Alaska has a high proportion of intermarriages between Jewish and Christian men and Eskimo women, Dr. Victor E. Levine, just returned from a 20,000-mile expedition to the Arctic to study the medical status of the Eskimo, reports.
Dr. Levine is nationally noted as a nutrition expert, and is on the faculty of the Creighton University School of Medicine.
The Jewish population of Alaska is comparatively small, however, Dr. Levine estimating their entire number to be about one hundred.
In the far north, Dr. Levine noted, the people have no time for the petty irritations which mar civilized life.
Where the inhabitants have to struggle side by side against the elements and food is a grave problem, there is no time for anything even bordering on anti-Semitic feeling. A spirit of co-operation and brotherliness prevails among all.
Dr. Levine found that in Juneau, capital of Alaska, the mayor, Israel Goldstein, is Jewish. The Goldstein family is the only Jewish one in the entire city.
The reason for intermarriage by those who stay in Alaska long enough is obvious.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.