Feature Article—November 2001

TATTOO TIME IN SOLDATNA, ALASKA
by Suzanne Lamb

Imagine this, you Lower-49ers, each October your state sends you a check for your share of the money it's earned from oil, gas and mineral extraction. And there's no state income or sales tax! Honestly, I'm not making this up. Since 1976, every eligible Alaskan—man, women and child—is paid a dividend. Last year's share was $1,964! And, just like clockwork, 14 days before the first checks are direct-deposited, the phone starts ringing at Classic Tattoos, the Kenai Peninsula's only tattoo studio. Then it's full bore, 12 to 18 hours a day for six weeks.

"During the winter, I don't do anything except clean, sterilize, draw and tend my plants," says manager and artist, Chuck Haviland. "I only average two to three tattoos a week from December 15 through March 31, so all the extra income from dividend season is used to pay the bills for the next three months."

Business really picks up when the newly minted 18-year-olds turn out for their first legal tattoo. "Soldatna [about a four hour drive southeast from Anchorage] is very conservative—a really religious community. I have an obligation to the community to respect its morals; so if the parent won't sign a consent form, I won't touch a kid 'til he turns 18," says Haviland.

In May, cannery workers start to work at the local fish processing plants, and tourists arrive in June. Customers come through the door in groups of four or five. "They're here to get a marker," says Chuck. "They want to mark their summer in Alaska. They'll get an outline of the State of Alaska with a bear or moose in the center or a tattoo of our State flag." During the summer, it doesn't get dark until about midnight, so Classic is open late. With about 250 Peninsula clients receiving ongoing work, customers wander in and out at ten or 11, because it feels like daytime.

Since becoming a full-time tattoo artist two years ago, Chuck has become more open to creative ideas. "I have to be artistic all the time. I can't just shut it off like when I was a journeyman welder during the day and tattooed at night."

Chuck guesses he's done 5,000 to 8,000 tattoos since going full-time two years ago. From a total Peninsula population of about 49,000, those are impressive numbers. "I get a lot of different clientele—police officers, doctors, nurses, politicians and oil workers from the slope in north Kenai. A lot of these tattoos are small and private. Even close friends would never know they have them. They may never tell anyone."

Chuck feels that Kenai is one of the most in-tune places he's ever lived, as far as people knowing what they want for a tattoo. "In eight years of part-time tattooing in central Washington, I never did a moose or a deer—and I lived in the mountains near White Pass where people hunt! Here, I do a lot of mountain scenery and the nature that people live with. And native Alaskans come in here with scrimshaw carvings on tusks and whale baleen. They want me to turn the designs into a tattoo."

Chuck credits his old-school apprenticeship for teaching him both the art and substance of running a tattoo business. Although he had to do all the "bad stuff," such as clean tubes, make needles, dust and paint, he says he had a pretty easy apprenticeship, because he never had to pay to learn. "Michael Christina took me under his wing and showed me." Chuck even took a job in Everett, Washington, to be near Michael's mentor, Percy, at Art Attack. That way, he could learn by watching.

"I do good work and guarantee what I do. I'm kind and considerate and bend over backwards to give my customers what they want. I rely on word of mouth, more than anything. In Anchorage, it's a high-volume business, so they can afford to piss people off. I'd make more in Anchorage, but I don't really care about money. My kids are seven and nine, and I'd rather have them grow up here."

Classic Tattoos

387 Lovers Lane

Soldatna, Alaska

(907) 262-3815