Historic Park or Site

The mon­u­ment, a plaque on a 13-ton rock, can be found in the town’s Tri­an­gle busi­ness dis­trict amidst a wild rose gar­den. It’s a trib­ute to those who It’s a fit­ting trib­ute to those who lost their lives dur­ing the 1964 earthquake. 

The art of totem pole carv­ing was a lux­u­ry that expe­ri­enced its hey­day in the mid-1700s to the late 1800s. The fur trade had pro­vid­ed the Tlin­git, Hai­da and Tsimshi­an peo­ples a new­found sense of wealth – and time to focus on the artistry of the totem

What was it like for a fam­i­ly liv­ing in Anchor­age in 1915? The Oscar Ander­son House Muse­um, locat­ed in Elder­ber­ry Park at 5^th Avenue and M Street, is the per­fect way to find out.

Downtown’s con­ve­nient grid pat­tern was set up at the same time that con­struc­tion start­ed on the Gov­ern­ment Hill neigh­bor­hood. And in 1915, downtown’s plots of land were auc­tioned off to the high­est bid­ders. Many of the build­ings from that era not only still stand, but are still named after some of the city’s found­ing fathers, remind­ing us of the sac­ri­fices they made to give a future to their bud­ding city.

Just a 10-minute walk from down­town along the water­front, this fort was built by the U.S. Army start­ing in 1902, then pur­chased by Army vet­er­ans in 1947. The Fort orig­i­nal­ly housed the enlist­ed men in two Bar­racks build­ings. Only one of the two build­ings stands today. It is unoc­cu­pied and in need of major repairs. The oth­er Barrack’s build­ing burned down in 1981. Recent­ly, the foun­da­tion of the burned build­ing was trans­formed into an outdoor  ...more

This aban­doned cop­per min­ing camp is a Nation­al His­toric Land­mark Dis­trict. Estab­lished in 1903, Ken­necott Min­ing Cor­po­ra­tion oper­at­ed 5 mines in the area. Ken­necott became a bustling min­ing camp filled with min­ers and their fam­i­lies. By 1938, Ken­necott was a ghost town. This guide shows the self-guid­ed walk­ing tour points.

The Pio­neer Mon­u­ment com­mem­o­rates res­i­dents of Whit­ti­er who have passed away. Flags fly above the mon­u­ment and names are added peri­od­i­cal­ly, as long-time res­i­dents pass. 

This mine played a sig­nif­i­cant role in the ear­ly set­tling of the Tur­na­gain Arm. The build­ing here are on the Nation­al Reg­is­ter of his­toric places and the mine is unique because of its asso­ci­a­tion with load min­ing. Indi­an Val­ley Mine was found­ed in 1910 by a vagabond who ran away from home at the age of 12, joined the cir­cus and then final­ly trav­eled to Alas­ka dur­ing the gold rush. The Cowles fam­i­ly will tell you all about the his­to­ry of this…  ...more

Quick: what’s the longest com­bined rail and high­way tun­nel in North Amer­i­ca? It’s the Ander­son Memo­r­i­al Tun­nel, and you’ll dri­ve through it on the scenic and his­toric dri­ve to Whit­ti­er. The Kenai Moun­tains-Tur­na­gain Arm Nation­al Her­itage Area is a place whose val­leys and moun­tains, com­mu­ni­ties and peo­ple tell the larg­er sto­ry of a wild place and a rugged fron­tier. This audio guide gives you the inside scoop on its fas­ci­nat­ing his­to­ry. You’ll…  ...more

Whit­ti­er is not only gor­geous; it’s also full of fas­ci­nat­ing WWII and Cold War his­to­ry. And that past is easy to explore — the town pub­lish­es a map out­lin­ing an engag­ing walk­ing tour of the his­toric sites. (You’ll get a copy when you dri­ve through the Whit­ti­er Tun­nel; those arriv­ing by cruise ship can pick one up in any local business.)

What ele­ments make a great city? When Anchorage’s fore­fa­thers land­ed at Ship Creek in 1915, those ele­ments were peo­ple, edu­ca­tion, jobs, cul­ture, cap­i­tal invest­ments, pro­duc­tiv­i­ty and growth, food pro­duc­tion and sub­sis­tence, wildlife and nat­ur­al beau­ty. So these pio­neers set out to make them all a real­i­ty. Four dis­tinct neigh­bor­hoods arose to meet the call for hous­ing and land man­age­ment offices, as well as school, library, and muse­um facilities.  ...more

In 1943, The Army Corps of Engi­neers built a mon­u­ment com­mem­o­rat­ing the effort of build­ing the 2.5 mile long tun­nel through the sol­id rock of May­nard to real­ize the vision of Whit­ti­er as a year-round ice-free port. The mon­u­ment was recent­ly restored in a new loca­tion with the orig­i­nal plaque. 

This Russ­ian Ortho­dox church was built by and for Ser­bian min­ers and Tlin­git Indi­ans — not Rus­sians. Tlin­gits were attract­ed to the reli­gion because of the church’s accep­tance of their lan­guage and cul­ture; Protes­tant mis­sion­ar­ies attempt­ed to erase their cus­toms. Now, more than 110 years lat­er, the church con­tin­ues to serve the com­mu­ni­ty, with ser­vices sung in Eng­lish, Tlin­git, and Slavon­ic. A clas­sic Russ­ian build­ing, paint­ed in the…  ...more

In 1906 the chapel was built to hon­or Father Igu­men Nico­lai and Makary Ivanov. Fr. Nico­lai, Kenai’s first priest, brought small pox vac­cine, which saved the lives of hun­dreds of Dena’i­na. The chapel is on the site of the orig­i­nal 1849 church, locat­ed in the north­west cor­ner of the Russ­ian fur trad­ing post of Fort St. Nicholas.

Vis­it the site of one of the most famous shoot­ings in ear­ly Alas­ka his­to­ry – the spot where a U.S. Deputy Mar­shal was gunned down. We’ll also meet one of Alaska’s most respect­ed lawyers and politicians.

Memo­r­i­al Park was built in 1992 in hon­or Coast Guard and Navy per­son­nel that lost their lives dur­ing WWII.

At Mile­post 35 of Tay­lor High­way you can stop at the view­ing deck. This spot offers amaz­ing views of Mount Fair­play and sur­round­ing val­leys. Take this oppor­tu­ni­ty to get out, strech your legs, and take some great pictures!

Seg­ments of the trail near Seward (Nash Road) and Gird­wood (Alyeska) can be hiked dur­ing summer.

This road leads to Holy Trans­fig­u­ra­tion of Our Lord Russ­ian Ortho­dox Church. Here you will find a mag­nif­i­cent view of Cook Inlet, vol­ca­noes, the beach and Ninilchik Vil­lage. This is a won­der­ful pho­to oppor­tu­ni­ty when the flow­ers are in bloom.

This road­stop hon­ors Lt. ​“Bil­ly” Mitchell, con­sid­ered the father of the mod­ern air force, and show­cas­es the moun­tain named in his honor.

This is one of the spots where two sep­a­rate con­struc­tion crew met dur­ing the build­ing of the Dal­ton High­way. The high­way was built in 1974 to allow for the con­struc­tion of the Trans Alas­ka Pipeline and fin­ished in only 5 months. This high­way, orig­i­nal­ly a haul road allow­ing access to Prud­hoe Bay, opened to pub­lic trav­el in 1994.

This his­tor­i­cal trail through the woods between McCarthy and Ken­ni­cott was the walking/​wagon road when the rail­road was still run­ning. It’s a nice alter­na­tive to walk­ing or bik­ing up the 4.5‑mile-long road between McCarthy and Ken­ni­cott, where you’ll find more vehi­cles and dusty conditions.

This turn-of-the-cen­tu­ry rel­ic harks back to Tenakee’s busier times as a hub for min­ers, log­gers and fish­er­men who hit town for a soak in the springs and a good time. It has served as every­thing from a jail, pool hall, dance hall, senior cen­ter to a bak­ery and art gallery.

The U.S. and Rus­sia were allies dur­ing World War II. Alas­ka was a key exchange point for war­planes in the Lend-Lease pro­gram, which leant thou­sands of Amer­i­can-made planes to Rus­sia for use at the battlefront.

Just a short, most­ly uphill, walk from down­town sits this estate that was built in 1913 for $40,000 and now hous­es Alas­ka Gov­er­nor Bill Walk­er. Along with a totem pole out­side, the 26-room build­ing has eight fire­places to keep the wet, cold win­ter at bay. There aren’t tours of the man­sion, but local bus tours made it a des­ti­na­tion dur­ing Sarah Palin’s time in office — par­tic­u­lar­ly, of course, when she was the Vice Pres­i­den­tial nominee.

The Cop­per Riv­er and North­west­ern Rail­way used to serve the min­ers in this area in the ear­ly part of the 20^th cen­tu­ry, but the trains stopped rolling in 1938, and car­go planes became the only way to get freight in and out. This 14 X 18 mail cab­in was built in one day in 1948 by employ­ees of the Chi­ti­tu min­ing com­pa­ny. It’s held up pret­ty well over the decades — it had to be rehabbed in 1998 to replace some rot­ting logs, but it still func­tions as…  ...more

The Kuz­itrin Riv­er Bridge had its ori­gins in Fair­banks. It was orig­i­nal­ly named the Cush­man Street Bridge when it was built across the Chena Riv­er in the heart of down­town Fair­banks in 1917. In the 1950s the bridge was replaced with a con­crete span and the orig­i­nal met­al bridge was dis­as­sem­bled, shipped down the Chena, Tanana, and Yukon rivers and barged up the Bering Sea coast to Nome. It was hauled in sec­tions up the Nome-Tay­lor High­way and  ...more

Start at this land­mark, in the cen­ter of town, to grasp the rich­ness and depth of Sitka’s his­to­ry as the cap­i­tal of Russ­ian Amer­i­ca. The archi­tec­ture and trea­sured icons of this land­mark high­light Sitka’s long his­to­ry as a Euro­pean set­tle­ment decades before the Amer­i­can Revolution.

Home of the Delta His­tor­i­cal Soci­ety Muse­um, Rika’s Road­house at Big Delta State His­tor­i­cal Park is in a ten-acre state park on the shores of the Tanana Riv­er. The Valdez-to-Fair­banks Trail ran through here and con­tin­ued across the riv­er, aid­ed by a fer­ry. The road­house was built to accom­mo­date the trav­el­ers and is a Nation­al His­toric Site. The muse­um is a sep­a­rate build­ing behind the road­house and has dis­plays of arti­facts from the Alaskan  ...more

At Mile­post .7 of Tay­lor High­way you will notice dark gray sand dunes on either sides of the road. These were cre­at­ed over 10,000 years ago when strong winds car­ried loose sed­i­ments from the plains of the Tanana Riv­er and piled them against these low mountains.

At Mile­post 67 Tay­lor High­way you will find the Chick­en Creek Bridge. This is the site of a dredge that was oper­at­ed by the Fair­banks Explo­ration Com­pa­ny from 1959 until 1965. In an aver­age run of the dredge, it was oper­at­ing 24 hours a day for 2 weeks. At it’s peak, one run would bring in $40,000 in gold. 

This mon­u­ment is ded­i­cat­ed to Felix Pedro, a very patient Ital­ian prospec­tor who dis­cov­ered gold here in July 1902. The gold rush that fol­lowed result­ed in the found­ing of Fair­banks, Alaska’s sec­ond largest City.

Walk through a series of his­tor­i­cal build­ings, some now occu­pied by shops and restaurants

The rock cut you’re about to dri­ve through was blast­ed out in the ear­ly 1900’s when the rail­road to the cop­per mines of Ken­ni­cott was being built. The rail­road began in Cor­do­va and fol­lowed the Cop­per Riv­er to cur­rent day Chiti­na before turn­ing through the rock cut and head­ing east towards the Wrangell Moun­tains. In the 1960’s the rail­road hand­ed over the land, and lia­bil­i­ty, to the new­ly estab­lished State of Alas­ka which prompt­ly began…  ...more

The Sul­li­van Road­house His­tor­i­cal Muse­um is housed in the old­est road­house in the inte­ri­or of Alas­ka and is locat­ed in the heart of Delta Junc­tion at the End of the Alas­ka High­way. Built in 1905 by John and Flo­rence Sul­li­van, the log lodge now hous­es a muse­um that focus­es on the Valdez-Fair­banks Trail and the road­hous­es that oper­at­ed along its route. Beau­ti­ful­ly recre­at­ed rooms, as well as inter­pre­tive exhibits give our vis­i­tors a real feel…  ...more

Near­ly a cen­tu­ry ago in 1903, this was the small min­ing and fish­ing town’s red-light dis­trict but today the board­walk street, propped up over Ketchikan Creek on wood­en pil­ings, teems with gift shops, muse­ums and well-pre­served homes.

When the Unit­ed States mil­i­tary left Unalas­ka Island at the end of World War II, it also left behind build­ings and equip­ment that would become war relics and reminders of the area’s impor­tance dur­ing the Aleut­ian cam­paign, often called the ​“For­got­ten War.” The build­ings have dete­ri­o­rat­ed over the years and some have been torn down. But his­tor­i­cal plaques mark­ing the loca­tion of sev­en World War II points of inter­est were erect­ed in 2007 to ensure  ...more

At Mile­post 68 Tay­lor High­way you pull off and enjoy this easy, 1.5 mile hike to an over­look above the remains of Mos­qui­to Fork Dredge. This dredge was shut down in 1938 after oper­at­ing for less than 2 seasons. 

Here is access to the Dyea town­site, Skag­way’s neigh­bor­ing town dur­ing the Klondike Gold Rush days. Around 8,000 peo­ple lived at Dyea. You’ll find remains of a wharf, foun­da­tions of some build­ings and Slide Ceme­tery, which con­tains the graves of those killed in the Palm Sun­day Avalanche, April 3, 1898.Visit inde­pen­dent­ly, mak­ing the rough­ly 25-minute dri­ve from Skag­way. Or, join a guid­ed tour with Rain­bow Glac­i­er Adventures.  ...more

Bring the spir­it of the Gold Rush to life with Alaska.org’s exclu­sive Skag­way Audio Guide, nar­rat­ed by one of Skag­ways’ favorite sons, Buck­wheat Don­ahue, a cap­ti­vat­ing sto­ry­teller, enter­tain­er, his­to­ri­an, and adventurer.

Teller Road cross­es Anvil Creek one mile below the site of the 1898 gold dis­cov­ery that trig­gered the Nome gold rush. From here you can view the wind tur­bines that form the start of Nome’s efforts to har­vest wind as an alter­na­tive ener­gy source.

King Moun­tain is the next hill­side on the west side of the val­ley where it is easy to see the mul­ti­ple cuts across its slopes for much of the year. Most cuts are man­made ditch­es that once brought water to Nome’s gold fields for hydraulic min­ing operations.

Look to the left side of the high­way and you’ll see what’s left of Gold Dredge Num­ber 3. This dredge was build in 1927 and even­tu­al­ly pro­duced $10 mil­lion in gold.

This aban­doned lodge was once a full ser­vice stop for prospec­tors dur­ing the Klondike Gold Rush. 

This was the orig­i­nal port and city of Valdez. The city was moved to its cur­rent loca­tion 4 miles down the road after it was dev­as­tat­ed by the 1964 Good Fri­day Earthquake.

“Nome­henge,” as some of the locals call the four tow­er­ing anten­nas on Anvil Moun­tain above Nome, oper­at­ed dur­ing the height of the Cold War to link remote parts of Alas­ka with the rest of the coun­try. These are the last of 71 White Alice struc­tures, and serve as impor­tant his­toric and geo­graph­ic land­marks in Nome.

Mile 43 Denali Park Rd, small cab­in is vis­i­ble down the embank­ment on the south side of the road

Arriv­ing in Kake, you’ll see a large light-green ware­house built on pil­ings over the water. This is Kake’s his­toric salmon-pack­ing can­nery, which locals are work­ing to restore as both a usable space for local busi­ness­es and an his­toric attrac­tion for visitors. 

Don’t miss the old trap­per’s cab­in at Byers Lake. Most Sour­doughs — that means old-time Alaskans — don’t even know it’s there. Hid­den in trees along the lakeshore trail, the old Bee­man cab­in stands as a reminder of sim­pler times. Peek in the win­dows and imag­ine liv­ing there all win­ter. Now part of Denali State Park, it’s an easy 10-minute walk from the main park­ing lot.

Look across the val­ley for a view of the aban­doned build­ings from an ear­ly dredg­ing oper­a­tion at Cleary Creek.

Watch the bus­tle of the seafood indus­try and get great pho­tos of a tru­ly giant ship — the Star of Kodi­ak is 441 feet long and can hold 10,000 tons of car­go! Pro­duced as part of a five-year gov­ern­ment pro­gram dur­ing WWII, this ship was con­struct­ed in Port­land, Maine and orig­i­nal­ly named the Albert M. Boe. Launched in 1945, it had only one year as an active mil­i­tary ship and saw very lit­tle action. Part of an impro­vised effort to get Kodi­ak back…  ...more

The town’s most rec­og­niz­able build­ing, with icon­ic blue onion-like cupo­las capped by cross­es, this cathe­dral was estab­lished in 1794. That’s the year Russ­ian monk St. Her­man arrived in Kodi­ak. A benev­o­lent force in the col­o­niza­tion and exploita­tion of the Aleuts and Alu­ti­iqs, he was known for his care of the sick and dying dur­ing West­ern-intro­duced epi­demics, as well as his pro­tec­tion of the local pop­u­la­tions. He was can­on­ized in 1970,…  ...more

Here you can see what remains of the old Fortymile Road­house. In 1959, the Fortymile Road­house served Alas­ka High­way trav­el­ers who were head­ing up the new Forty-mile and Eagle High­way, now the Tay­lor High­way, which was still under con­struc­tion with only about 20 miles of road fin­ished. The road­house offered cab­ins, meals, a gro­cery store and a garage with gas and oil. The road­house closed in 1985.

Har­ry Karstens was the first ranger of Denali Nation­al Park. He arrived in ear­ly sum­mer 1921, and estab­lished his head­quar­ters on the north­west bank of Riley Creek, an ide­al spot for mon­i­tor­ing vis­i­tors using the trail lead­ing into the park. In 1925, the head­quar­ters moved to it’s cur­rent loca­tion at mile 3.4 of the Denali Park Road. 

Whit­ti­er was built as a deep­wa­ter port and rail­road ter­mi­nus to trans­port fuel and sup­plies dur­ing World War II. Come inside the Anchor Inn where a small but fas­ci­nat­ing muse­um gives a glimpse of Whit­tier’s inter­est­ing history.

The strik­ing Holy Ascen­sion Russ­ian Ortho­dox Church – with its red-shin­gled roofs and green onion domes – has become an inte­gral part of the Unalas­ka sky­line over the last cen­tu­ry. It is both an odd­i­ty (archi­tec­tural­ly dif­fer­ent than any­thing else in the Aleu­tians) and a sym­bol of Russ­ian influ­ence on Aleut cul­ture and religion.

This was the largest base on Kodi­ak Island dur­ing WWII, and the cen­ter of the Har­bor Defens­es for Kodi­ak. At the peak, some 8,000 troops were sta­tioned here. Now all that remains are some unmarked buildings.

His­toric site near Golovin opened by John Dex­ter where min­ers got their sup­plies and trad­ed infor­ma­tion. It’s where the ​“Three Lucky Swedes” stocked up (on sup­plies and help) after their big gold dis­cov­ery on Anvil Creek in 1898. Also where Leon­hard Sep­pala fin­ished his long leg of the 1925 dipthe­ria serum run. This build­ing is still stand­ing in Golovin, and was report­ed­ly board­ed up as is, with all its arti­facts still inside.

This is the site of the his­toric Fair­banks Explo­ration Com­pa­ny gold min­ing camp, estab­lished in 1925. Here you’ll find the old school house, which has been con­vert­ed into a muse­um. This area is on the Nation­al Reg­is­ter of His­toric Places.

One of the best spots to check out WWII relics, there’s a short trail from the park­ing area on the side of the road.

Here is the for­mer site of the Jack Wade Dredge. This was a pop­u­lar attrac­tion and pho­to sub­ject for high­way trav­el­ers for many years. The dredge was dis­man­tled and scraped by the BLM in 2007. BLM offi­cials said that the dete­ri­o­rat­ing con­di­tion of the old dredge was a safe­ty haz­ard. T

Although this cab­in is not acces­si­ble from the road sys­tem, it bears men­tion­ing as a Nation­al His­toric Site in the Cor­ri­dor. Har­ry A. John­son arrived in Seward in 1904 from Erie, Penn­syl­va­nia. A 30-year-old black­smith, he came north to help build the railroad. 

So don’t just stroll through town — take the offi­cial tour, brought to you by long­time res­i­dent experts: Alas​ka​.org and the Anchor­age Con­ven­tion & Vis­i­tors Bureau.

This cab­in, pos­si­bly the old­est in the Canyon Creek drainage, is a sym­bol of the area’s rich gold min­ing his­to­ry. The cab­in was built and used by the first gen­er­a­tion of Canyon Creek min­ers. North­ern Euro­pean crafts­man­ship went into the con­struc­tion of this cab­in. The cor­ner logs were dove­tailed and hand-hewn. The ridge­pole was hewn to fit the shape of the roof’s peak. Hor­i­zon­tal logs were round­ed on the out­side of the build­ing and hewn flat…  ...more

Con­struc­tion of this ear­ly-1900s bridge cost a whop­ping (at the time) $1.4 mil­lion, which earned it the nick­name Mil­lion Dol­lar Bridge. But the bridge quick­ly earned its keep, allow­ing the rail­road to haul cop­per from Ken­ni­cott to the port of Cordova.

This lit­tle cab­in was orig­i­nal­ly a rest stop for the McCormick Trans­porta­tion Co.

Beyond the bridge, a long line of small build­ings hugs the coast where a U.S. Army post once stood dur­ing the ear­ly gold rush. Fort Davis was dis­man­tled in 1923 as Nome’s econ­o­my declined. The build­ings you see today are local­ly-owned hunt­ing and fish­ing sub­sis­tence camps. The Inu­pi­at used this area well before the sol­diers arrived because of diverse and abun­dant birds, fish, and mam­mals. Please do not dis­turb or trespass.

A vis­it to Nome and the Seward Penin­su­la brings you to the ori­gins of the Amer­i­c­as’ indige­nous pop­u­la­tions. It was here that sev­er­al great migra­tions took place from Asia to North Amer­i­ca, across the Bering Land Bridge. The route was made pos­si­ble by low­ered sea lev­els, which exposed a land pas­sage rang­ing up to 1,000 miles wide, link­ing what is now Rus­sia to the Seward Penin­su­la of Alaska.  ...more

Believe it or not, but this area used to be cov­ered by tall trees!

Trav­el­ing the Richard­son High­way south of Glen­nallen, you will pass Wil­low Lake with spec­tac­u­lar views of the lake and the Wrangell Moun­tain vol­ca­noes in the dis­tance. Read about how ancient Lake Atna once filled the area you’re dri­ving through and shaped the Cop­per Riv­er valley.

Dat­ing back to 1650, the park is the area’s old­est con­tin­u­ous­ly inhab­it­ed Athabaskan set­tle­ment. View the col­or­ful Spir­it Hous­es built over the graves of the deceased, along with an Ortho­dox Chris­t­ian Cross — a cus­tom that came from the meld­ing of the cultures.

Talk about an authen­tic pio­neer town. Time seems to have stood still on McCarthy’s Main Street, which is unpaved, only a few hun­dred yards long, and lined with clas­sic build­ings and memorabilia.Some vis­i­tors walk through McCarthy and com­plain that there’s noth­ing to do — and that’s exact­ly why folks like liv­ing here. But while you may not find much activ­i­ty, you will find a lot of his­to­ry: In the town’s hey­day there were sev­er­al hotels,…  ...more

Glac­i­ers are formed when more snow accu­mu­lates than melts through the sea­sons. The weight of the snow cre­ates pres­sure that turns snowflakes into dense, rivers of ice that shape the land.

Char­lie Anway, one of the town’s ear­ly pio­neers who home­stead­ed the prop­er­ty, built the cab­in in 1903. Anway had a knack for gar­den­ing and even­tu­al­ly devel­oped the famous Anway straw­ber­ry — a berry so large and juicy that Haines became known as the Straw­ber­ry Cap­i­tal of Alas­ka. In 2003, the prop­er­ty was donat­ed to the Chilkat Val­ley His­tor­i­cal Soci­ety; plans are in the works to restore the cab­in and open it to visitors.

The Kenaitze Indi­an Tribe’s Dena’ina ances­tors, rec­og­niz­ing the abun­dance of the place called Yagha­nen, ​“the good land,” set­tled along the banks of its rivers and Tikaht­nu (Cook Inlet). In the past sev­er­al years, one loca­tion the Kenaitze Tribe has focused on is Sqi­lant­nu, mean­ing ​“the gro­cery store,” locat­ed in the area now called Coop­er Land­ing. Today, Kenaitze Indi­an Tribe part­ners with the Chugach Nation­al For­est to pre­serve, pro­tect and  ...more

Thurs­day evenings are open mic night in McCarthy. It’s a great chance to rub elbows with some locals and fel­low trav­el­ers and get a taste for the neigh­bor­hood. All are wel­come! Bring your gui­tar, har­mon­i­ca, and voice – or just your eyes and ears. Occa­sion­al­ly on Fri­days and Sat­ur­days there’s a band play­ing after 8:30 p.m. Be on the look­out for spe­cial events that are free and open to the public.

Step back in time and explore his­toric Skag­way using our detailed walk­ing tour.

At its peak, the Inde­pen­dence hard-rock gold mine was home to 206 work­ers and 16 fam­i­lies who lived high above tree line. Dig­ging and blast­ing, these work­ers recov­ered 140,000 ounces of gold before the mine shut down in the wake of World War II. There are 1.5 miles of paved walk­ways through­out the site, with infor­ma­tion­al plac­ards for a self-guid­ed tour. 

Old rail­road build­ing along­side the road. 

The Hope-Sun­rise His­tor­i­cal and Min­ing Muse­um exhibits pho­tographs and arti­facts of the Tur­na­gain Arm Gold Rush of 1896 and the years since.

Cap­tain James Cook saw much of Alaska’s coast­line dur­ing his trou­bled third voy­age in search of a North­west Pas­sage. Prince William Sound, Prince of Wales Island, Nor­ton Sound, and Bris­tol Bay are just some of the places he named dur­ing his trav­els. Eng­lish Bay, on the east­ern side of Unalas­ka Island, ref­er­ences the two land­ings Cook and crew made there in 1778 (just months before his death in the Hawai­ian Islands).

When the U.S. Navy closed their Kodi­ak sta­tion, Fort Gree­ley, in 1972, the Coast Guard took over. This is now the country’s largest sta­tion, with almost 1,000 personnel.

In the 1940’s more than 100 build­ings pep­pered the hill­side here, mak­ing up U.S. Army Base Fort Schwat­ka and Bat­tery 402. This coastal out­post was con­sid­ered cut­ting edge for its time. The Battery’s posi­tion high on Ulak­ta Head gave look­outs a strate­gic view and its 8‑inch, 21-ton guns boast­ed a range of 22 miles.

Palmer Creek and the road that fol­lows it were named after George Palmer, who in 1894 first dis­cov­ered gold on its banks. The creek was the site of ear­ly plac­er min­ing and lat­er lode min­ing. Evi­dence of the his­toric Lucky Strike and Hir­shey mines, as well as the Swet­mann camp, can be found along trails that lead to Palmer Lakes. Sev­er­al hik­ing trails are acces­si­ble from the Palmer Creek Road.

Trails were estab­lished by prospec­tors trav­el­ing through the Tur­na­gain Pass area. The Ingram Creek trail fol­lowed the creek from Tur­na­gain Arm up to Tur­na­gain Pass. After the pass, the trail fol­lowed Gran­ite Creek to Sixmile Creek, which then led prospec­tors to Sun­rise and Hope.

This is the largest lake you will see on the Demp­ster High­way. It was named for Ernest Chap­man, a trad­er, trap­per and prospec­tor. There are many oth­er small­er lakes in the vicin­i­ty and togeth­er they sup­port a vari­ety of water­fowl and shorebirds.

Russ­ian sol­diers were a com­mon sight around Nome dur­ing World War II. The government’s top secret Lend-Lease pro­gram pro­vid­ed Rus­sia with crit­i­cal war mate­ri­als to aid the fight against Ger­many, and Nome was the last fuel stop for war planes head­ed West. A 1944-era hangar can be seen here today, a rel­ic from this amaz­ing effort.

Begin­ning in the sum­mer of 1899, thou­sands of men, women, and chil­dren worked shoul­der-to-shoul­der to glean trea­sure from these shores after news of Nome’s ​“Gold­en Beach­es” rock­et­ed around the world. To this day, hearty inde­pen­dent min­ers con­tin­ue to work many area beach­es with high bankers and sluice box­es. Most find them­selves brav­ing the cold waters in wet­suits to oper­ate small, mod­ern, float­ing suc­tion dredges essen­tial­ly vacuuming  ...more

Built in 1909-10, this two-sto­ry build­ing lat­er became asso­ci­at­ed with one of Seward’s most beloved cit­i­zens – Sol Urie. An avid Seward pro­mot­er, Sol­ly ran his bar and liquor store here.

When Kake’s totem pole was raised on the bluff over­look­ing the city in 1971, it was cel­e­brat­ed as the tallest sanc­tioned totem pole in the world. It is now fad­ed, and cracked at the top, but remains a sym­bol of Kake’s his­to­ry and hon­ors many traditions.

This is one of Alaska’s old­est orig­i­nal road­hous­es from the gold rush era. Stop in for a slice of home­made pie or a giant cin­na­mon roll and min­gle with the local min­ers, dog mush­ers, trap­pers and fishermen.

Arrange a water taxi ride to this man made arch­i­pel­ago extend­ing into Sit­ka Sound, a rel­ic of decay­ing for­ti­fi­ca­tions built to defend Alas­ka from for­eign inva­sion dur­ing World War II. Dur­ing World War II, Sit­ka was the hub of mil­i­tary activ­i­ty in South­east Alas­ka, with a U.S. Naval Air Sta­tion and oth­er installations.

The end of the pave­ment, side roads in both direc­tions fol­low where the North Fork Ditch passed by. It’s not much to look at now, but for near­ly 60 years, the ditch chan­neled water from the North Klondike Riv­er to an elec­tric pow­er plant 25 km fur­ther West. It helped to pro­vide elec­tric­i­ty and water for gold dredg­ing in the Klondike. Con­struct­ed in 1909 by the Granville pow­er com­pa­ny, the hydro­elec­tric plant pro­vid­ed 10,000 hp, lat­er increased…  ...more

Palmer may look like it grew organ­i­cal­ly, like any oth­er town. But it was actu­al­ly designed by the gov­ern­ment as a planned agri­cul­tur­al com­mu­ni­ty. In fact, Palmer was part of FDR’s New Deal Reset­tle­ment Projects dur­ing the Great Depres­sion: More than 200 fam­i­lies vol­un­teered to move to Alas­ka to try farm­ing in the Last Frontier!

This rest area is the site of a rail­road sec­tion house. The restored house and its out­build­ings were built by the Alas­ka Rail­road to house the sec­tion fore­man and his fam­i­ly. The fore­man was respon­si­ble for main­tain­ing a 10-mile stretch of rail­road track. You’ll find an old train car and rotary plow that used by the sec­tion fore­man to clear snow off the tracks in win­ter. This is a fun stop for kids to take a look at rail­road his­to­ry and…  ...more

Three Scan­di­na­vians found gold in Anvil Creek in 1898 and quick­ly staked their claims. The fact that they knew lit­tle about min­ing didn’t impede their quick path toward wealth. Locals call them the ​“Three Lucky Swedes,” and their life-sized bronze stat­ues stand in Anvil City Square, near where their lives were for­ev­er changed.

Over­grown and unmarked, this 200-year-old Russ­ian ceme­tery is still used for Russ­ian Ortho­dox parish­ioners of St. Michael’s. You’ll find stone and wood head­stones, some of which are made from the bal­lasts of old Russ­ian ships.

If you’ve spent the day in Ken­ni­cott, on the glac­i­er trail, or in the moun­tains and still can’t get enough of the out­doors, skip the shut­tle ride down the hill to McCarthy and take this nice 1.5‑hour walk. The Wag­on Trail cuts off the main road just to the right of the St. Elias Guides office.

This old bunker is open for explo­ration. If you make it this far on your hike, be sure to walk around the bunker and step inside to get a rough idea of how how sol­diers lived dur­ing WWII.

On the ocean side (not bay side) of Rugged Island you can look up on the ridge of this island and see a bright orange and white day mark­er just above an old WWII mil­i­tary look out sta­tion. Fort Bulk­ley was locat­ed on Rugged Island and this ridge was the first defense if any ene­my boats were to enter the bay.

At Mile­post 43 of Tay­lor High­way, there is a nice pinic area over­look­ing the creek. 

George A. Brack­ett began build­ing Brack­ett Wag­on Road in Novem­ber of 1897 and by March of 1898, the toll road was open and spanned 10-miles up the val­ley to White Pass City. The road was very pop­u­lar with pack­ers as it was a vast improve­ment over the mis­er­able Trail of 1897. Brack­ett sold the road in June of 1898 to the rail­road for $100,000.

Look for the Old Dal­ton Cache locat­ed behind the cus­toms build­ing. This lit­tle cab­in has been a road­house, a toll­house for the Dal­ton Trail and a cus­toms office. Check with the U.S. Cus­toms office before walk­ing down to the cabin.

This rail­road tun­nel was hand-cut start­ing in 1905. Nine com­pa­nies were bat­tling to take advan­tage of the short route from the coast to cop­per coun­try. Progress on the tun­nel was inter­rupt­ed and after a gun bat­tle, con­struc­tion halt­ed and the tun­nel was nev­er fin­ished. You can read about the tun­nel and these events in Rex Beach’s nov­el, The Iron Trail.

41 Places To See Fair­banks’ Past

Rail­road con­struc­tion began in Nome the sum­mer of 1900. By 1906 the track stretched 80 miles to the Kuz­itrin Riv­er. Like many oth­er res­i­dents, the world famous mush­er Leon­hard Sep­pala ran his dog team along t he tracks using a small rail­road car, called a ​“pup­mo­bile.”

After four years of wor­ship­ing in the Pres­by­ter­ian Chapel, Epis­co­palians final­ly had their own church in 1899, with the con­struc­tion of St. Peters-by-the-Sea. Com­plete with stained glass win­dows, mod­i­fied fly­ing but­tress­es, and wood­en pews, this small chapel is open to the pub­lic ²⁴⁄₇. The church and the adja­cent See House (1905) are both on the Nation­al Reg­is­ter of His­tor­i­cal Places, and are large­ly the work of Bish­op Peter Trim­ble Rowe.…  ...more

If your trav­el group includes a WWII enthu­si­ast, a wildlife devo­tee, a bird­er, and a kid who enjoys rolling around on the tun­dra, Bunker Hill is the per­fect spot. Plus, it has the best pho­to ops, with a 360-degree view of the entire area: Cap­tains Bay, Amak­nak Island, Unalas­ka Bay and Ili­uliuk Harbor.

This one cab­in is all that’s left of the old Tiekal Moun­tain Road­house (not to be con­fused with the Tiekal Lodge a few miles north.)

This his­toric 33-mile trail fol­lows the route tak­en by gold rush prospec­tors in the late 1800s. It’s a chal­leng­ing hike that takes 3 – 5 days to com­plete, but it offers incred­i­ble views of the rugged Alaskan wilderness.

Just across Bonan­za Bridge, three rusty steam loco­mo­tives and some rolling stock lie sink­ing into the water-logged tun­dra. Dubbed ​“The Last Train to Nowhere,” they are all that remain of a dream to build the most exten­sive and pros­per­ous rail sys­tem on the Seward Penin­su­la. In the ear­ly 1900s, Chica­go investors backed con­struc­tion of the Coun­cil City & Solomon Riv­er Rail­road in an effort to link the region’s major min­ing cen­ters by rail.  ...more

An assort­ment of homes and cab­ins dots the road for the next two miles and com­pris­es the town of Chini­ak. Orig­i­nal­ly a native Alu­ti­iq out­post, the pop­u­la­tion here explod­ed dur­ing WWII, fol­low­ing con­struc­tion of a road from Olds Riv­er. The Army, Navy, and Air Force have based oper­a­tions here, with work­ers liv­ing in Quon­set huts and mil­i­tary hous­ing. But fol­low­ing the clo­sure of the hous­ing in 1954, the res­i­dents built the ​“town.” Elec­tri­fied in…  ...more

Descrip­tion­Lo­cat­ed between the Chugach and Tal­keet­na Moun­tain ranges, The Alpine His­tor­i­cal Park pro­vides com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers, as well as vis­i­tors from far or near, a look back in time to under­stand the her­itage and cul­tures of the ear­ly set­tlers of this area. The Park is a place for fam­i­ly and com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers, often being used for gath­er­ings, par­ties, busi­ness events, com­mu­ni­ty pic­nics and many oth­er events, as there is no com­mu­ni­ty cen­ter in…  ...more

As you round Cape Nome, the Cape Nome Road­house is on the shore-side of the road. Road-hous­es once flour­ished along trails around the state, pro­vid­ing food and shel­ter for win­ter trav­el­ers who often arrived by dog team or horse-drawn sleigh. The Cape Nome Road­house also served as an orphan­age after the dev­as­tat­ing epi­demics of the ear­ly 1900s and as a World War II com­mu­ni­ca­tions base. It is now a pri­vate­ly-owned camp.

Take a walk­ing tour through the his­toric dis­trict in Marine Park. Pick up a free map at the kiosk and just go! South Franklin Street is the main tourism dis­trict and one of the best shop­ping areas to find every­thing Alaskan, from cute and fur­ry faux crea­tures (like ice­worms) to hand­made native crafts and expen­sive fine art. To ensure authen­tic­i­ty, look for the polar bear sym­bol for goods made in Alas­ka and the Sil­ver Hand label for genuine…  ...more

Right next to the Tal­keet­na His­tor­i­cal Soci­ety, this orig­i­nal ​“trap­pers cab­in” gives you an inte­ri­or look at traps, antique tins, a wash­tub, and furs, offer­ing a sense of how these pio­neers lived. And Olé is quite the char­ac­ter: he came to Alas­ka in 1916 and worked as a log­ger, sur­vey­or, and gold min­er. His grand­kids still attend the local schools.

The Koyukuk Gold Rush is one of the most remote and old­est min­ing booms in Alas­ka. Word got out that gold had been found at the Koyukuk Riv­er and min­ers stam­ped­ed to the area in 1898. Today, the Koyukuk Min­ing Dis­trict is one of the largest in the Yukon Riv­er region. Both life-long and recre­ation­al min­ers still find gold in this area today.

The mill was built in 1908 to ease the high cost of ship­ping sil­ver ore out of the ter­ri­to­ry. Grav­i­ty pulled a line of buck­ets filled with ore down an aer­i­al tramway cable from the mine above to the mill below.

This Lev­el Park­ing area was once the site of Old Man Camp, a for­mer pipeline con­struc­tion camp. There were a total of 31 con­struc­tion camps oper­at­ing dur­ing the con­struc­tion of the Trans Alas­ka Pipeline from 1974 – 1977. These camps were tem­po­rary facil­i­ties to house the thou­sands of work­ers who build the pipeline. 

Cap­tain James Cook saw much of Alaska’s coast­line dur­ing his trou­bled third voy­age in search of a North­west Pas­sage. Prince William Sound, Prince of Wales Island, Nor­ton Sound, and Bris­tol Bay are just some of the places he named dur­ing his trav­els. Eng­lish Bay, on the east­ern side of Unalas­ka Island, ref­er­ences the two land­ings Cook and crew made there in 1778 (just months before his death in the Hawai­ian Islands).

Opened in 1923 to accom­mo­date trav­el­ers on the new Alas­ka Rail­road, the small inn found fame (or noto­ri­ety) quick­ly: Pres­i­dent War­ren G. Hard­ing came for lunch, and died just a few days lat­er. Today, the hotel is com­prised of six recent­ly ren­o­vat­ed rooms as well as a bar and live music venue. You’ll hear every­thing from jazz and folk to open mic nights and seri­ous rock-n-roll. At the very least, do a walk-through to enjoy some local col­or and…  ...more

Look to the south and you’ll see a WWII era build­ing. Troops were sta­tioned at Cordova.

Because Homer los­es so many loved ones at sea, most­ly in the com­mer­cial fish­ing busi­ness, Homer res­i­dents con­struct­ed a Sea­far­ers’ Memo­r­i­al near the end of the Spit, embla­zoned with brass plates list­ing the names of mariners lost or killed at sea.

This old com­pa­ny owned asbestos min­ing town once was home to 500 peo­ple. The main build­ing housed the post office, gro­cery store and cafe­te­ria. The town is aban­doned but the road allows pas­sage to the his­toric ghost town of Fortymile.

If you had looked at the Seward water­front area before 1964, you would have seen fish pro­cess­ing plants, ware­hous­es, a small boat har­bor, var­i­ous plea­sure and com­mer­cial ves­sels, and huge Tex­i­co and Stan­dard Oil tanks. You would also have seen the Alas­ka Rail­road facil­i­ties and tracks which ran to the south end of town near where the Alas­ka Sea Life Cen­ter is today. That’s where steam­ers would come in to off and on load mate­ri­als. The bulk of…  ...more

Locat­ed on San­ta Claus Lane, the Ter­ry Miller Memo­r­i­al Park fea­tures a pic­nic area, chil­dren’s play­ground, a spa­cious gaze­bo donat­ed by the North Pole Rotary Club and an up close view of the Alas­ka Rail­road as it pass­es by.

At Mile­post 69 you will arrive at the Lost Chick­en Hill Mine, which was estab­lished in 1895. It got its name because it held a pay streak that had been ​“lost” for many years. The area has min­ing his­to­ry that began before the Klondike Gold Rush of 1897 – 98. It is now pri­vate­ly owned and mined.

The most cat­a­stroph­ic event in Seward’s his­to­ry took place along the shore­line here. On March 27, 1964, the largest earth­quake ever record­ed in North Amer­i­ca, and the tsunamis that fol­lowed, changed Seward’s his­to­ry forever.

You won’t find any old build­ings here, but there are great inter­pre­tive signs and numer­ous hik­ing trails at this state park. And it’s an impor­tant place — the site of the first Russ­ian set­tle­ment on Bara­nof Island.

Across the street from the muse­um is a short path lead­ing to the old rail­road turntable used to flip the engine around so it could push the train the 4.5 remain­ing miles up to Ken­ni­cott. Look for a wood­en sign across the street point­ing the way. Two or three peo­ple can get it mov­ing again. It’s a great activ­i­ty for kids look­ing for a short but unique ride.

Built between 1894 – 96, the Holy Assump­tion Ortho­dox Church is the most endur­ing exam­ple of Russ­ian cul­ture in south cen­tral Alas­ka. For the Kenaitze Indi­ans, who once com­prised a sig­nif­i­cant por­tion of the pop­u­la­tion, this church con­sti­tut­ed a major link to west­ern cul­ture. A sim­ple, wood-frame struc­ture with clap­board sid­ing, Holy Assump­tion Church fea­tures a square two-sto­ry bell tow­er and a dis­tinc­tive crown-shaped cupo­la, both with the…  ...more

Nome’s Old St. Joe’s avoid­ed the fate of many oth­er gold rush era build­ings, which were destroyed by fire or flood. Today it is restored and list­ed on the Nation­al Reg­is­ter of His­toric Places. The sto­ry of Old St. Joe’s par­al­lels that of the Alaskan pio­neer spir­it: one of hard work, resource­ful­ness and a deep respect for the past.

St. Peter’s Epis­co­pal Church is the old­est sur­viv­ing Protes­tant church build­ing on the Kenai Penin­su­la. It was also the loca­tion of the first pub­lic school class­room in the town of Seward, and it housed a library read­ing room begin­ning in 1929. Soon after the town of Seward was estab­lished in the sum­mer of 1903, a priest head­quar­tered in Valdez began mak­ing peri­od­ic trips to Seward to hold ser­vices in a tent. The base­ment, or undercroft,…  ...more

There are more than 500 archae­o­log­i­cal sites in the Tan­gle Lakes Dis­trict indi­cat­ing that ancient peo­ple lived in this area for at least 10,000 years. Some of the dens­est con­cen­tra­tions of archae­o­log­i­cal resources in the North Amer­i­can sub­arc­tic can be found here and the area is list­ed on the Nation­al Reg­is­ter of His­toric Places.

Some 40 – 50 rock etch­ings, pos­si­bly 8,000 years old, can be spot­ted here above and below mean high tide. The con­cen­tra­tion of carv­ings is unmatched in Alas­ka and in few oth­er places in the world. There is some belief that the pet­ro­glyphs pre-date the Tlin­git Indi­ans of this area.

In 1904 a tele­phone line ran from Nome to the rail­road ter­mi­nus at Dick­son, to the min­ing camps up Big Hur­rah Creek, and on to Coun­cil. For one brief sum­mer, parcels could be mailed to any point in the U.S. and mon­ey orders sent world­wide. The Coun­cil City & Solomon Riv­er Rail­road also ran past, offer­ing min­ers a one-hour trip to the coast. Griz­zlies, moose, muskox, and rein­deer are fre­quent­ly sight­ed between the creek and East Fork Bridge.  ...more

Clan hous­es line Beaver Trail Road in Angoon, an area that hasn’t changed much in the last 100 years. The weath­er-beat­en, wood-framed build­ings are out­ward signs of a cul­ture that has been main­tained through generations.

Crow Creek Mine has been in oper­a­tion since 1896, and gold is still found in its claims today! Your guides will be mem­bers of the min­ing fam­i­ly that keeps Crow Creek oper­a­tional. This is their home, so tour groups are kept small, cre­at­ing a more inti­mate envi­ron­ment and allow­ing more time for ques­tions. Try your luck at pan­ning, and keep what you find. 

Look east across the Susit­na Riv­er and you’ll see the old Valdez Creek gold mine in the foothills of the Clear­wa­ter Moun­tains. The mine was start­ed by the Peter Mon­a­han Par­ty in 1903, trig­ger­ing a small gold rush and an out­post set­tle­ment known as Denali. The orig­i­nal dig­gings and set­tle­ment are long gone.

Beyond the Pil­grim Riv­er Bridge, the road con­tin­ues uphill and offers sweep­ing views of a net­work of lakes and the mean­der­ing riv­er val­ley. North of the Pil­grim Riv­er drainage is a large hill topped with a series of gran­ite rock out­crop­pings known as Hen and Chick­ens because of its resem­blance to a small flock at cer­tain angles. A cross was placed at the sum­mit in mem­o­ry of a priest who died in a bliz­zard on his way to the orphanage.

Take a ride on the Yukon Route Rail­way and head east just like the min­ers of the Gold Rush days. This loco­mo­tive cut trav­el time to White­horse from sev­er­al weeks to just a few days.

Once the admin­is­tra­tive head­quar­ters for an empire stretch­ing from Asia to Cal­i­for­nia and Hawaii, Cas­tle Hill today is lit­tle more than a grassy hill with a few inter­pre­tive signs, a mod­est stonewall, sev­er­al old can­nons, and a few flag­poles. But when you vis­it the top of this hill, you’re stand­ing on rich his­toric grounds.

See His­toric Homes From Before Statehood

Dur­ing the win­ter of 1907 the A.J. Meals Co. freight­ed a 70-ton steam­boat over Mar­shall Pass from Valdez. The steam­er was car­ried piece-by-piece on horse-drawn sled to the Cop­per Riv­er, 31 miles east. The 110-foot-long ship trav­eled 170 miles of the Cop­per and Chit­na Rivers.

Look for the old out­build­ings of the Sour­dough Road­house on the banks of Sour­dough creek.

This stout struc­ture is a re-cre­ation of the guard tow­er that once stood here, part of the fortress enclos­ing the Rus­sians dur­ing their time in Sit­ka, from 1804 to 1867. Fear­ful of the wilder­ness around them, and of Tlin­git Natives, the Rus­sians’ enclosed fort was open to out­siders only in the daytime.

This dredge is locat­ed at Chick­en Gold Camp and Out­post. The dredge mined on Pedro Creek just out­side of Fair­banks from 1938 until 1959 before it was moved to Chick­en Creek and oper­at­ed between 1959 and 1967. Mike Bus­by and Bernie Karl pur­chased the dredge and moved it and oth­er min­ing equip­ment down to Chick­en in 1998 as a tourist attrac­tion. It was put on the Nation­al Reg­is­ter of His­toric Places in 2006.

Alaska’s old­est Nation­al Park isn’t a big one — only 113 acres — but it’s rich with his­to­ry and there’s plen­ty to do: hik­ing trails, ranger-led inter­pre­tive walks, carv­ing demon­stra­tions, ethno­graph­ic dis­plays, and more. The park’s main attrac­tions are the rough­ly 20 totem poles and the beau­ti­ful coastal rain­for­est, which you can explore on your own or with park rangers.

A short boat ride to George Island brings chances to see whales and marine life along the way, fol­lowed by inver­te­brates at low tide and a love­ly walk through a beau­ti­ful tem­per­ate rain­for­est to an his­toric site that still has gun emplace­ments left over from World War II.

Loved by locals and trav­el­ers alike, this 182-acre state park has numer­ous trails, beach­es, and rocky view­points. For his­to­ry buffs, the trails take you past bunkers and relics from WWII out­posts in the area. You’ll also find sum­mer nat­u­ral­ist pro­grams where you can learn about ecol­o­gy as well as ocean and for­est creatures.

When vis­i­tors think of the Idi­tar­od Trail, they often think of Anchor­age where the race’s cer­e­mo­ni­al start takes place. But the trail actu­al­ly begins in Seward, right here. This spot is also where the town’s first set­tlers land­ed back in August 1903.

At this point in the dri­ve you may need some­thing to talk about.The Athabas­can peo­ple trav­eled along the cur­rent McCarthy Road cor­ri­dor to access their sum­mer hunt­ing camps in the Chugach Moun­tains. Their trails took them to prime moun­tain sheep coun­try, as well as to some of their favorite spots for har­vest­ing cop­per. One cop­per nugget tak­en from Dan Creek, almost pure and as big as a refrig­er­a­tor, now sits in a muse­um at the Uni­ver­si­ty of…  ...more

Min­ers worked this dredge up and down the Blue­stone Riv­er and Gold Run Creek in the ear­ly 1900s. Now it serves as a nest­ing and perch­ing site for com­mon raven.

One of only a few struc­tures remain­ing from the orig­i­nal Russ­ian set­tle­ment, the endurance of the Russ­ian Bishop’s House reflects the ded­i­ca­tion brought to the job by the mis­sion­ary Bish­op Inno­cent Veni­aminov, its first occu­pant. Its chapel includes sev­er­al icons Inno­cent import­ed from Russia.

In the 1950s, an Anchor­age fam­i­ly worked tire­less­ly at their dream of build­ing a ski resort here at the base of Gun­sight Moun­tain. They built a small chalet and erect­ed a rope tow. But financ­ing was always a prob­lem. Busi­ness did not boom. Today, the chalet is all that’s left of their efforts.

Stop here for a bath­room break and stretch your legs by the creek. Lit­tle creeks drain into big­ger creeks and cre­ate big­ger rivers. Learn how the waters in this small creek make their way to the Gulf of Alaska.

In 1882, the U.S. Navy bom­bard­ed the small vil­lage of Angoon, result­ing in destruc­tion of homes, win­ter food stores and all but one canoe. The com­mu­ni­ty sur­vived through much hard­ship. The event is still very much a part of the col­lec­tive his­to­ry passed down through gen­er­a­tions of Angoon residents.

At Mile­post 21 of Tay­lor High­way, you can stop and read about the life cycle of cari­bou and the fall and rise of the Fortymile herd. 

The first two things vis­i­tors notice about Ken­necott are the spec­tac­u­lar views and the town itself…in that order. The com­bi­na­tion of dra­mat­ic scenery and strange min­ing town makes for a unique expe­ri­ence. Give your­self a cou­ple hours to explore and take it in.

Site Sum­mit, locat­ed in Arc­tic Val­ley at near­ly 4,000 feet atop Mt. Gor­don Lyon, was once home to a Nike Her­cules mis­sile bat­tery, part of the ​‘Rings of Steel’ mis­sile defense sys­tem that sur­round­ed major U.S. cities from pos­si­ble Sovi­et mis­sile attacks dur­ing the Cold War.

The area of Whit­ti­er has long served as pas­sage between Prince William Sound and Tur­na­gain Arm. The Alas­ka Engi­neer­ing Expe­di­tion envi­sioned a rail line out to this large­ly unset­tled area back in 1914, but it was the U.S. Army that made Whit­ti­er where and what it is.

This high­way is named for the for­mer Alas­ka road com­mis­sion direc­tor, Cap­tain Wilds P. Richard­son. In 1903 Richard­son pre­sent­ed the need for Alas­ka roads. He impressed Con­gress with his knowl­edge of Alas­ka and his abil­i­ties as an engi­neer. The mon­u­ment here hon­ors Richard­son’s con­tri­bu­tion as the Alaska’s first great road builder.

This 1898 house was the home of Judge James Wick­er­sham, a leg­end in Alas­ka who brought civil­i­ty and law to the wild gold-rush towns of Eagle, Fair­banks, and Nome. After climb­ing Denali (Mt McKin­ley), he also helped lob­by for the cre­ation of Denali Nation­al Park, and was a force in Wash­ing­ton, where he per­suad­ed the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment to build uni­ver­si­ties and rail­roads in Alas­ka while giv­ing the ter­ri­to­ry legal rights. The house was in the…  ...more

Stop and take your pic­ture in front of the most pho­tographed build­ing in Alas­ka. In times past, it was a fra­ter­nal hall; the local chap­ter of the Broth­er­hood first met here in August 1899. (Step across the street, and you’ll notice the let­ters ​“A.B.” and the ​“1899” above the door, and ​“Camp Skag­way No. 1” on the over­hang. The orga­ni­za­tion’s sym­bol, a gold pan and nuggets, is up near the roof line. The façade, which dates from 1900, has been…  ...more

Housed in the cir­ca 1898 White Pass & Yukon Route Rail­road Depot, the his­toric Moore house and the Mas­cot Saloon. Col­lec­tions con­sist of over 200,000 archae­ol­o­gy arti­facts asso­ci­at­ed with the Klondike gold rush and 3,000 copies of his­toric pho­tographs of the gold rush peri­od. Library and 100-seat audi­to­ri­um. Guid­ed tours, inter­pre­tive pro­grams, films and per­ma­nent exhi­bi­tions. Hours May-Sep: Dai­ly 8am-6pm Admis­sion No admis­sion fee,…  ...more

Built as a cab­in in 1896 by prospec­tor Fritz Miller as a stop over on the sled dog trail between Cir­cle City and Fair­banks. After the Steese High­way was com­plet­ed it func­tioned as a road­house until 1970. It has since burned down, how­ev­er, items from the Miller House can be found at the Muse­um in Central.

World War II buffs will want to check out remain­ing World War II defen­sive for­ti­fi­ca­tions like ele­phant-steel mag­a­zines and the base-end sta­tion that over­look Sum­mer Bay and Humpy Cove.

At Mile­post 34 of Tay­lor High­way you are able to com­pare the gen­tly round­ed ridges of the Yukon-Tanana Uplands, that were to nev­er cov­ered in ice, to the rugged, glaciat­ed Alas­ka Range in the distance. 

Built in the 1920s, this bridge helped prospec­tors cross the Niz­ina Riv­er and reach the gold camps at Chi­ti­tu Creek and Dan Creek. The glac­i­er-dammed lake near here caused flood­ing with some reg­u­lar­i­ty — and as result, would wash out the bridge with some regularity.

Like most sea­port towns, Seward had ladies of the night from the town’s begin­ning. But in 1915, with the deci­sion to start build­ing the Alas­ka Rail­road here, the town became con­cerned about the upcom­ing influx of con­struc­tion work­ers. Seward decid­ed to con­fine these ladies to a spe­cif­ic area, a place that became the town’s Red Light Dis­trict. Dur­ing pro­hi­bi­tion it was also known for its moon­shin­ing, thus the nick­name, Home­brew Alley.

The bow of the sunken SS North­west­ern points to the sky in Cap­tains Bay, a fifty-foot-high sym­bol of Alaska’s role in World War II. The North­west­ern had a fas­ci­nat­ing his­to­ry even before Japan­ese war­planes bombed her on June 4, 1942. After trans­port­ing pas­sen­gers, troops and bananas on the East Coast, she logged more than thir­ty years in north­ern waters, car­ry­ing pas­sen­gers between South­east Alas­ka and Seattle.

Here, Tay­lor High­way begins to descend into the val­ley of the Fortymile Riv­er. You will be able to see the intri­cate­ly fold­ed meta­mor­phic rocks exposed by the road cut. Keep an eye out for white mar­ble, quartzite, gneiss, and schist. 

The Wible Camp is marked by Gold Rush Cen­ten­ni­al inter­pre­tive signs at a pull-out 3.2 Miles south of the Hope Junc­tion on the Seward High­way. Look­ing east of Canyon Creek, vis­i­tors can see a straight strip of alder brush on the hill­side where min­ers dug a ditch used for hydraulic min­ing. The ditch­es were dug to col­lect and divert water into met­al pipes. The high­ly pres­sur­ized water then scoured hill­sides. Loca­tion Mile­post 59.5 Seward…  ...more

Orig­i­nal­ly con­struct­ed by the Alas­ka Road Com­mis­sion in 1924 – 1925, the Sav­age cab­in and inter­pre­tive trails are now used as part of liv­ing his­to­ry pre­sen­ta­tions in the sum­mer months. Dur­ing the win­ter the cab­in become strict­ly util­i­tar­i­an by pro­vid­ing shel­ter for patrols.

His­to­ry, fun, and mas­sive por­tions of food come togeth­er at this insti­tu­tion, which was built over 3 years start­ing in 1914. Choose from a vari­ety of cozy rooms in the main road­house and wake up the smell of fresh baked goods from the Kitchen in the morn­ing. Or, for a more pri­vate expe­ri­ence, book one of the cab­ins out back or the Muse­um Apart­ment at the end of the block. 

There isn’t a much left of this old min­ing town, but at one time, it was home to 250 – 300 min­ers. The town, named for prospec­tor Nels Olnes, boast­ed gen­er­al stores, lodges, hotels and mail and tele­phone ser­vice. It was even a stop on the Tanana Val­ley Railroad.

This spot was once a stop on the White Pass and Yukon Route. In 1900, gold was dis­cov­ered in the area a town site was sur­veyed. Low min­er­al yield caused Robin­son to be aban­doned, but the old road­house still stands as a glimpse into Alaska’s gold rush history.

The shales in this road cut con­tain fos­sil plant frag­ments. Please look but leave for oth­ers to enjoy. Take away only photographs.

One of the First Road­hous­es in Alaska

Alas­ka has served an impor­tant role in U.S. mil­i­tary strat­e­gy, espe­cial­ly dur­ing World War II, and the Cold War. But the mil­i­tary his­to­ry in Nome actu­al­ly start­ed even before the city was incor­po­rat­ed, when gold rush deal­ings and a pop­u­la­tion boom required some old fash­ioned law and order brought by U.S. soldiers.

Hope­ful­ly this life-size bronze stat­ue is the clos­est you’ll come to a Kodi­ak brown bear. The stat­ue hon­ors Charles Mad­sen, Kodiak’s pio­neer-era bear-hunt­ing guide and one of the first reg­is­tered guides in Alaska.

If you have some seri­ous time and seri­ous ener­gy, take an adven­ture: hike the 20 miles out the Chase Trail to see what’s left of a lux­u­ry hotel built as a lay­over for the rail­road jour­ney between Seward and Fairbanks.

At Mile­post 49, there is a camp­ground with plen­ty of park­ing spaces avail­ble for cars and RVs. From the scenic over­look on the upper­road you can spot trum­peter swans and moose in the small lake below. This riv­er access point is the south­ern­most access point on the 400-mile Fortymile Nation­al Wild and Scenic Riv­er System. 

At Mile­post 75 Tay­lor High­way you can pull off and read the inter­pre­tive pan­els to learn more about the Fortymile gold rush. 

What was it like to be an Alaskan sci­en­tist back in the 1940s? This site, on the south side of Palmer’s down­town, near Gulka­na and E. Fire­weed streets, will give you a pret­ty good idea. Back then, this two-sto­ry cement build­ing, the eight sim­ple cot­tages, and the arbore­tum were built by the Uni­ver­si­ty of Fair­banks and used by researchers study­ing how to increase pro­duc­tiv­i­ty in cold-weath­er crops.

Sur­prise! This bridge over the Susit­na Riv­er appears with­out warn­ing, so if you want to stop and see this huge drainage, slow down and pull off the road at either end. Alaskans call it the Big Su. We fish it, pad­dle it, and snow machine its frozen braids. Bush pilots even nav­i­gate by this riv­er. The Susit­na Riv­er winds its way over 313 miles of South­cen­tral Alas­ka; this old rail­road bridge cross­es the water on the east­ern edge of Denali…  ...more

About 75 Miles South­east of Anchorage

One of the last ranch­es on the island, this cat­tle com­pa­ny is run by Bill and Kathy Bur­ton, who start­ed their 20,000-acre lease in 1967. With 60 – 70 cows, 400 buf­fa­lo, 70 elk, and 14 yaks, the ranch is a place for domes­ti­cat­ed meat and guid­ed hunts. Ranch­ing was first brought to Kodi­ak by the Rus­sians, who took advan­tage of the nat­ur­al grass­lands on the green, tem­per­ate island. Amer­i­cans con­tin­ued the ranch­ing tra­di­tion, which peaked with some…  ...more

After Finnish labor­ers com­plet­ed St. Michael’s Russ­ian Ortho­dox Cathe­dral, they asked Russ­ian author­i­ties if they could build a Luther­an church for them­selves. The Rus­sians allowed it, but only if the build­ing didn’t look like a church. That build­ing was torn down in 1888, but you can still see what it looked like: the cur­rent Luther­an church (which looks like a church) has a mod­el and pho­to of the orig­i­nal. The Luther­an Church is right across…  ...more