September 3, 2026, Seward Folly Staff

Miller’s Landing and Blackwater Railroad have teamed up to bring another music festival to Lowell Point on September 6th.  Doors open at 5 p.m. and there’s plenty of parking.

“The idea started as an end-of-the-year crew party that’s been carried on for years now. We’re planning an end-of-season party, something more for the locals now that the music and arts festival has fizzled out,” said Tom Miller.  “We always had this unofficial ‘Burning Moose’ party — it started as my crew getting together, building a moose effigy out of pallets and brush, and lighting it on fire at the end of summer. It was just a fun get-together.”

This year, Chance and Tom Miller are officially making it a big end-of-the-year event for staff and the entire community, with Blackwater Railroad headlining the event.

“We’re leaning in and making it bigger,” says Tom. 

The burning moose itself is put together at the event. In the past, it was built out of whatever they had lying around the day before.

“Last year, one of my crew wanted to learn welding, so he made a metal moose frame out of old railroad track. Now we just stack wood and pallets in and around it, pick a good spot, and set it alight,” Tom continued.  “There’s an idea floating around about letting people burn something symbolic at the event, similar to what they do at Burning Man.”

That idea expanded, and now the group is “playing with the idea of building an orca effigy out of scrap metal. If we get enough donations, maybe $1,000, we’ll burn that too, with all proceeds going to fund more smolt for release in the bay.”  

The Millers asked Blackwater Railroad to help organize this event.

“Since we’ve organized events around Alaska — like Hatcherump, Winter Romp, and Down East Romp — they thought we’d be a good fit,” said Tyson Davis. “Now, it’s become a proper event with five musical acts and four DJs lined up, plus eight local craft vendors from Seward.”

The Millers will be serving their famous fish and chips and chicken strips, and another food truck and a hot beverage truck will be on hand as well. 

Burning Moose is set to become an annual, family-friendly event. Tickets are $20, so it’s accessible for everyone. As for the burning itself — there will be a bonfire, maybe not an actual moose, but something big and memorable.

The Salmon Partnership: proceeds go to smolts

For years, the Seward Charter Boat Association, in collaboration with the Chamber of Commerce, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G), and the Cook Inlet Aquaculture Association, has supported stocking local waters with salmon. Traditionally, proceeds from the annual salmon derby were pooled into a fund to buy and release salmon smolt into Resurrection Bay. Recently, however, changing times and tighter budgets have made it harder for the Chamber to raise those kinds of funds. Consequently, the bay has seen a significant drop in hatchery fish releases. The Resurrection Bay coho run is heavily dependent on hatchery fish. 

“Looking for new solutions,” Chance Miller stated, “I started to explore crowdfunding to support these efforts. This summer, the existing partnership made it possible for anyone to donate. If you search for the ‘Seward Salmon Partnership,’ you’ll find a link through the Chamber of Commerce or the Seward Charter Boat Association website (Seward Salmon Partnership – Seward Charter Boat Association), where supporters can buy a single smolt, a school of fish, or donate any amount they wish. We’ve even got QR codes on stickers around town to make it easy to give.”

Chance says the idea really took off during this year’s Salmon & Song festival. He reached out to other organizers, including the Stearns family who runs Salmonfest, and asked if they would consider donating a percentage of their net proceeds to the Partnership. They agreed, and now Salmon & Song has pledged 10% of its net to help restock salmon in Seward. “Anyone can contribute at any time, but linking the effort to our music festivals just made sense — a fun way to give back.” 

“The more awareness we can build through these gatherings, the better. We can’t put halibut or rockfish back in the water, but we can put salmon back — if we have the funds,” Chance continued. “It isn’t just charter fishermen who benefit; all recreational anglers who fish out of Seward rely on healthy salmon runs.” According to Chance, working through the Chamber’s agreement with the ADF&G makes this idea “a real win.”

Chance’s idea doesn’t stop there. “Our goal is to keep this program growing. In the future, with enough funding, we could even create a local king salmon program, raising our own fish from Seward stock. Right now, even if we had the funds and agreements in place, there just aren’t enough king salmon available to purchase — they’re all spoken for by different hatcheries. But if the community comes together, who knows what we can build?”