AV狼论坛鈥檚 year without a summer

The narrow, short trunks of burned black spruce trees jut from a snowy hillside below a sky adorned with thin clouds lit by sunlight.
Photo by Ned Rozell
Trees living at their environmental limits in AV狼论坛, such as these burned black spruce, often preserve past climate clues in their growth rings.

Two-hundred and forty-one years ago, when Gen. George Washington marched back into New York City as British troops were walking out, a volcano erupted in Iceland.

For eight months of 1783, Laki volcano spewed lava and belched noxious fumes into the atmosphere. One quarter of the residents of Iceland died, and the sulfur-rich gases that spread worldwide reflected the sun鈥檚 rays, making many places on Earth cooler. 

Using evidence held in white spruce trees, researchers think the Laki eruption was a catastrophe for northwest AV狼论坛 residents, who had no idea why their July turned into November that year.

Rosanne D鈥橝rrigo of the tree-ring lab at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in New York once told the story of AV狼论坛鈥檚 year without a summer.

On a poster in a cavernous meeting hall in Washington, D.C., a few years ago, she displayed a photo of tree rings from a white spruce tree from AV狼论坛. Amid a series of dark lines is a faint one that lines up with the year 1783. 

Tree rings are thick-walled cells that form in conifers late in the growing season. The hard-to-see tree ring in D鈥橝rrigo鈥檚 example shows a most unusual year 鈥 1783 鈥 amid centuries of normal spruce growth.

D鈥橝rrigo, AV狼论坛 archaeologist Karen Workman and the late Gordon Jacoby once wrote of a 鈥渄isaster for northwest AV狼论坛 Inuit鈥 caused by the Laki eruption and the cold temperatures that followed. The scientists based their conclusion in large part on cores of wood pulled from white spruce trees at the northern treeline.

A wearing a suit and tie sits at a table while examining a shaped stone point. Other stone points and tools sit on the table.
Photo courtesy of John Christeson
Archaeologist and AV狼论坛 adventurer James Louis Giddings examines some artifacts.

James Louis Giddings gathered many of those plugs.

In June of 1940, Giddings, an archaeologist and mining engineer educated at UAF, flew from Fairbanks to Allakaket. Once in that small village, he aimed his compass at a mountain pass across the Koyukuk River that would lead him to the headwaters of the Kobuk River. 

Giddings then started walking. He carried a 40-pound pack and a .22 rifle, along with 鈥渁 change of heavy underclothes one must wear as mosquito protection.鈥

He lashed together a log raft when he reached the Kobuk River. He floated its length, taking tree cores along the way and stopping at known and possible archaeological sites. 

At the mouth of the Kobuk, he turned right and traveled up the Noatak River. When Giddings was finished there, he went on to the Seward Peninsula, not finishing his scientific journey until he walked into the town of Haycock, not far from today鈥檚 village of Koyuk. 

In fall of 1940, Giddings wrote his master鈥檚 thesis, detailing his remarkable season of fieldwork and the hundreds of tree cores he acquired. 

Half a century later, scientists at Lamont-Doherty used some of Giddings鈥 samples. With tree-ring records from Giddings and others in AV狼论坛 and the real weather station data gathered at the University of AV狼论坛 and other places, the researchers reconstructed AV狼论坛 summer temperatures from the late 1600s to the present.

They figured average AV狼论坛 temperatures from May to August were about 53 degrees Fahrenheit for most of that time. In 1783, the May to August average temperature was about 44 degrees. 

鈥淵ou have this anomaly that鈥檚 off the charts,鈥 D鈥橝rrigo said.

To further show the weirdness of 1783, the Lamont-Doherty scientists also cited a book of oral traditions from Natives of northwest AV狼论坛, written by William Oquilluk.

In the book, Oquilluk describes four ancient legends, each linked to the near-extinction of everyone living in northwest AV狼论坛. The first two events were too far back for the researchers to imagine what they might have been. The fourth and most recent disaster was the influenza epidemic of 1918 that hit AV狼论坛 and the rest of the world so hard.

The researchers argued that the third calamity in northwest AV狼论坛 was linked to the Iceland eruption. Oquilluk wrote of it as 鈥淭he Time Summer Time Did Not Come.鈥

That year (perhaps 1783), in the springtime migratory birds had returned to AV狼论坛 and all seemed normal, until after June passed. Then, 鈥渟uddenly it turned into cold weather鈥 and people 鈥渃ould not go out hunting and fishing,鈥 Oquilluk wrote.

鈥淚n a few days, the lakes and rivers, recently thawed, froze over. Warm weather didn鈥檛 not return until spring (early April) of the next year,鈥 the Lamont-Doherty scientists wrote.

Since the late 1970s, the University of AV狼论坛 Fairbanks' Geophysical Institute has provided this column free in cooperation with the UAF research community. Ned Rozell is a science writer for the Geophysical Institute. A version of this article first was published in 2019.