Primary Name: Sully, H. V.

Filed as: Sully, H. V.

Also known as: H. V. Sully

Occupation / Association: Undertaker; cabinet shop owner; charter member, Pioneers of Alaska Juneau Men's Igloo

Associated places: Douglas, Alaska; Juneau, Alaska

Keywords: H.V. Sully, Sully family Douglas Alaska, Douglas undertakers, Douglas funeral directors, cabinet makers Douglas Alaska, Douglas undertaking parlors, Pioneers of Alaska charter members, Juneau Douglas businesses

Biography

H. V. Sully was associated with the undertaking and furniture trade in Douglas, Alaska, during the territorial period and was a charter member of the Pioneers of Alaska, Juneau Men's Igloo.

In the early communities of Southeast Alaska, there were no morticians as the profession is known today. Cabinet shops often produced furniture as well as coffins and caskets, and the owners of these shops commonly served as undertakers for the community.

Advertisements in the Douglas Island News described such businesses as “Undertaking … Manufacturers of Furniture, Carpentering, Jobbing, Store and Office Fixtures.” Other advertisements referred to the “Douglas Undertaking Parlors, Funeral Directors and Embalmers.”

Among those associated with undertaking services in Douglas were H. V. Sully, Pioneers of Alaska, Juneau Igloo charter member John A. McKanna, T. P. Sheldon, L. G. Thomas, and Merle Thomas.

These early undertakers provided essential services for the growing mining community and its surrounding settlements during the development of Douglas and the Juneau area.

Sources

Survey and Inventory of Douglas Historic Cemeteries.