I must confess to not being particularly involved in the current national election cycle. I feel a sense of great exasperation every time I peek at the political headlines and doubly so when I could not help but be drawn in to reading a series of articles that have appeared in the news-periodical firmament about my mother, Kim Metcalfe. These articles detail the Bernie Sanders campaign’s harassment of my mother about her superdelegate status.
Coincidentally, in the last few months I have been doing some digging into the microfiche archives of the State Historical Library’s amazing collection of newspaper archives trying to learn more about my family’s — the Metcalfe family’s — history in Alaska. My maternal grandfather’s (Vern Metcalfe) liaisons with the Kennedys have always been of interest to me. I have a long-standing fascination with John and Robert Kennedy, especially, and I have long been aware that Vern had met both JFK and RFK on their sojourns to our great state.
Reading through the archives of the Empire and Juneau Independent for the period of the late 1950’s is a pastime that I would recommend to anyone interested in the history of statehood, and I took personal pleasure in reading Vern’s Independent column “Speaking of Just about Everything but Sports,” which was, in theory, a sports column but included stories about characters on Front Street just as much as stories about local sports.
Some gems from this period include a short article from September 1958 entitled, “Advertisers Beware! Metcalfe Joins Independent Staff,” about Vern being hired to sell ads for the Independent. From the article: “Metcalfe is well known in Juneau so we feel this is sufficient warning to our unsuspecting advertisers.”
JFK came to Juneau Nov. 10, 1958, during the long run-up to his campaign for president in 1960 and gave an address at the Gross Alaska Theater on Front Street. The audio of JFK’s speech in Juneau is actually up on YouTube (www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sq89ceJ0w3o) and is great to tune in to all these many years later. My mother shook JFK’s hand during his visit here.
Another great find in the Empire’s online archives is, “Haunting Sad Eyes of Robert Kennedy,” by Warren Wiley from 1999 where Mr. Wiley recounted how in 1965 RFK had passed through Juneau on his way to Canada to hike a mountain that was named for JFK. There is a great Life Magazine issue from April 1965 with a story written by RFK himself about his adventure. Mr. Wiley’s Empire piece recounts how Wiley and Vern wrangled their way onto RFK’s chartered flight and accompanied him to Whitehorse.
The Metcalfe family’s origins in Alaska go back much farther than the statehood-era; they go back to the beginning of last century and I recount this only to contrast this to the various machinations of the Bernie Sanders campaign and their “Superdelegate Hit List” that has been used to demonize Kim Metcalfe and my family. As one meme online has it, my mother is out to “screw Alaska.” To me the hypocrisy and ignorance of these young Sanders enthusiasts is both familiar from my own not-too-distant youth and also very sad.
I can think of few families that care more about Alaska and are more invested in this great state than the Metcalfe family. Rather than being harassed and libeled online by people that don’t even have to get dressed or leave their couch to do so, Kim Metcalfe and family should be honored and their long history in this state should be celebrated.
I encourage the Sanders supporters that may be reading this to take a second look at the life and times of Kim Metcalfe and her family. I encourage them to continue to be involved in politics and to continue to push for their ideas, and I would also suggest that it might be instructive for the Sanders supporters to explore their own past and motivations.
• Leo Helmar was born and raised in Juneau and is the son of Kim Metcalfe and Paul Helmar.
