“When you go work in the canneries and go to Alaska, you can reinvent yourself — you’ll be a completely different you,” said Oscar Peñaranda, who worked 15 seasons in Bristol Bay canneries — and might return to one next year.
Canneries are a big part of Alaska’s history. Throughout the 20th century, waves of immigrants – primarily from the Philippines – came to work alongside Alaska Native people in the canneries.
There’s even a recreation of a bunkhouse, with a door covered in names of the workers who slept there from the 1980s to 2009. Jackie Manning is the exhibit’s curator. Her favorite thing is a little cart used to serve coffee to workers during what was called Mug Up time. That’s where the exhibit gets its name.
Now, he’s a historian. He founded the San Francisco chapter of the Filipino American National Historical Society and wrote about his experiences as an Alaskero – the term for Filipinos who worked in Alaska’s canneries. “Language is how you see the world. You know two languages, you get two ways of seeing the world,” he said. The labor movements happening in the canneries paralleled his life in San Francisco in the winters. In 1968, he participated in Peñaranda went on to teach literature and Filipino language in high schools and colleges.
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