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Tom "Kiarcimalria" Wassilie
Tom Kiarcimalria Wassilie is Yup'ik and was born on March 19, 1941 to Helena and John Wassilie in Akiachak, Alaska. Tom's parents passed away while he was young, and he stayed most of the time after that with his father’s mother, Anna Cyril. She was his teacher, who had him go out very early every morning without his shoes to check the weather. Her subsistence camps were at Pugcenar and Taqikarpak on the Elaayiq River. Mike Cyril taught Tom how to hunt, trap, fish, and run a dogteam. Tom married Lucy Nose on September 2, 1965, and together they raised seven children. Tom is an accomplished dog musher who has participated in sled dog races around the Kuskokwim Delta region. In 2005, he had a dog yard with 32 dogs in it and had recently won first place in the Russian Mission sled dog race. Tom Wassilie passed away in 2007 at age 66.
Biography written by Sophie Kasayulie of the Yupiit School District.