In the fall of 2024, a storm flooded Kotzebue, forcing about 80 people from their homes and damaging dozens of houses. Within days, members of the Alaska National Guard flew in to help with repairs before freeze-up. Kotzebue resident Thomas Baker was sent to the airport to pick them up.
“I saw this real tall guy coming off the jet, and I thought, ‘We’re going to be okay,’” Baker said at the AFN convention in October.
Veterans Day is a time to honor those who have served our country. Last month, the Alaska Federation of Natives honored that tall guy — Baker’s cousin, Dempsey Woods Jr. — with its military service award.
Woods had just traded sand for snow, coming home from a nine-month National Guard deployment in Kuwait. He said he volunteered for the flood response as soon as he heard.
“It was another welcome home, but also I was heartbroken for some of the houses that were affected,” he said.
Woods and the rest of the Guard team spent the next week getting flooded homes ready for winter. They stabilized fuel tanks, cleared storm debris and repaired the outside of Kotzebue’s rec center.
Woods said the community made sure the soldiers were taken care of, with Native food, housing and vehicles.
“We were very spoiled in Kotzebue because of how the community loves the military,” he said.
When Kotzebue flooded again the next fall, Woods was put in charge of the Guard’s response in town, leading Army and Air Force members, along with Village Public Safety Officers, in assessing affected homes.
Days later, the remnants of Typhoon Halong hit the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta. Woods and Baker, who serves in the Alaska State Defense Force, flew together to Bethel on a military C-17 cargo jet and worked in villages affected by the storm.
Woods said the damage was heartbreaking.
“But knowing that I was out there to provide help, it also gave me motivation to help these people in this tough time,” he said.
Three generations of service
In October, a year after Halong, the Alaska Federation of Natives honored Woods with its Gin’tith Richard Frank Military Award, for his service helping Western Alaska recover from the devastating storms. At the ceremony, Woods’ wife and parents stood beside him on the AFN stage, along with leaders from the Northwest Arctic.
Service runs in the Woods family. His father, Dempsey Woods Sr., served in the Guard for 22 years. And his grandfather, Wesley Woods Sr., told him stories at fish camp about his own service in 1942.
Woods grew up in Kotzebue. His family ran sled dogs in the winter and fished in the summer, sharing their catch with Kotzebue and nearby villages. At the AFN ceremony, Woods joked that mushing prepared him for the military.
“I was already ready for the yelling before I went to basic training, because I grew up dog mushing with my father,” he said.
But joining wasn’t his idea. The December after he graduated from high school, Woods was Christmas shopping in Anchorage when his phone rang. It was his dad.
“‘Here’s a number. You better go in and enlist. Do something with your life,’” Woods remembered his father saying. Woods said he also enlisted because he saw how his father's military career provided for their family.
Woods enlisted in December 2014. Now works full time in Anchorage repairing small arms for the Guard. He has two sons, Wesley and Dempsey the third. He said it’s up to them, but he hopes they’ll serve too.
Woods wasn’t the region’s only honoree at AFN. Heanie and Lee Staheli II of Kiana received its Small Business Award. The family has run Lee’s Sea Air for more than 50 years.
