Daily Sitka Sentinel

Percy Hope

Percy Hope

Services for Percy Hope, a lifelong Alaskan, will be held 10:30 a.m. Monday, Oct. 16, at the Sitka Pioneers Home Chapel, located on the Home’s second floor.

A reception will follow.

Percy died Oct. 8 at the Home. He was 87 – which was surprising, because  part of his youth was spent in a tuberculosis sanitarium.

He was born in Sitka, the 10th child of Andrew Percy and Tillie (Howard) Hope. He was a quiet man, probably due to the isolation of living in a TB sanitarium from age 10 to 16 instead of in a house full of siblings.

Growing up, he went fishing with his dad and brothers on the boat Neva,  which his father, a master boatbuilder,  had built. Chatham cannery was open then.

Percy graduated from Sheldon Jackson school, and later received vocational training in office machines. He worked at Capital Office Supply in Juneau, and enjoyed traveling to various cities in the lower 48 to receive advanced training in office machinery.

He later worked as manager of the ANB Hall in Juneau. Coincidentally, the hall was in what was then the Andrew Hope Building, named after his father.

Percy was a Raven from the Kiksadi clan. Following the Hope family tradition, he was very active in tribal groups and organizations, and was a lifelong member of the Alaska Native Brotherhood.

Percy spent his last years living in senior housing in Juneau before moving to the Sitka Pioneers Home when he developed macular degeneration eye disease.

He was happy to be back home in Sitka, where he had grown up.

Percy will be missed by his Juneau friends, co-workers and family, and in Sitka by his real family and his Pioneer Home family.