Discovery Channel’s Alaska: The Last Frontier, the 11-season reality show that ended in 2022, garnered quite a fanbase, with millions all over the world following the exploits of the Kilcher family, homesteaders living off the land near Homer, Alaska. But what many people don’t know is that the Kilcher family has been attracting attention for decades.
Stellavera Kilcher, one of eight children of Swiss immigrants Yule and Ruth Kilcher, now lives in Maharishi Vedic City near Fairfield and summers on the family’s Alaskan homestead. Her parents established their 120-acre homestead in the 1940s under the Alaska Homestead Act, later expanding it to 620 acres, with help from their two sons and six daughters. More than merely survivalists, Yule and Ruth were changemakers who placed great importance on being world citizens. “They brought the world to us,” says Stellavera. “Their homestead was a think tank attracting philosophers, artists, politicians, environmentalists, and spiritual leaders.”
The unusual family was featured in numerous magazines, including National Geographic and LIFE. The Discovery TV series focused on first-generation siblings Otto and Atz and their sons, with appearances from the rest of the huge extended Kilcher family. In response to the show’s popularity, Stellavera spends summers giving tours on the Kilcher Homestead, keeping up small Airbnbs.
“Kilcher” means “keeper of the church,” Stellavera says. To her, this goes beyond religious affiliation and points to the family’s drive to protect the earth, inspire positive change, find soulfulness in daily activities, and be self-sufficient.
Yule & Ruth
Both of Stellavera’s parents were visionaries with a deep respect for nature. A film and history student at the University of Geneva in the 1930s, Yule saw how the European political situation mirrored historical patterns that presaged civil breakdown. Certain that war was imminent, he and his group of friends decided to focus on studying survival skills for one year, after which they planned on establishing a community in the wilderness of northern America, where they would live off the land and safeguard what they could of human culture.
In 1936, Yule came to Alaska looking for suitable land and bought an abandoned furrier’s farm, which, with additions, eventually became the 620-acre Kilcher Homestead. Ruth, his future wife, was the only one in their friend group able to get a visa as World War II broke out. When Yule met her at the boat, he proposed. After pausing for thought, she said, “Why not?”
“I asked Mom if it was really true that she married Yule the day after she arrived,” says Stellavera, “and she replied, ‘With courage and money, I didn’t need to say yes to the first man in America who proposed! But then I remembered Yule’s vision, and so I said yes to that.’ ”
Ruth was a singer, celebrated poet, and award-winning journalist who was president of the Alaska Press Women. Stellavera remembers her mother always singing, whether she was working outside with Yule or inside the house. Ruth and Yule raised their children to be “Renaissance humans,” as Stellavera puts it. “Growing up, everything was an educational moment. For example, to learn languages and music, we had to sing for our supper. We sang around the dinner table and held hands. Usually it was a grace in some language from around the world. . . .” She laughs. “You couldn’t eat if you didn’t sing.”
This practice created a family of skilled singers, who naturally gravitated towards performing. As well as appearing in school theatrics and choirs, the children traveled all over Europe with their parents as the “Trapper Family Singers,” providing musical counterpoints to Yule’s film presentations about homesteading. To this day, the Kilcher children are accomplished singer-songwriters, and their creative legacy continues with actress Q’orianka Kilcher and folk superstar Jewel.
An amateur filmmaker, Yule regarded every moment of their Alaskan lifestyle as a film opportunity. Stellavera says he “used film as a platform for an inspirational pep talk about what was important,” hoping to inspire people to live more mindful, creative lives in harmony with nature. Yule believed that nature, when treated with respect, would heal and support human life.
When clearing the land for their homestead, Yule considered himself an artist, making the beauty of nature more visible, creating the stunning meadows and forest vistas Discovery Channel viewers are familiar with. “I am a sculptor of the land,” he once told Stellavera, pointing out that choosing to clear or leave certain trees and bushes created “a balanced piece of art.”
Given his strong views, it’s not surprising that Yule became involved in politics. A delegate to the Alaska pre-statehood Constitutional Convention in 1955–1956, Yule helped craft the Alaskan constitution, and later served as a State Senator from 1963 to 1967. While he was President of the Senate, Stellavera says her father “enacted laws that are pillars of Alaskan law to protect native rights, the environment, and natural resources.”
Concerned by the trend he saw of surrounding homesteads being broken up into small parcels, Yule started the Kachemak Heritage Land Trust in the early 1990s, into which he placed their entire 620 acres under the protection of conservation easements. This trust maintains the Kilcher Homestead as a nature preserve and educational resource for future generations. The Kilcher children each get a five-acre plot. Buildings on the land can be rented for recreational or educational purposes, furthering the original vision of the homestead as a place to reconnect with nature and as a destination for changemakers and visionaries.
An Unconventional Childhood
The eight Kilcher children were raised in a one-room, 18-by-20-foot log cabin with no electricity, telephone, or running water for much of their childhood. They helped clear the land, plant the gardens, and care for their livestock, and learned to forage, fish, and hunt. Everything was upcycled. Reduce, reuse, and recycle was part of the family lifestyle before it became a catchphrase. Homeschooled until the eldest children were in their early teens, the Kilcher kids faced teasing for their patched jeans and homegrown lunches. They weren’t allowed to have plastic, processed food, sugar, or refined flour, and ate seasonally available produce and game. “We got flack for being Kilchers,” she says. “All my friends had perfect little peanut butter and jelly Wonder Bread sandwiches. I had no trading power with a moose tongue sandwich I couldn’t even fit in my mouth.”
The Kilchers learned to make do, solving problems with limited resources. “Our Discovery TV show encouraged creative problem solving for the millions of fans who had a saying, ‘What would a Kilcher do?’ when they were trying to figure out a MacGyver kind of situation.”
While Stellavera appreciates the show, she is frustrated that it mainly emphasized the survivalist aspects of homesteading life. With its focus on the brothers and their families, it did not illustrate how involved the sisters have always been on the homestead. “Anything the boys learned to do, the girls had to do also. Plus, we also did the inside ‘girl’ jobs!” Stellavera adds, “Our parents were keenly interested in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. They taught us by example that we are not just meant to survive—we also have creative and spiritual needs to develop our full potential.”
More Iowa Connections
Stellavera came to Fairfield in 1974, as part of the first graduating class of MIU. But she says there are other Kilcher family connections to Iowa. Some distant cousins in Waucoma have been settled in Iowa for generations. They connected with the Alaskan Kilchers in the 1970s when Eldrid Kilcher came across an article in TIME magazine about Yule and the family. Certain they must be related, Eldrid drove all the way to Alaska to investigate. Interestingly, when Yule later visited Eldrid’s family in Waucoma, during an animated conversation they both stood up and waved their arms for emphasis. Eldrid’s wife noticed this and told Stellavera, “Dang, it’s a Kilcher thing. He’s found his own kind.”
When Stellavera’s parents came for her MIU graduation in Fairfield, she and Ruth paid a visit to Williamsburg, where her maternal grandfather made his fortune as a young man before returning to Switzerland to wed Ruth’s mother. While in Iowa, Yule picked up an Amish horse-drawn buggy that’s still on the Alaskan homestead. After Yule’s death in 1998, the buggy drew his coffin on a memorial parade through town during an Alaskan blizzard. Throughout Alaska, the state flags were flown at half mast for two days in Yule’s honor.
In keeping with her parents’ bent towards healthy living, Stellavera spends her Iowa months working as a health professional and teacher. And every summer, she returns to the Kilcher Family Homestead in Alaska.
“It is a privilege for me to work with my brothers and sisters as a steward of my parents’ vision to create a nonprofit educational venue to help transform people.” she says. “Our parents only built one non-profit facility on our land in the early 1970s—and fans of the show are surprised to hear that it was for yoga and women empowerment retreats!” Her parents’ creative vision is reflected in the workshops they plan to offer on their homestead, “like arts and crafts, health and yoga, sustainable agriculture and energy, foraging, how to make medicines from local plants, and yes, basic survival skills—anything that promotes self-transformation and encourages appreciation of the beautiful planet we live on.”
To contact Stellavera for a chat, a local trail walk, or a tour of the Kilcher Family Homestead in Alaska, call (907) 299-5868. She is always thrilled to host Iowa fans and is also available for private video tours for those who can’t travel.For those who haven’t seen the series, she recommends watching Season 1 and then Season 10, which includes all six sisters.