But the government asked more of them than bond purchases. In Alaska, Gruening, concerned about a Japanese invasion (this was a month before Japan attacked the Aleutians), set out to organize the Alaska Territorial Guard. It was to be a militia, armed citizens prepared to fend off invaders. As Gruening needed the guard to extend up the whole coast, this meant enrolling indigenous people.

“Up until then,” Gruening remembers, “I had had very little contact with the Eskimos.” He wondered how they might react to the prospect of joining the military. Alaska Natives endured a harsh Jim Crow system: separate seating in theaters, segregated schools, and NO NATIVES ALLOWED signs on hotels and restaurants. Gruening confessed that he “did not know what resentment might lurk behind their smiling faces.” Nor did the mainland soldiers, who worried that Alaska Natives, if armed, might turn their guns against the army.