Capturing a Changing Arctic: Paul Shepson’s Mission to Preserve Its Stories

Since 1988, Paul Shepson, dean and distinguished professor in the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences (SoMAS), has been working in various parts of the Arctic trying to understand the way the natural atmosphere works, and the way of life of the hardy people who live there. 

“I had a friend who was already doing work in the Arctic, and he asked me if I wanted to go,” said Shepson. “We traveled by a C130 military transport to the tip of Ellesmere Island, which is in the Canadian Archipelago. I’ve always liked adventure and it sounded exotic. I just wanted to go see the northernmost community on the planet, which was a Canadian Forces base.” 

Shepson’s research, along with extensive time spent among Arctic communities, is documented on the website Arctic Stories, a tribute to a centuries-old way of life now threatened by climate change put together by Shepson, his wife Jody, and friend and environmental author Peter Lourie.

“I started out with a very esoteric interest in atmospheric chemistry and some weird things that happen in the Arctic with atmospheric composition and chemistry,” he said. “We made some interesting observations, and I just got hooked.”

Eventually his research took him to Utqiagvik, Alaska (formerly Barrow). Located north of the Arctic Circle, it’s one of the northernmost towns in the world, and the northernmost in the United States.

“It’s a fascinating place,” he said. “It’s a combination of scientists who are there to understand climate change, people looking at impacts on the natural Arctic and Arctic wildlife, and oil and gas people among this town of maybe 5,000 people, most Inupiat Eskimos. It’s an intriguing confluence of people with different objectives and perspectives.” 

What intrigued him even more was the confluence of old world traditions and modern technology. Shepson noted that locals hunt bowhead whales using seal skin handmade umiaqs as they have for hundreds of years, while also using GPS and satellite remote sensing to determine the sea ice conditions, how it is moving, and whether it’s safe or not.

“So these very traditional methods are supported with a high degree of technical savvy,” Shepson said. “The kids access the internet and social media and all the modern technology that other kids do, but then they also learn how to hunt whales. It’s an amazing intersection of technology and old, old culture and a respect for nature. And I felt like somebody ought to be capturing this, because it’s all going to be gone 100 years from now.” 

Shepson first went to the Alaska North Slope region with Lourie with the intention of telling the stories of the local people and others trying to figure out the impact of humans on various aspects of the natural Arctic. 

“We interviewed lots of Native Americans about life in the Arctic, and what they enjoy about it, and what it means to them,” he said, adding that he was struck by a fascinating thing that emerged in his interviews. He expected the residents to be angry at outsiders compromising their natural lands, but did not find that to be the case.

“They deal with the harshest aspects of the natural world, so to them, climate change is just another challenge that nature brings,” he said. “They said, ‘If it gets warmer and we lose the ice, we’ll hunt on land and we will be better at fishing. We adapt to change. We’re tough people.’ It was very philosophical.”

The effect of climate change, particularly the reduction of sea ice, is immediately apparent. Shepson said that without ice, the bowhead whale — which uses its cranial structure to bash through the sea ice from below — loses its natural ability to protect itself from its natural predator, the orca. Similarly, polar bears hunt for seals by waiting around their breathing holes in the ice, and both polar bears and seals create dens for their pups on the ice. “So if you remove the ice, lots of mammals may die in this very sensitive ecosystem.” 

Shepson noted that while the stories shared on the website have “so much rich material,” it is tempered by the reality of a very different existence in the not-too-distant future.

“Your grandchildren will probably never get to see that world, because it will be gone, and I find that personally offensive,” he said. “We wanted to record those stories and capture the beauty of the Arctic. There are a lot of photographs and videos on this site and it seemed like we were capturing some natural human history.”

Despite their unique existence, the local people, said Shepson, have the same hopes and dreams as most of us.

“They’re just people, and they love getting on an airplane and going somewhere nice,” he said. “Their kids go to college in Anchorage or Fairbanks, and some go away and never come back. And others get advanced degrees and return to become more valuable to their own community.” 

It’s a feeling Shepson is familiar with. 

“There’s a ‘salmon’ character in me,” he said. “I grew up in the Finger Lakes area of New York, and always wanted to get back there. It still feels like home, and there’s something about home that brings people back.” 

Shepson’s last trip to the Arctic was in spring of 2022, and Arctic Stories is static for the time being. 

“Over the years, we have been fortunate to have our work, using our airplane, funded, in the interest of understanding the impacts of human activities on the natural Earth. We have since lost some of that funding,” he said. “At this age, it’s probably time to move on to another adventure.” 

Still, he hopes a younger person will one day carry it forward.

“These people are connected to the point of helping each other survive,” he said. “It’s very human and very intimate, but they can still be part of the modern world. But they can also walk out with their shotgun and bear slugs and be part of the natural world. In many ways that world seems more real than the one you and I live in. They are very deeply connected to their community and very deeply connected to the earth. I’ve been richly blessed with the opportunity to be part of that.”

— Robert Emproto