The name of the highest mountain in North America became a subject of dispute in 1975, when the Alaska Legislature asked the U.S. federal government to officially change its name from "Mount McKinley" to "Denali". The mountain had been unofficially named Mount McKinley in 1896 by a gold prospector, and officially by the federal government in 1917 to commemorate William McKinley, who was President of the United States from 1897 until his assassination in 1901.
The name Denali is based on the Koyukon name of the mountain, Deenaalee ('the high one'). [1] [2] The Koyukon are a people of Alaskan Athabaskans (also known as Dena) who settled in the interior area north of the mountain. [1] [lower-alpha 1]
Alaska in 1975 requested that the mountain be officially recognized as Denali, as it was still the common name used in the state and was traditional among Alaska Native peoples. This change action was repeatedly blocked by members of the congressional delegation from Ohio, the home state of the mountain's presidential namesake.
In August 2015, Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell announced that the name would officially be changed in all federal documents. [4] [5] While on an Alaskan visit in the first week of September 2015, President Barack Obama announced the renaming of the mountain. [6]
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Numerous Indigenous peoples of the area had their own names for this prominent peak. The local Koyukon Athabaskan name for the mountain, used by the Indigenous Americans with access to the flanks of the mountain (living in the Yukon, Tanana and Kuskokwim basins), is Dinale or Denali ( /dɪˈnæli/ or /dɪˈnɑːli/ ). [7] To the South the Dena'ina people in the Susitna River valley used the name Dghelay Ka'a ('the big mountain'), anglicized as Doleika or Traleika, as in Traleika Glacier. [1] [8]
The historical first European sighting of Denali took place on May 6, 1794, when George Vancouver was surveying the Knik Arm of the Cook Inlet and mentioned "distant stupendous mountains" in his journal. However, he uncharacteristically left the mountain unnamed. The mountain is first named on a map by Ferdinand von Wrangel in 1839; the names Tschigmit and Tenada correspond to the locations of Mount Foraker and Denali, respectively. Von Wrangel had been chief administrator of the Russian settlements in North America from 1829 to 1835. [8]
During the Russian ownership of Alaska, the common name for the mountain was Bolshaya Gora (Russian : Большая Гора, lit. 'big mountain'). [9] The first English name applied to the peak was Densmore's Mountain or Densmore's Peak, for the gold prospector Frank Densmore, who in 1889 had fervently praised the mountain's majesty; however, the name persevered only locally and informally. [7]
The mountain was first designated "Mount McKinley" by a New Hampshire-born Seattleite named William Dickey, who led a gold prospecting dig in the sands of the Susitna River in June 1896. An account written on his return to the contiguous United States appeared in The New York Sun on January 24, 1897, under the title Discoveries in Alaska (1896). [10] [11] Dickey wrote, "We named our great peak Mount McKinley, after William McKinley of Ohio, who had been nominated for the Presidency, and that fact was the first news we received on our way out of that wonderful wilderness." [10] [11] By most accounts, the naming was politically driven; Dickey had met many silver miners who zealously promoted Democratic presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan's ideal of a silver standard, inspiring him to retaliate by naming the mountain after a strong proponent of the gold standard. [11]
In a United States Geological Survey (USGS) report in 1900, Josiah Edward Spurr refers to "the giant mountain variously known to Americans as Mount Allen, Mount McKinley, or Bulshaia, the latter being a corruption of the Russian adjective meaning big." [12] The 1900 report otherwise calls it Mount McKinley, [13] as does the 1911 USGS report The Mount McKinley Region, Alaska. [14]
McKinley was assassinated early in his second term, shot by Leon Czolgosz on September 6, 1901, and dying of his wounds on September 14. This led to sentiment favoring commemoration of his memory, and the Federal government officially adopted the name Mount McKinley in 1917, when Congress passed and President Woodrow Wilson signed into law "An Act to establish the Mount McKinley National Park in the territory of Alaska" (Public Act No. 353). [15]
The mountain was always commonly referred to by its Koyukon Athabaskan name Denali, especially by Alaskans, mountaineers, and Alaska Natives. In 1975, the Alaska Board of Geographic Names changed the name of the mountain to Denali, [16] and, at Governor Jay Hammond's behest, the Alaska Legislature officially requested that the United States Board on Geographic Names (BGN), the federal governmental body responsible for naming geographic features in the United States, change the name of the mountain from "Mount McKinley" to "Mount Denali". [17]
Ohio congressman Ralph Regula (whose district included Canton, where McKinley spent much of his life) opposed action by the U.S. Board and was able to prevent it. [18] [19] At first, the Board consideration was delayed by opposition from Secretary of the Interior Rogers Morton, under whose purview the board fell, as he personally did not favor a change of the mountain's name. [17] Later, in 1977, with Secretary Morton no longer at the helm of the Department of the Interior, the Board again prepared to consider the name change, but Regula gathered signatures from every member of the Ohio congressional delegation against renaming Mount McKinley, and no ruling was made. [11] [17]
On December 2, 1980, with President Jimmy Carter's signing into law of the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA), McKinley National Park—which had been created on February 26, 1917 [11] —was incorporated into a larger protected area named Denali National Park and Preserve. [20] Naming the new, larger park Denali, while retaining the name Mount McKinley for the actual mountain was thought to be a compromise by many "Mount McKinley" partisans. [20] [21] However, "Denali" advocates, including Alaska Congressman Don Young, rejected the position that the 1980 action constituted a real compromise, and instead argued that naming the mountain and park by different names only created confusion. [21] [22] While the Board was originally set to make a ruling on December 10, 1980, with the passage of Lands Conservation Act on December 2, they opted to defer their ruling yet again. [17] [23]
The following year, Regula used a procedural maneuver to prevent any change to the Mount McKinley name. Under U.S. Board on Geographic Names policy, [24] the Board cannot consider any name-change proposal if congressional legislation relating to that name is pending. Thus, Regula began a biennial legislative tradition of either introducing language into Interior Department appropriation bills, or introducing a stand-alone bill that directed that the name of Mount McKinley should not be changed. [17] [25] This effectively killed the Denali name-change proposal pending with the Board. [17]
In 2009, the retirement of Regula reinvigorated interest in renaming the mountain. Alaska State Representative Scott Kawasaki sponsored Alaska House Joint Resolution 15, which urges the U.S. Congress to rename the mountain Denali. [26] Despite efforts in Alaska, Ohio Representatives Betty Sutton and Tim Ryan assumed Regula's role as congressional guardians of the Mount McKinley name and introduced H.R. 229 which reads: "Notwithstanding any other authority of law, the mountain located 63 degrees 04 minutes 12 seconds north, by 151 degrees 00 minutes 18 seconds west shall continue to be named and referred to for all purposes as Mount McKinley." [27]
A January 2015 bill submitted by Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski once again proposed renaming the peak to Denali. In June 2015 testimony to Congress, the National Park Service's associate director stated that the NPS "has no objection to adopting the name of Denali for Mt. McKinley". [28]
On August 30, 2015, Sally Jewell announced that the mountain would be renamed Denali, under authority of federal law which permits her as Secretary of the Interior to name geographic features if the Board on Geographic Names does not act within a "reasonable" period of time. In media interviews, Jewell cited the board's failure to act on the state's four-decade-old request, saying "I think any of us would think that 40 years is an unreasonable amount of time." [lower-alpha 1] [4] [5] [29] [30]
Ohio Republicans were critical of the renaming. John Boehner, who served as Speaker of the United States House of Representatives and a Representative from Ohio at the time that the name change was announced, said he was "deeply disappointed" by the change, [31] while Regula, who had retired by the time the name change was announced, commented that Obama "thinks he is a dictator". [32] Presidential candidate Donald Trump called the name change a "great insult to Ohio" and vowed to reverse the decision if elected. [33] All 13 Republican members of Ohio's congressional delegation signed a letter of complaint denouncing the "troubling" action of the Obama administration: "William McKinley's legacy has been tarnished by a political stunt." [34] U.S. Representative Mike Turner of Ohio vowed to fight the change: "I'm certain [Obama] didn't notify President McKinley's descendants, who find this outrageous." [35] Not all the state's elected Republicans agreed, however, such as Ohio Secretary of State Jon A. Husted:
I wouldn't want people from Alaska telling me what things in Ohio should be. So I guess we shouldn't tell people from Alaska what they should do in their own state. [34]
In February 2015, in response to the objections from Ohio, Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, a Republican, said:
There's a lot of things in Ohio that are already named after McKinley. This is no affront to our former president; this is all about ensuring that respect for the land and respect for the native people of the region is afforded. [36]
Ohio native and junior Alaska Senator Dan Sullivan, a Republican, said he was "gratified" that President Obama changed the name. [3] Alaska Governor Bill Walker, an independent, said: "Alaska's place names should reflect and respect the rich cultural history of our state, and officially recognizing the name Denali does just that." [36]
On August 30, 2015, speaking from Denali's Ruth Glacier, Senator Murkowski said:
For centuries, Alaskans have known this majestic mountain as the 'Great One'. Today we are honored to be able to officially recognize the mountain as Denali. I'd like to thank the President for working with us to achieve this significant change to show honor, respect and gratitude to the Athabascan people of Alaska. [36] [37]
Obama used the first week of September 2015 on a "climate change-focused" visit, which he also used to announce the renaming of the mountain. On September 6, 2015, former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin criticized Obama's Alaskan visit and also voiced her opposition to the name change: "The name of the national park was changed to Denali some years ago. So I thought that was good enough. We could keep McKinley as the highest peak on the North American continent. We could keep that name McKinley." [6]
After the 2016 presidential election, President Trump and Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke reportedly asked Alaskan senators Dan Sullivan and Lisa Murkowski if they wanted Trump to reverse the name change. The two senators told Trump that they did not want this to happen, and Trump agreed not to reverse the name change. [38] [39]
Denali is the highest mountain peak in North America, with a summit elevation of 20,310 feet (6,190 m) above sea level. It is the tallest mountain in the world from base-to-peak on land, measuring 18,000 ft (5,500 m), With a topographic prominence of 20,194 feet (6,155 m) and a topographic isolation of 4,621.1 miles (7,436.9 km), Denali is the third most prominent and third-most isolated peak on Earth, after Mount Everest and Aconcagua. Located in the Alaska Range in the interior of the U.S. state of Alaska, Denali is the centerpiece of Denali National Park and Preserve.
The Alaska Range is a relatively narrow, 600-mile-long (950 km) mountain range in the southcentral region of the U.S. state of Alaska, from Lake Clark at its southwest end to the White River in Canada's Yukon Territory in the southeast. Denali, the highest mountain in North America, is in the Alaska Range. The range is part of the American Cordillera.
Denali National Park and Preserve, formerly known as Mount McKinley National Park, is a national park and preserve located in Interior Alaska, United States, centered on Denali, the highest mountain in North America. The park and contiguous preserve encompass 6,045,153 acres which is larger than the state of New Hampshire. On December 2, 1980, 2,146,580-acre Denali Wilderness was established within the park. Denali's landscape is a mix of forest at the lowest elevations, including deciduous taiga, with tundra at middle elevations, and glaciers, snow, and bare rock at the highest elevations. The longest glacier is the Kahiltna Glacier. Wintertime activities include dog sledding, cross-country skiing, and snowmobiling. The park received 594,660 recreational visitors in 2018.
Lisa Ann Murkowski is an American attorney and politician serving as the senior United States senator representing Alaska, having held that seat since 2002. She is the first woman to represent Alaska in the Senate and the Senate's second-most senior Republican woman, after Susan Collins of Maine. She became dean of Alaska's congressional delegation upon Representative Don Young's death.
Anthony Carroll Knowles is an American politician and businessman who served as the seventh governor of Alaska from 1994 to 2002. Barred from seeking a third consecutive term as governor in 2002, he ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate in 2004 and again for governor in 2006. In September 2008, Knowles became president of the National Energy Policy Institute, a non-profit energy policy organization funded by billionaire George Kaiser's family foundation, and located at the University of Tulsa.
Ralph Straus Regula was an American politician from Ohio. A member of the Republican Party, he served in the Ohio House of Representatives, the Ohio State Senate and the United States House of Representatives. He represented Ohio's 16th congressional district for 18 terms from 1973 to 2009. In the 110th Congress (2007–2009), he was the second longest serving Republican member of the House of Representatives.
The Koyukon, Dinaa, or Denaa are an Alaska Native Athabascan people of the Athabascan-speaking ethnolinguistic group. Their traditional territory is along the Koyukuk and Yukon rivers where they subsisted for thousands of years by hunting and trapping. Many Koyukon live in a similar manner today.
Mount Foraker is a 17,400-foot (5,304 m) mountain in the central Alaska Range, in Denali National Park, 14 mi (23 km) southwest of Denali. It is the second highest peak in the Alaska Range, and the third highest peak in the United States. It rises almost directly above the standard base camp for Denali, on a fork of the Kahiltna Glacier also near Mount Hunter in the Alaska Range.
Hudson Stuck was a British native who became an Episcopal priest, social reformer and mountain climber in the United States. With Harry P. Karstens, he co-led the first expedition to successfully climb Denali in June 1913, via the South Summit. He published five books about his years in Alaska. Two memoirs were issued in new editions in 1988, including his account of the ascent of Denali.
Campbell Hill is, at 1,549.09 feet (472.16 m), the highest point in elevation in the U.S. state of Ohio. Campbell Hill is located within the city of Bellefontaine, 2 miles (3.2 km) northeast of downtown.
Mount Hunter or Begguya is a mountain in Denali National Park in Alaska. It is approximately eight miles (13 km) south of Denali, the highest peak in North America. "Begguya" means child in the Dena'ina language. Mount Hunter is the third-highest major peak in the Alaska Range.
Denali State Park is a 325,240-acre (131,620 ha) state park in the U.S. state of Alaska. It is located in the Matanuska-Susitna Borough adjacent to the east side of Denali National Park and Preserve, along the Parks Highway.
Henry Bradford Washburn Jr. was an American explorer, mountaineer, photographer, and cartographer. He established the Boston Museum of Science, served as its director from 1939–1980, and from 1985 until his death served as its Honorary Director. Bradford married Barbara Polk in 1940, they honeymooned in Alaska making the first ascent of Mount Bertha together.
Walter Harper was a mountain climber and guide of mixed white and Alaska Native ancestry. On Saturday, 7 June 1913, he was the first person to reach the summit of Denali, the highest mountain in North America. He was followed by the other members of the small expedition team, guide Harry Karstens, Episcopal archdeacon Hudson Stuck, who had organized the effort, and Episcopal missionary Robert Tatum.
Adolph Murie, the first scientist to study wolves in their natural habitat, was a naturalist, author, and wildlife biologist who pioneered field research on wolves, bears, and other mammals and birds in Arctic and sub-Arctic Alaska. He was also instrumental in protecting wolves from eradication and in preserving the biological integrity of the Denali National Park and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. In 1989 Professor John A. Murray of the English Department at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks received an NEH grant to inventory the extensive Adolph Murie written and slide archives at Rasmusson Library in the Arctic and Polar Collection. He wrote a forty-page report and biographical narrative of Adolph Murie, which remains unpublished but which is in his papers.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to the U.S. state of Alaska:
Sarah Margaret "Sally" Roffey Jewell is an American business executive and environmentalist who served as the 51st United States secretary of the interior in the Obama administration from 2013 to 2017.
Mount Barrille is a 7,650 ft (2,330 m) mountain summit located in the Alaska Range, in Denali National Park and Preserve, in the U.S. state of Alaska. It is situated 2,650 feet above the Ruth Glacier at the gateway to the Don Sheldon Amphitheater, or The Great Gorge, depending on direction of travel. Barrille is set 11.43 mi (18 km) southeast of Denali, 3.37 mi (5 km) west of The Mooses Tooth, 3.68 mi (6 km) east of The Rooster Comb, and 1.42 mi (2 km) north of Mount Dickey which is the nearest higher peak. The mountain was named by famed explorer Dr. Frederick Cook for Edward Barrill (1861–1946), a horse packer from Darby, Montana, who was his sole companion during his 1906 claim to be the first to climb Mount McKinley. The claim was later disproved, and in 1909 Barrill signed an affidavit stating that they had not reached the summit. Cook referred to his companion as Barrille in his accounts of the expedition, and Barrille remains as the official spelling used by the United States Geological Survey.
On June 28, 2013, the centennial anniversary of the first ascent of Denali, Tom Choate was recognized as the oldest person to summit Denali at the age of seventy-eight years old. He has reached the peak of Denali multiple times, spanning across five different decades: in 1963, 1983, 1993, 2003, and lastly in 2013.