Seen from across Third Avenue in 1989:  The Community House (and behind it, the spires of St. Joseph's Church), KNOM garage, "The Fire Trap" at center (and behind it to the left, the roofs of "The Crooked House" and Gleeson Hall), and finally at right, the original KNOM studio.
 

In 1947, James Walsh purchased a tiny house and had it moved to Nome's 3rd Avenue, four lots west of Steadman Avenue.  Walsh was station manager for Pan American Airlines. At left is the original building in a photograph taken between 1947 and 1950.  Visible in the background is the Miners and Merchants Bank, and behind it, the Bering Sea. The house grew along with the Walsh family.  This tiny structure eventually became KNOM Studios A, B and C. In the 1950's, the Walshes sold the building to St. Joseph's Catholic Parish, whose pastor, Fr. Lawrence A. Nevue, SJ entertained hopes of creating a parochial school.

At left, in a photo taken in 1970, (with King Island Eskimo youth Dennis Pikonganna), the house as it appeared when the church purchased it.  It served as a rental for fifteen years.  Note the original windows, in the right-hand side of the first story.               (Left) Volunteer secretary Kathy Prueher poses at the back of the building.    In the color photo below, taken in 1990, you can see the extent of the 1970 addition, which was the fifth major addition to the structure. In addition to a business office, the building's upstairs included a small sitting area and four small volunteer bedrooms.  In 1972, the sitting area was divided into a smaller space and a tiny fifth bedroom. Like all but the largest commercial buildings in Nome, all of the KNOM-related structures simply sat upon blocks of wood laid on the ground, and were subject to major shifting as the ground beneath them melted and thawed. From its earliest years into the late 1980's, volunteer nurses were the station's major source of operating income.  These nurses (and a couple of doctors) worked at Nome's hospital, lived as volunteers and donated their entire salaries.  This added as many as eight volunteers to the KNOM crew, which, including cook and building maintenance worker, topped out at 25 in 1980-81.  A staff of this size required considerable space for housing.

Most of the volunteers lived in "k-d" (knockdown) buildings, "temporary" structures erected by the U.S. Army during World War II.  Seven years before the war, Nome had been devastated by a city-wide fire, and in 1945 and 1946, many Nomeites adopted these k-d's for homes and businesses.

(The most easily identified of the few k-d building surviving in the year 2001 is Rasmussen's Music Mart, on the southeast corner of First Avenue and Federal Way, near the Nome Post Office.)
 

The building at left was an old army refrigeration building, and was therefore slightly better insulated than most. Volunteers remodeled it in 1969 to serve as a girl's dormitory, with four bedrooms and a large living room area. As the volunteer crew grew, it was remodeled several times later to add more rooms, eliminating the common space. For many years, it was known as "The Girls' Dorm," but by 1987 the building had become so unstable that volunteers dubbed it "The Crooked House." By the time these photos were taken, daylight was visible through many cracks in the walls. In 1991, the building was demolished; after a slight push, it fell over under its own weight.

From the earliest days, the core building in the complex was another k-d building which had long served as the parish rectory, and was therefore known simply as "The Rectory", but later took on the name "Community House."
 

With its front door facing Third Avenue, in 1969 the rear of the building was attached to St. Joseph's Church, seen in the left background. The Community House included priest's office and bedroom, plus three additional bedrooms, two bathrooms and a 20 ft. by 20 ft. kitchen/dining area, with seating for up to 25.  The only KNOM location with a television (starting in 1971), it was the social center for the volunteer community.  The photo at left features parish catechist Sr. Cecelia Huber and KNOM volunteer Larry "Spike" Anderson in 1990.

(Right) Luella Poole (Fr. Jim Poole's mother) and "Thunder" in the rectory that later became the Community House, about 1967. As far as anyone remembers, this is about the way the rectory had looked since the army building was converted and moved onto the site in 1946. The kitchen, behind the book case at right, was turned into Luella's bedroom in 1968. The region behind the desk was walled off as Fr. Poole's bedroom, and the foreground became the large gathering area and community kitchen..

(Left)  September, 1968, in the newly installed kitchen, with a 9-foot long counter that could easily seat eight people.  Pictured from left:  carpenter Bro. John Huck, SJ, Therese "Tweet" Burik, Luella Poole and volunteer carpenter Tom Karlin. As the volunteer crew grew, so did the table, to 13 feet long in 1971, and a year later, to 16 feet. In 1991, the Community House, badly deteriorated and unrepairable, was separated from the church and given to a local man in return for his hauling it away.

That year, KNOM began building the new Luella Poole Community House volunteer dorm on the same lot.

In the image below, you can see the new volunteer house under construction on the site of the Community House.   A snowmachine travels west, approaching the intersection of Third and Steadman Avenues.
 

In front of the new volunteer house sits a trailer moved onto the corner in 1975 for the Brothers of Christian Instruction (removed in 1992), and to the left, St. Joseph's Church, fronting on Steadman Avenue. Just above the roof of the trailer, the triangular cut line is visible where the old Community House had been removed from the church a half-year earlier. Also visible is the KNOM Christmas Star atop the studio tower, a hundred feet farther back. This St. Joseph's Church building had been constructed of k-d buildings in 1946, and was also deteriorating badly.  It was replaced by the parish in 1994, sold for a very small sum and hauled away.

 

(Right)  St. Joseph's Church in 1991.

To the left (south) of the church stood Gleeson Hall (below, in 1989, with KNOM maintenance chief Bro. Ray Berube, FIC), fronting on the wooden boardwalk along Steadman Avenue.
 

This long building, also a k-d, served as parish hall from the 1940's through the 60's.  In 1969-71, when Nome's public school had outgrown its 1952 building, Gleeson Hall was home to Nome's two first grade classes.  In 1982, the rear of the building was renovated, creating two larger dorm rooms, which were occupied by the second and third married volunteer couples in the station's history.  Later, Fr. Jim Poole, SJ moved into one of the rooms, and long time engineer Timothy Cochran moved into the other.

Here's Gleeson Hall, looking east from the back, toward Steadman Avenue, May 1986.  Behind, left, the "Crooked House" and St. Joseph's Church beyond. Notice the sagging, uneven walls. Like all of the other buildings, Gleeson was rotting, falling apart, unrepairable and expensive to heat.  About 1988, the front began blowing fuses, and electricity was pulled out.  When the rear began blowing fuses two years later, the building was evacuated.  The front half of the building was demolished, and the back end was gutted, salvaged and hauled away.

In 1972, KNOM purchased a small home on Steadman Avenue, just south of Gleeson Hall, to house married volunteer Les Brown and his family.
 

Known for many years as "The White House," the building was home to KNOM volunteers until 1988, when it was given to St. Joseph's Parish for use as rectory. In 1995, the parish sold the house to help finance construction of the new church.  Today, it remains on the site, a private home. (In the 1988 photo, note the wall of Gleeson hall at right, and the KNOM studio tower in the background.)

On Third Avenue next door to the original KNOM studio stood the Hudert home (below right), built in 1946, also a k-d buildings, disguised by siding.

The Catholic Church bought the building as a firebreak about 1960, and rented it for many years.  A back apartment housed volunteers Tweet Burik and Noralee Irvin in the 1960's, assistant pastor Fr. Harold Greif, SJ in the 1970's, and later several KNOM staff and volunteers.  Electrical wiring in all of the buildings was crumbling, but this building was the worst, powered by three electric boxes crabbed together in the front entryway, and the 1987 volunteer crew, some of whom lived in it, dubbed it "The Fire Trap." The present KNOM "Keller Broadcast Center" studio occupies the lot where the Hudert home once stood.

After "The Fire Trap" was cut apart and hauled away in late spring 1992, Pomeranz Construction began erecting the new studio, just three feet from the old studio's eastern wall.  This photo was taken during construction, in February 1993.  Note the KNOM sign, still on the old studio.

The KNOM Photo Gallery has images of the new construction and finished buildings.  Thank you to everyone who made our safe, economical new buildings possible!
 

Copyright © 2008 KNOM