Guide to the Alberts family papers
1927-1962, bulk 1927-1944
An Alaska Historical Society collection
Collection number: HMC-1509-AHS.
Creator:
Alberts, Hugo William.
Alberts, Walter Watson.
Carmean, Ruth Watson.
Title: Alberts family papers.
Dates: 1927-1962, bulk 1927-1944.
Volume of collection: 0.6 cubic feet.
Language of materials: Materials in this collection are in English.
Collection summary: Primarily photograph albums of a director of Alaska Agricultural Experiment Stations and his family.
Biographical note:
Dr. Hugo W. Alberts was born in Wisconsin in 1889. From 1926 to 1932, he served as Director of Alaska Agricultural Experiment Stations, then under the U.S. Department of Agriculture. While the position was based in Sitka, Dr. Alberts traveled to Agricultural Experiment Stations in Kodiak, the Matanuska-Susitna Valley, and Fairbanks, as well as other locations in Alaska. In 1927, he married Ruth Watson, and they had a son, Walter Watson Alberts, often called “Watson,” in 1929. After Hugo Alberts left Alaska, he continued working as an agricultural scientist for the U.S. government. Prior to 1940, he and Ruth divorced, and the collection contains a letter reflecting a later married name, Carmean. In 1944, Ruth and Watson took a trip to Southeast Alaska.
Collection description:
The collection consists of four photograph albums. Three of the albums contain photographs, dated 1927-1929, taken during Hugo Alberts’s time as Director of Alaska Agricultural Experiment Stations. The fourth album, created by Watson Alberts, documents a trip to Southeast Alaska that he and his mother, Ruth, took in 1944. There is also one folder containing documents, loose photographs, and postcards. Images in the first three albums include photographs of Hugo and Ruth Alberts, people they met while traveling throughout Alaska, and Agricultural Experiment Stations in locations across Alaska, as well as other locations and towns they visited. Locations depicted in these albums include Sitka, Wrangell, Juneau, Petersburg, Hoonah, Valdez, Anchorage, Eklutna, the Matanuska-Susitna Valley, Cantwell, Mount McKinley National Park (now Denali National Park and Preserve), Healy, Nenana, Fairbanks, Ruby, Kaltag, Nulato, Russian Mission, Atka, Ouzinkie, Unga, Unalaska, Makushin, Kashega, Umnak, Atka, and Attu. A few captions in the albums use outdated language, now considered derogatory, to describe people and locations.
The fourth album contains commercial and original photographs from Ruth and Watson Alberts’s trip to Southeast Alaska, as well as a narrative of the trip written by Watson. Places depicted and described include Ketchikan, Juneau, and Sitka.
Finally, there is one folder containing three documents, loose photographs, and postcards. The documents include a thank-you letter, dated 1929 and addressed to Mrs. H.W. [Ruth] Alberts, from an official with the U.S. Department of Agriculture following a visit to the Matanuska Agricultural Experiment Station. There is also a response from the Slavic and Central European Division of the Library of Congress to a request for information about Baranof Castle in Sitka, addressed to Mrs. W.M. [Ruth] Carmean, from 1962. The third document is a description of totem poles in the Alaska Building at the 1905 Lewis and Clark Exposition in Portland, Oregon. The photographs and postcards in the folder depict similar subject matter as the photographs in the albums.
Arrangement: The photograph albums are arranged chronologically, with the first three albums covering roughly the same dates. Loose photographs from the albums have been put in, and notes have been placed in the albums where they were removed. The folder of loose material at the end of the collection is organized by type of material.
Alternative formats: The collection contains a typed transcription of the trip narrative in the 1944 album.
Digitized copies: This collection has not been digitized. For information about obtaining digital copies, please contact Archives and Special Collections.
Rights note: The Alaska Historical Society holds copyright to this collection and has given the Archives authority to grant use permissions.
Preferred citation: Alberts family papers, Alaska Historical Society collections, Archives and Special Collections, Consortium Library, University of Alaska Anchorage.
Works used in preparation of inventory:
1940 United States Census, Pasadena, Los Angeles, California, digital image, s.v. “Ruth Alberts,” Ancestry.com.
1950 United States Census, Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, California, digital image, s.v. “Ruth W. Carmen” [sic], Ancestry.com.
“Alberts, Hugo William.” In Biographical Encyclopedia of the World. Institute for Research in Biography, 1940.
Separated materials: An Alaska Steamship Company map of Alaska was removed from the collection and added to the Alaska Historical Society maps collection (EPH-0433-AHS).
Acquisition note: This collection was donated to the Alaska Historical Society in 2025 by Allison Alberts, daughter of Walter Watson Alberts. The Historical Society retains ownership of the collection and placed it on deposit in Archives and Special Collections in 2025.
Processing information: This collection was described by Gwen Higgins in 2026.