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MAJOR ATTRACTIONS:
Mount McKinley
Mount McKinley—also called Denali—is North America’s
highest mountain, elevation 20,320 feet. Mount McKinley/Denali
is located within Denali National Park & Preserve.
The Parks Highway provides the most direct highway access
to Denali National Park and Preserve (formerly Mount McKinley
National Park) from either Anchorage or Fairbanks. On a clear
day, Mount McKinley/Denali may be visible from as far away
as Anchorage. But because the mountain generates its own weather
conditions, even on a clear day it may be shrouded in clouds.
Summer’s often overcast or rainy weather frequently obscures
the mountain as well, giving visitors only about a 30 to 40
percent chance of seeing the famous peak.
If not obscured by clouds, the mountain is visible from several
viewpoints along the 92-mile Park Road that traverses Denali
National Park between the main park entrance at Milepost A
237.3 Parks Highway and private land holdings in the Kantishna
area to the west. There are also formal viewpoints along the
Parks Highway: Denali Viewpoint South, Milepost A 135.2; Denali
Viewpoint North, Milepost A 162.4, and Denali View North Campground
at Milepost A 162.7. There is a Denali viewpoint on the Talkeetna
Spur Road, 12.8 miles from Milepost A 98.7.
First mention of “the mountain” was in 1794, when
English explorer Capt. George Vancouver spotted “a stupendous
snow mountain” from Cook Inlet. Early Russian explorers
and traders called the peak Bolshaia Gora, or “Big Mountain.”
The Athabascan Indians of the region called it Denali, “the
High One.” In 1896 a prospector, William A. Dickey, named
the mountain for presidential nominee William McKinley of
Ohio, although McKinley had no connection with Alaska. Protests
that the mountain be returned to its original name, Denali,
ensued almost at once. But it was not until the Alaska National
Interest Lands Conservation Act of 1980 changed the park’s
status and name that the Alaska Board of Geographic Names
changed the mountain’s name back to Denali. (The U.S.
Board of Geographic Names, however, still shows the mountain
as McKinley.)
The history of climbs on McKinley is as intriguing as its
names. In 1903, Judge James Wickersham and party climbed to
an estimated 8,000 feet, while the Dr. Frederick A. Cook party
reached the 11,000-foot level in 1906. Cook returned to the
mountain and made 2 attempts at the summit–the first
unsuccessful, the second (according to Cook) successful. Cook’s
vague description of his ascent route and a questionable summit
photo led many to doubt his claim. The exhaustive research
of McKinley expert Bradford Washburn has proven the exaggeration
of Cook’s claim. Tom Lloyd, of the 1910 Sourdough Party,
which included Charles McGonagall, Pete Anderson and Billy
Taylor, claimed they had reached both summits (north and south
peaks), but could not provide any photographic evidence. The
first complete and well documented ascent of the true summit
of Mount McKinley was made in June 1913 by the Rev. Hudson
Stuck, Episcopal archdeacon of the Yukon, accompanied by Walter
Harper, Harry Karstens and Robert Tatum. Harper, a Native
Athabascan, was the first person to set foot on the higher
south peak. The story of their achievement was colorfully
recorded in Stuck’s book, The Ascent of Denali. Out of
respect for the Native people among whom he lived and worked,
Stuck refused to refer to the mountain as McKinley.
Today, more than a thousand people attempt to climb McKinley
each year between April and June, most flying in to base camp
at 7,200 feet on Kahiltna Glacier. In the 2002 climbing season,
642 climbers achieved the summit of Denali—52 percent
of the 1,232 who attempted it.
The first airplane landing on the mountain was flown in 1932
by Joe Crosson. Geographic features of McKinley and its sister
peaks bear the names of early explorers: Eldridge and Muldrow
glaciers, after George Eldridge and Robert Muldrow of the
U.S. Geographic Service who determined the peak’s altitude
in 1898; Wickersham Wall; Karsten’s Ridge; Harper Icefall;
and Mount Carpe and Mount Koven, named for Allen Carpe and
Theodore Koven, both killed in a 1932 climb.
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