Paul White, Sr. Holding Trumpet With First Wife Elizabeth White, Son Louie White and Parents William and Mary White

Paul White, Sr. was born in Kake near Fredrick Sound on Kupreanof Island.  This had once been a big village and had a strong herring fishery.  With the coming of western culture and disease, the population decreased drastically.

In 1903, Captain Richard Henry Pratt visited Sitka.  Captain (later, General) Pratt was the superintendent of the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania.  “According to The Thlinget, October, 1908, “Captain Pratt visited Sitka and “on his return took with him four of our boys.  They entered Carlisle taking advantage of every opportunity and this summer they have all returned bright earnest young men fully equipped for life’s service and not at all spoiled by their education and contact with the whiteman’s ways.  Paul White is with his uncle finishing his boat shop.”  His son, Paul White Jr., said that when a Jim Thorpe movie came out, Paul White Sr. told him that there was a college track meet, each school (college) had 30 or 40 athletes, but Carlisle, which had only about six athletes, completely dominated the meet.  Paul White Sr. was a great distance runner.  His son, Frank C. White, won the Alaska State 440 championship.  But Paul could outrun his son- Paul was so fast, Frank said “He was like a deer, his feet didn’t seem to touch the ground.”  This was when Paul was about 47 years old. 

Paul White Sr. met some extremely famous people while at Carlisle.  He attended Carlisle the same time as Jim Thorpe (considered one of the greatest athletes who ever lived) and was coached by the famous Pop Warner.  Andrew Kerr, who was an assistant to Warner at Pittsburgh and Stanford, said he considered Warner "the greatest creative genius in American football”. 

In addition to carpentry and boat building, Paul White was a well-known music teacher.  His son Paul Jr. said he could play all brass instruments.  Paul White learned to play the trumpet at Carlisle.  The school had a famous band that had been led by Dennison Wheelock (June 14, 1871 – March 10, 1927), an internationally renowned Oneida band conductor, composer and cornet soloist of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.  Wheelock was compared at the time to John Philip Sousa, and nominated to be bandmaster of the United States Marine Band.  At the age of 40 he became an American Indian rights activist and attorney, and within several years was arguing cases for Indian nations at the United States Court of Claims and US Supreme Court.  This band performed at world fairs, expositions, and presidential inaugurals. While at the school, Wheelock composed the Sousa-inspired "Carlisle Indian School March." In 1900 he debuted his three-part symphony, Aboriginal Suite, at Carnegie Hall in New York City. 

His first wife, Elizabeth, and his sons Louie and Paul White Jr., passed away from tuberculosis.  He married Sadie Williams from Klukwan in 1933 at Hoonah.  Past Paul White, Jr., former Director of the Huna Totem Corporation is one of their sons.  They divorced at Juneau in 1952.