik Eskimo communities, gold prospectors, and the rapidly changing world around Nome during Alaska’s Gold Rush. These photographs survive today as rare windows into a way of life that was already being disrupted by outside forces.
The word “Eskimo” has a complicated history. It is now understood to derive from an Ojibwa word meaning “to net snowshoes.” In Canada and Greenland, the term is considered offensive and has been replaced by “Inuit.” In Canada’s Central Arctic, the preferred term is Inuinnait, while people in the eastern Canadian Arctic identify as Inuit. However, most Indigenous Alaskans still refer to themselves as Eskimo. This is because “Inuit” does not translate into the Yupik languages of Alaska and Siberia — it applies specifically to the Inupiat of northern Alaska, the Inuit of Canada, and the Kalaallit of Greenland. The Eskimo population of the Bering Strait region has lived there for 4,000 to 6,000 years, according to multiple archaeological studies.
Life in the Arctic demanded practical solutions to an extreme environment. Caribou fur clothing protected against temperatures that could kill an unprotected person within minutes. Seals were hunted with harpoons from the ice or from skin-covered kayaks. For larger prey like whales, hunters used an open boat called an umiak — a wide, sturdy vessel built from a wooden or whalebone frame covered in animal skin. In summer, families moved inland and hunted caribou with bows and arrows. Dog sleds were the primary form of land transportation across snow and ice.
The nuclear family sat at the center of Inuit society and daily economic life. Spiritual beliefs were animistic — meaning people held that animals, objects, and natural forces all carried a spirit. Winter homes were built as snowblock iglus or semi-subterranean structures made from stone and sod over a frame of wood or whalebone. In warmer months, families moved into tents made from animal skins. This seasonal rhythm between winter shelters and summer camps defined the pace of Inuit life.
The Lomen family arrived in Nome from Minnesota in 1903. They quickly built a diverse business empire in the region. At various points, they operated a clothing store, a pharmacy, a stationery shop, a meatpacking facility, a shipping company, and a local photography studio. The Lomen Brothers studio also regularly bought negatives from other photographers and reissued them under the Lomen Brothers Co. name. Their photographs covered a sweeping range of subjects: dogsled teams, gold mining operations, ships, aviation, and the Indigenous communities of Alaska and Canada.
In September 1934, a fire destroyed the Lomen studio along with 25,000 to 30,000 negatives and 50,000 commercial prints. Only about 3,000 negatives survived. The loss was enormous — decades of visual documentation of Nome and its surrounding communities gone in a single night. What remained became all the more precious as a historical record.
Nome during the Gold Rush was a place of collision between two very different worlds. Gold prospectors flooded the region starting in the late 1890s, and the beaches of Nome became some of the most productive and chaotic mining sites in American history. The Anvil Creek mine, active by 1915, was among the most notable operations in the area.
Gold panning on Nome’s beach was open to anyone with a pan and the energy to work the sand. Men lined the shore in large numbers, sifting through gravel for flakes and nuggets. The Miners and Merchants Bank in Nome held $1,250,000 in gold bullion in 1906 alone — a figure that illustrates the staggering scale of wealth being extracted from the region during those years.
The Diomede Islands, sitting in the middle of the Bering Strait between Alaska and Siberia, were home to Inuit communities who had lived there for thousands of years. Their geographic position placed them at one of the most remote crossroads on Earth — between two continents, in waters that froze solid each winter.
Beyond photography, the Lomen family became deeply involved in the reindeer industry. In the 1920s and 1930s, they purchased large reindeer herds and built an extensive network of slaughterhouses and processing facilities. They successfully crossbred caribou and reindeer and eventually dominated the reindeer meat and skin export market across the United States. The scale of their operation made it nearly impossible for small Inuit reindeer farmers to compete. In 1937, Congress stepped in and directed the Bureau of Indian Affairs to take over administration of all Alaskan reindeer herds, forcing the Lomen meatpacking business to close.
The photographs that survived the 1934 fire remain among the most detailed early records of Inuit life in Alaska. They show community gatherings, daily labor, children at play, and the faces of people navigating both their ancient traditions and a world that was changing fast around them.
