Denali National Park and Preserve
Park road entrance and Visitor Center at Milepost 237.3
Natural History of Alaska
- Native Peoples of Alaska
- Alaska Land Mammals
- Alaska Birds
- Close Encounters with Wildlife
- Denali National Park and Preserve
- Geologic History of Denali National Park
- Alaska Geology
- Major Vegetation Types of Alaska
- Trees of Alaska
- National Petroleum Reserve
- Alaska Government
- Legislation that Shaped Alaska's History
Established: 1917 (as Mt. McKinley National Park); 1980 (redesignated by ANILCA).
The Park was established in 1917 as Mt McKinley National Park. Charles Sheldon, who is considered the ‘father of the park,” first traveled and hunted in the area in 1906. He and his guide, Harry Karstens, returned during the summer of 1907 to research possible boundaries for the park. Sheldon saw the need for a national park because of the potential of decimating the wildlife that was present in the area. Market hunters that provided gold miners and railroad laborers with wild game endangered the wildlife in the area. Charles Sheldon moved to Washington D.C. and lobbied for the park for ten years. When the original park was established, it was two million acres in Size. The inclusion of Mt. McKinley was almost an accident, as the park was established to protect the wildlife, not to protect the mountain, and the original park boundary did not include the whole mountain. Harry Karstens was the first superintendent of the park.
In 1980, under ANILCA, the park’s name was changed to Denali National Park and Preserve, the size of the park was increased from two to six million acres, and lands within the park were redesignated under different levels of protection. Currently, the park is managed as three distinct units:
1. Denali Wilderness (the highest level of protection within a National Park), which encompasses the original park boundaries
2. Denali National Park, which contains part of the enlarged boundaries (traditional subsistence hunting and trapping can be done by local residents with permits) and
3. Denali National Preserve (subsistence use and sport hunting, trapping, and fishing are legal within the preserve).
Denali National Park is one of the major destinations of travelers in Alaska. The park is well known for Denali (Mt. McKinley) and the Alaska Range, the scenic and unspoiled beauty of the landscape, and the wildlife that inhabits the park (especially the large mammals). The road restrictions and shuttle bus system were instituted in 1972 in response to the increasing number of visitors to the park. The system of restricting public access has been controversial at times, but it has helped preserve, the qualities that make the park such a wonderful and desirable place to visit.
Denali National Park and Preserve is within the sub-arctic zone and there are two major vegetation types or biomes within the park, taiga and tundra. Taiga, or boreal forest, can be found at lower elevations (less than 2,700 feet in elevation), especially in river valleys. Trees such as white and black spruce, birch, quaking aspen, willow, and balsam poplar characterize boreal forests in the park. Ponds within the forest zone are often chocked with sphagnum mosses, sedges, and other aquatic vegetation that is often favorite, food for Moose. These swampy areas are also called muskeg bogs. Above 2,700 feet in elevation, taiga gives way to tundra. There are two general types of tundra found in Denali - dry tundra and moist tundra - with gradations in between.
The opportunity to observe large mammals such as moose, caribou, Dali sheep, grizzly bears, and wolves is a major attraction of the park. Spotting and observing the large mammals in this sub-arctic environment is ,a special experience as the actual number of individuals is relatively low compared to the amount of wild land needed to support them here (check current population estimates froth the Park Service,). Thirty seven species of mammals have been recorded inside the park, including snowshoe hare, lynx, wolverine, marten, beaver, porcupine, hoary marmot, arctic ground squirrel, pika, and red fox.
A variety of amazing birds can also be seen in Denali National Park. Some species, such as the Northern Wheater, Arctic Tern, Pacific Golden Plover, and Arctic Warbler migrate via incredible routes and distances in order to breed during the short summer season in Denali National Park. Year-round residents such as Ptarmigan, Ravens, Golden Eagles, Gray Jays,’ and Magpies can be seen as well
Denali (Mt. McKinley)
Height: 20,320 feet (south peak)*; 19,470 feet (north peak).
Denali is he highest mountain of North America at 20,320 feet, (6,194m). It has the greatest vertical relief 18,000 feet - of any mountain in the world. Its location and height make it one of the coldest mountains on earth. Night-time temperatures in May can reach -30 to -40 F on its upper slopes. The winter temperature lows at 14,500 feet can be -95 F (or colder!), with wind gusts up to 150 mph or more. Halfway to the summit, the climate is equivalent to the North Pole. The mountain is so large that it creates its own weather, and long periods of clear and calm weather are rare, especially on its upper slopes. Because of its northern location, scientists estimate that the available oxygen at its summit is equivalent to Himalayan peaks 2,000 to 3,000 feet higher. Above approximately 7,000 the mountain is covered in permanent ice and snow.
Mountaineering on Denali and within the Alaska Range has a rich history. The climbing season on the mountain goes from about the end of April to the beginning or middle of July. Most climbers are flown into a maintained base camp at the 7000 foot level of the Kahiltna Glacier, and then make the ascent from there, via the West Buttress, or other routes. In 1951, Bradford Washburn, a mountaineer and cartographer pioneered the West Buttress route, and it is the most popular route on the mountain (due to its relative safety and that it is the least “technical” route on the mountain). Typically, over one thousand climbers attempt to reach the summit of Denali every year. Depending on the weather, 30 to 50% of those that climb the mountain actually gain the summit. Check out the Talkeetna Ranger Station or the Denali NP website for the most recent information on mountaineering occurring in the Alaska Range.
*In 1989, Denali was measured by satellite and was found to be 20,306 feet. This measurement is apparently pending official verification.
The Naming of the Mountain
Denali
In the native Athabascan language, “Denali” means “the high one” or “the great one.” The mountain was a central figure in their native culture, but little is known about their existence in the Denali National Park area. It is believed that the Taniana Indians used the area, but archeological surveys in the park have located few sites of aboriginal occupation.
Mt. McKinley
In 1896, William A. Dickey came to the Cook Inlet and the Susitna River in search of gold. One story about naming the mountain states that during his travels, he argued long and loud with other miners about the gold standard versus the silver standard ‘to back up American currency. Dickey supported the Republican candidate for president, William McKinley from Ohio, who favored the gold standard. The miners he encountered supported Democratic candidate William Jennings Bryan, and the silver standard. After Dickey returned to the lower 48, he wrote an account of his travels in 1897 for the New York Sun. In this article, Dickey called the great mountain “Mt. McKinley” as a way to get back at the other miners. Another version of history is that the first news his party heard on their way out of the Alaskan wilderness was that the Republican Party had nominated William McKinley of Ohio for president. Regardless of how it transpired, the name has stuck since William Dickey’s written account of Alaska. In 1975, the state of Alaska and the state Geographic Names Board claimed that the proper name for the mountain is Denali. The federal Geographic Names Board has not taken any action on this subject, and legislators in Congress from Ohio have blocked attempts to change the name back to Denali.
Kantishna
In 1903, Joe Quigley and Judge Wickersham discovered gold in Glacier Creek in the Kantishna Hills region. The ensuing stampede brought about two thousand people to the valley by 1905. Only two of the creeks really paid off for the miners (Eureka and Glacier), and by 1907, there were only about fifty people living in the Kantishna Hills.
Two of the most well known pioneers of Kantishna were Joe and Fannie Quigley. Fannie was known as "Fannie the Hike" and the "Witch of Denali." She was originally from Nebraska and arrived in Alaska in 1898. Fannie started out working as a dancehall girl in Dawson, and also cooked for miners at a number of stampedes. She would travel to a promising area before the major stampede occurred with a Yukon stove, tent, supplies, and firearms for hunting. After the stampede fever cooled off, and a new strike came along, she would go to a new area. In Kantishna, she met Joe Quigley and they were later married. Her fame spread as a dog musher, hunter, prospector, trapper, gardener, and gourmet cook. Joe Quigley came to Alaska in 1891 via the Chilkoot Trail, and eventually ended up living in Kantishna. He was known as a good prospector, hunter, and self-taught scientist.
In 1980, when the park was enlarged, it encompassed the private lands of the Kantishna Hills. In 1985, Sierra Club and other environmental organizations sued the National Park Service for allowing mining to continue in the national parks, preserves and monuments against park regulations. Fifty-four million acres were closed until a study was done on the impact of mining. Eleven of the thirteen active mining operation went bankrupt because of the court injunction. In the fall of 1989, the study was completed and turned over to the courts for further decisions as to What, if any, mining can occur in the disputed areas. According to A History of Mining in the Kantishna Hills, and as of 1978, the area produced 55,000 ounces of gold, 265,000 ounces of silver, five million pounds of antimony (44% of Alaska’s total production), and 1.5 million pounds of combined lead and zinc.
Denali Backcountry Lodge
The Denali Backcountry Lodge sits practically at the end of the road, and beyond the lodge, the road widens into “Kantishna International Airport.” A narrow jeep track continues on about two miles to an old prospectors place - Jahoula’s cabin -that is the true end of the road. If you took a raven’s-eye view (or bush pilot’s) and traveled north of the lodge to Barrow, or northwest to Nome and Siberia - a distance of about six hundred miles either way - you would not see another road, except for the main streets of a few native towns such as Tanana, Kobuk, and Anaktuvak Pass. The few cars in those towns got there by barge or cargo plane. Beyond Barrow, it is only eight hundred miles to the North Pole; there is not a whole lot of traffic out that way either. The point is that Denali Backcountry Lodge is way out there! It really is “the end of the road” in many ways.
The lodge was built in 1989 as Denali Mountain Lodge, but the realities and expenses of trying to run a business in a remote location soon overtook the original owners, who never really completed the project -- even though they were open for business. Many travel nightmares pale in relation to the stories of groups who spent. nights at the lodge with no beds or roofs. At any rate, the bank soon became the unwilling operator, albeit on a very small scale. n a visit to the area in 1992, Sham Idnani, a hotel operator from Tennessee, fell in love with Kantishna and bought the lodge out of foreclosure. Alaska Wildland Adventures approached him, and a partnership was arranged.
A small group came out to the lodge in September of 1992 to draw up plans and deliver materials. After being snowed in for ten days, a second group of AWA staff were able to haul in a semi-trailer full of lumber through several feet of snow and subzero temperatures and leave it at the lodge, in mid-April of 1993, a crew was flown into Wonder Lake (the snow was too soft to land at the airstrip), and six weeks of virtually non-stop work had the lodge in operating order about five minutes before the first bus load of guests arrived. The kitchen and entire plumbing system had been rebuilt, along with numerous other systems and buildings. improvements to the facilities are made each year as necessary during the short pre and post-season work period - the road usually opens around May 22 and closes on September 15, while the operating season runs from June 6 to September 11. It sounds like and is a great deal of work, but those who have been involved have loved every minute of it.
The Park was established in 1917 as Mt McKinley National Park. Charles Sheldon, who is considered the ‘father of the park,” first traveled and hunted in the area in 1906. He and his guide, Harry Karstens, returned during the summer of 1907 to research possible boundaries for the park. Sheldon saw the need for a national park because of the potential of decimating the wildlife that was present in the area. Market hunters that provided gold miners and railroad laborers with wild game endangered the wildlife in the area. Charles Sheldon moved to Washington D.C. and lobbied for the park for ten years. When the original park was established, it was two million acres in Size. The inclusion of Mt. McKinley was almost an accident, as the park was established to protect the wildlife, not to protect the mountain, and the original park boundary did not include the whole mountain. Harry Karstens was the first superintendent of the park.
In 1980, under ANILCA, the park’s name was changed to Denali National Park and Preserve, the size of the park was increased from two to six million acres, and lands within the park were redesignated under different levels of protection. Currently, the park is managed as three distinct units:
1. Denali Wilderness (the highest level of protection within a National Park), which encompasses the original park boundaries
2. Denali National Park, which contains part of the enlarged boundaries (traditional subsistence hunting and trapping can be done by local residents with permits) and
3. Denali National Preserve (subsistence use and sport hunting, trapping, and fishing are legal within the preserve).
Denali National Park is one of the major destinations of travelers in Alaska. The park is well known for Denali (Mt. McKinley) and the Alaska Range, the scenic and unspoiled beauty of the landscape, and the wildlife that inhabits the park (especially the large mammals). The road restrictions and shuttle bus system were instituted in 1972 in response to the increasing number of visitors to the park. The system of restricting public access has been controversial at times, but it has helped preserve, the qualities that make the park such a wonderful and desirable place to visit.
Denali National Park and Preserve is within the sub-arctic zone and there are two major vegetation types or biomes within the park, taiga and tundra. Taiga, or boreal forest, can be found at lower elevations (less than 2,700 feet in elevation), especially in river valleys. Trees such as white and black spruce, birch, quaking aspen, willow, and balsam poplar characterize boreal forests in the park. Ponds within the forest zone are often chocked with sphagnum mosses, sedges, and other aquatic vegetation that is often favorite, food for Moose. These swampy areas are also called muskeg bogs. Above 2,700 feet in elevation, taiga gives way to tundra. There are two general types of tundra found in Denali - dry tundra and moist tundra - with gradations in between.
The opportunity to observe large mammals such as moose, caribou, Dali sheep, grizzly bears, and wolves is a major attraction of the park. Spotting and observing the large mammals in this sub-arctic environment is ,a special experience as the actual number of individuals is relatively low compared to the amount of wild land needed to support them here (check current population estimates froth the Park Service,). Thirty seven species of mammals have been recorded inside the park, including snowshoe hare, lynx, wolverine, marten, beaver, porcupine, hoary marmot, arctic ground squirrel, pika, and red fox.
A variety of amazing birds can also be seen in Denali National Park. Some species, such as the Northern Wheater, Arctic Tern, Pacific Golden Plover, and Arctic Warbler migrate via incredible routes and distances in order to breed during the short summer season in Denali National Park. Year-round residents such as Ptarmigan, Ravens, Golden Eagles, Gray Jays,’ and Magpies can be seen as well
Denali (Mt. McKinley)
Height: 20,320 feet (south peak)*; 19,470 feet (north peak).
Denali is he highest mountain of North America at 20,320 feet, (6,194m). It has the greatest vertical relief 18,000 feet - of any mountain in the world. Its location and height make it one of the coldest mountains on earth. Night-time temperatures in May can reach -30 to -40 F on its upper slopes. The winter temperature lows at 14,500 feet can be -95 F (or colder!), with wind gusts up to 150 mph or more. Halfway to the summit, the climate is equivalent to the North Pole. The mountain is so large that it creates its own weather, and long periods of clear and calm weather are rare, especially on its upper slopes. Because of its northern location, scientists estimate that the available oxygen at its summit is equivalent to Himalayan peaks 2,000 to 3,000 feet higher. Above approximately 7,000 the mountain is covered in permanent ice and snow.
Mountaineering on Denali and within the Alaska Range has a rich history. The climbing season on the mountain goes from about the end of April to the beginning or middle of July. Most climbers are flown into a maintained base camp at the 7000 foot level of the Kahiltna Glacier, and then make the ascent from there, via the West Buttress, or other routes. In 1951, Bradford Washburn, a mountaineer and cartographer pioneered the West Buttress route, and it is the most popular route on the mountain (due to its relative safety and that it is the least “technical” route on the mountain). Typically, over one thousand climbers attempt to reach the summit of Denali every year. Depending on the weather, 30 to 50% of those that climb the mountain actually gain the summit. Check out the Talkeetna Ranger Station or the Denali NP website for the most recent information on mountaineering occurring in the Alaska Range.
*In 1989, Denali was measured by satellite and was found to be 20,306 feet. This measurement is apparently pending official verification.
The Naming of the Mountain
Denali
In the native Athabascan language, “Denali” means “the high one” or “the great one.” The mountain was a central figure in their native culture, but little is known about their existence in the Denali National Park area. It is believed that the Taniana Indians used the area, but archeological surveys in the park have located few sites of aboriginal occupation.
Mt. McKinley
In 1896, William A. Dickey came to the Cook Inlet and the Susitna River in search of gold. One story about naming the mountain states that during his travels, he argued long and loud with other miners about the gold standard versus the silver standard ‘to back up American currency. Dickey supported the Republican candidate for president, William McKinley from Ohio, who favored the gold standard. The miners he encountered supported Democratic candidate William Jennings Bryan, and the silver standard. After Dickey returned to the lower 48, he wrote an account of his travels in 1897 for the New York Sun. In this article, Dickey called the great mountain “Mt. McKinley” as a way to get back at the other miners. Another version of history is that the first news his party heard on their way out of the Alaskan wilderness was that the Republican Party had nominated William McKinley of Ohio for president. Regardless of how it transpired, the name has stuck since William Dickey’s written account of Alaska. In 1975, the state of Alaska and the state Geographic Names Board claimed that the proper name for the mountain is Denali. The federal Geographic Names Board has not taken any action on this subject, and legislators in Congress from Ohio have blocked attempts to change the name back to Denali.
Kantishna
In 1903, Joe Quigley and Judge Wickersham discovered gold in Glacier Creek in the Kantishna Hills region. The ensuing stampede brought about two thousand people to the valley by 1905. Only two of the creeks really paid off for the miners (Eureka and Glacier), and by 1907, there were only about fifty people living in the Kantishna Hills.
Two of the most well known pioneers of Kantishna were Joe and Fannie Quigley. Fannie was known as "Fannie the Hike" and the "Witch of Denali." She was originally from Nebraska and arrived in Alaska in 1898. Fannie started out working as a dancehall girl in Dawson, and also cooked for miners at a number of stampedes. She would travel to a promising area before the major stampede occurred with a Yukon stove, tent, supplies, and firearms for hunting. After the stampede fever cooled off, and a new strike came along, she would go to a new area. In Kantishna, she met Joe Quigley and they were later married. Her fame spread as a dog musher, hunter, prospector, trapper, gardener, and gourmet cook. Joe Quigley came to Alaska in 1891 via the Chilkoot Trail, and eventually ended up living in Kantishna. He was known as a good prospector, hunter, and self-taught scientist.
In 1980, when the park was enlarged, it encompassed the private lands of the Kantishna Hills. In 1985, Sierra Club and other environmental organizations sued the National Park Service for allowing mining to continue in the national parks, preserves and monuments against park regulations. Fifty-four million acres were closed until a study was done on the impact of mining. Eleven of the thirteen active mining operation went bankrupt because of the court injunction. In the fall of 1989, the study was completed and turned over to the courts for further decisions as to What, if any, mining can occur in the disputed areas. According to A History of Mining in the Kantishna Hills, and as of 1978, the area produced 55,000 ounces of gold, 265,000 ounces of silver, five million pounds of antimony (44% of Alaska’s total production), and 1.5 million pounds of combined lead and zinc.
Denali Backcountry Lodge
The Denali Backcountry Lodge sits practically at the end of the road, and beyond the lodge, the road widens into “Kantishna International Airport.” A narrow jeep track continues on about two miles to an old prospectors place - Jahoula’s cabin -that is the true end of the road. If you took a raven’s-eye view (or bush pilot’s) and traveled north of the lodge to Barrow, or northwest to Nome and Siberia - a distance of about six hundred miles either way - you would not see another road, except for the main streets of a few native towns such as Tanana, Kobuk, and Anaktuvak Pass. The few cars in those towns got there by barge or cargo plane. Beyond Barrow, it is only eight hundred miles to the North Pole; there is not a whole lot of traffic out that way either. The point is that Denali Backcountry Lodge is way out there! It really is “the end of the road” in many ways.
The lodge was built in 1989 as Denali Mountain Lodge, but the realities and expenses of trying to run a business in a remote location soon overtook the original owners, who never really completed the project -- even though they were open for business. Many travel nightmares pale in relation to the stories of groups who spent. nights at the lodge with no beds or roofs. At any rate, the bank soon became the unwilling operator, albeit on a very small scale. n a visit to the area in 1992, Sham Idnani, a hotel operator from Tennessee, fell in love with Kantishna and bought the lodge out of foreclosure. Alaska Wildland Adventures approached him, and a partnership was arranged.
A small group came out to the lodge in September of 1992 to draw up plans and deliver materials. After being snowed in for ten days, a second group of AWA staff were able to haul in a semi-trailer full of lumber through several feet of snow and subzero temperatures and leave it at the lodge, in mid-April of 1993, a crew was flown into Wonder Lake (the snow was too soft to land at the airstrip), and six weeks of virtually non-stop work had the lodge in operating order about five minutes before the first bus load of guests arrived. The kitchen and entire plumbing system had been rebuilt, along with numerous other systems and buildings. improvements to the facilities are made each year as necessary during the short pre and post-season work period - the road usually opens around May 22 and closes on September 15, while the operating season runs from June 6 to September 11. It sounds like and is a great deal of work, but those who have been involved have loved every minute of it.
Brought To You by Alaska Denali Tours: www.AlaskaDenaliTours.com