Eskimos

The Jesuit order of the Roman Catholic Church has agreed to pay $50 million to 110 Eskimos to settle claims of sexual abuse by priests and missionaries in some of the world's most remote villages. Attorneys for the plaintiffs announced the settlement Sunday, calling it a record payout by a Catholic religious order. However, officials for the Jesuits -- formally called the Society of Jesus -- said there were "still many issues that need to be finalized."

A school in a remote Eskimo village caught fire and the blaze quickly grew out of control, engulfing homes and other buildings and forcing about 250 people to flee, officials said. No injuries were reported among the 1,100 residents of Hooper Bay. The fire's cause was not immediately known. Officials said at least 12 homes, a teacher housing complex and one of two village grocery stores burned.

THE 800 YUP'IK ESKIMOS in this wet and lonely village knew the situation was serious when government scientists began swooping in on bush planes. Except for a few doctors that fly in each year to give villagers checkups, outsiders rarely visited this outpost of scattered gray plywood homes and prefab structures plopped in the middle of the tundra. Soon, latex gloves appeared on store shelves and Wild West-style posters started popping up around town: "Wanted: Birds of the Delta."

The boys hunt for mastodon bones on the tundra as the women and girls gather salmonberries from their secret spots in the hills. The men keep busy with various manly things, fishing and fixing roofs and hauling water from the community well. It's another sunny afternoon in this Eskimo village of 340 on Alaska's west coast, and there isn't the slightest hint that life is approaching a cataclysmic change.

For 500 years, explorers nudged their ships through these Arctic waters, vainly seeking a shortcut to the riches of the East. The Northwest Passage, a deadly maze of sea ice, narrow straits and misshapen islands, still holds the traces of those who failed. There are feeble cairns, skeletons lying face down where explorers fell, makeshift camps piled high with cannibalized bones and, on one rocky spit, a trio of wind-scoured tombstones.

A vote in favor of lifting a yearlong alcohol prohibition in Barrow, Alaska, has been certified, but some Inupiat Eskimo leaders say they may file a federal complaint to upend the results. The Oct. 3 vote underscored racial divisions in Barrow, where non-Eskimos organized to end the liquor ban and some Eskimo leaders who say alcohol has harmed their culture worked to retain it.