Yukon who is who

Maria Johns Klaoos Tlaa (b.~1865)

Maria Johns lived in Tagish. She was tuq'wedi [Dèshìtàn] and traced her ancestry to the Tlingit coastal town of Angoon. Her first language was Tagish, she spoke a good deal of Tlingit and had fine command of English. She saw a white man for the first time in the 1880s when her family defied the coastal Tlingit and crossed the Chilkoot Pass to trade at Wilson's Store in Dyea. She led a rich life but was in poor health and partly blind during most of her adult days. In 1948, she was totally blind. Maria composed at least three songs of her own, and she told a great many stories to her children, adding to their repertoire. She told anthropologist Katherine McClelland the story of the girl who married the bear and McClelland published the story in 1970. Johns was a great storyteller, changing her voice to indicate that different characters were speaking, and imitating the sounds of dogs and bears. Daughter Dora Austin Wedge was Maria Johns’ interpreter.¹⁾