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Ketchikan: Alaska’s First City
First off, Ketchikan does not boast Alaska’s biggest glaciers, tallest mountains, or most diverse attractions and activities; But they don’t have to. There is a certain charm to Ketchikan, mostly due to its wealth of native culture, colorfully displayed in an amazing collection of totem poles. In fact, the Totem Heritage Center has the largest collection of original 19th-century totem poles anywhere, and you’ll also find two other totem-pole parks.
It was the area’s abundant fish and timber resources that first attracted non-natives to Ketchikan, where Tlingit Indians had operated a fish camp. The township began with Mike Martin’s purchase of 160 acres from Chief Kyan in 1885. The first cannery opened the next year, and by 1936, Ketchikan claimed seven canneries, producing 1.5 million cases of salmon.
Today, besides the wealth of totems, Ketchikan is the site of a major salmon fishery. And if you’re looking to catch some salmon to take home with you, Ketchikan offers the best opportunity along the Southeast coast to real in the big one. You can also stroll the Creek Street boardwalk, which was home to the red-light district until the 1950s, and today has some fun shops. And of course, vast tracts of forest aren’t far away: Misty Fjords National Monument, a 2.2-million-acre wilderness, begins just east of here, and the vast Tongass National Forest (the nation’s largest) stretches north.
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