East Anchorage Book Club with Andrew Gray

Send us Fan Mail Today we celebrate 63 years of Alaskan Statehood by continuing our conversation with Victor Fischer, the last living signer of the our State’s Constitution. We discuss Alaska in the 1950s when he was both a territorial legislator and a delegate to the 1955 constitutional convention. We also talk about the Great 1964 Earthquake when Mr. Fischer was working in the administration of...

Send us Fan Mail Melanie Bahnke , president of Kawerak, the nonprofit tribal consortium representing 20 Alaska Native tribes in the Bering Strait Region, talks about her childhood in the remote western Alaskan village of Savoonga where she grew up speaking St Lawrence Island Yupik. We also discuss her contentious time this past year serving as one of the 5 members on the Alaska Redistricting Board...

Send us Fan Mail Victor Fischer , the last living signer of the Alaska state constitution, was born in Berlin to a Russian mother and an American father in 1924. Today he recounts his childhood growing up in both Germany as Hitler took power and Russia under Josef Stalin. He discusses the atrocities that he experienced firsthand before his dramatic escape to America as a teenager. He covers this p...

Send us Fan Mail The politician who avoids the extremes of either the right or the left is an increasingly rare breed, but former Anchorage Assembly member and recent mayoral candidate Bill Evans is that politician. We will discuss the difficulties of walking that middle road and the political peril that lies along that path. We will also talk about his time on the Cleveland Police Force in the 19...

Send us Fan Mail Leslie Gonsette, M.D.,  a hospitalist at Providence Alaska Medical Center, gave prominent testimony at two Anchorage Assembly meetings in favor of Covid mitigation. We discuss her experiences in the hospital and in the assembly chambers. Robin Ninefeldt, M.D., who owns her own  medical practice, also testified in favor of the Covid mitigation ordinance. She authored a letter to th...

Send us Fan Mail Former Anchorage Assembly member Heather Flynn is a political juggernaut once described by the Anchorage Daily News as “Velvet and Razor Blades.” After challenging a draconian pregnancy policy while teaching at Romig Middle school in 1971, she went on to dominate the political landscape of Anchorage, serving on the Anchorage Assembly and school board. She will recount some importa...