On the eve of the National Park Service’s 100th anniversary, the name of the highest peak in North America changed from “Mount McKinley” to “Denali.” The timing of the change not only helps mark the agency’s centennial, it shines a light on the long human history of the park, and illuminates a naming debate that has lasted more than 100 years.The controversy started before the establishment of the park and has continued into the present. They were also concerned about preserving for the mountain a Native name which increasingly was being dismissed or completely ignored by American mapmakers, and in other publications.Riggs disagreed with Sheldon and Browne. The mountain was first designated "Mount McKinley" by a New Hampshire-born Seattleite named William Dickey, who led a gold prospectoring dig in the sands of the Susitna River in June 1896. Alaska in 1975 requested that the mountain be officially recognized as Denali, as it was still the common name used in the state. Can it be too late to make an exception to current geographic rules and restore these beautiful names—names so expressive of the mountains themselves, and so symbolic of the Indians who bestowed them?”Get tips on where to photograph and see Denali, the tallest mountain in North America, as well as how to photograph wildlife and wilderness.Wilderness provides outstanding opportunities for solitude or primitive and unconfined types of recreation.Designated Wilderness areas protect many aspects of the park from maintaining natural areas to protecting historical and cultural resources.A ranger is available 9 am—4 pm daily (except on major holidays). Charles Sheldon and Belmore Browne, who were the strongest advocates for the formation of the park, probably would have been pleased to hear about the 2015 decision by the Secretary of the Interior to restore the name “Denali” to North America’s highest peak.On January 13th, 1916, hunter-naturalist Charles Sheldon made an appeal to Thom… Sheldon and Browne, who had both spent significant time within the proposed park boundaries, were deeply alarmed by the decimation of the region’s game due to market hunting and the impending arrival of the railroad.

If you get to the voicemail, please leave a message and we'll call you back as soon as we finish with the previous caller. Browne and Sheldon were not the only proponents of “Denali.” Harry Karstens, the park's first superintendent, and Hudson Stuck, an influential Alaskan missionary, are on record supporting a Native name. Denali, once called Mount McKinley, is the tallest mountain in North America. It proved difficult to supplant words and meanings that endured for generations among Athabaskan groups living in close proximity to the mountain. Situé au centre de l'Alaska, aux États-Unis, il culmine à 6 190 mètres d'altitude. Although the new president had no direct connection to Alaska, the name Mount McKinley was popularized following the president’s 1901 assassination.As Mount McKinley became more established in American vernacular in the early 1900s, there were still many people with connections to Interior Alaska who were disturbed by the dismissal of Native antecedents. At some 18,000 ft (5,500 m), the base-to-peak rise is the largest of any mountain situated entirely above sea level. The local The historical first European sighting of Denali took place on May 6, 1794, when The mountain was first designated "Mount McKinley" by a New Hampshire-born The mountain was always commonly referred to by its Koyukon Athabaskan name The following year, Regula used a procedural maneuver to prevent any change to the Mount McKinley name. Athabaskan words for the mountain translate to “the tall one” or “mountain-big” (perhaps Riggs did not know the Native words were descriptive). In his reply to Browne, Riggs declared:“I don’t like the name of Denali. It was clear that the name McKinley bothered both of them.In a 1913 memoir, Browne lamented: “In looking backward over the history of the big mountain, it seems strange and unfortunate that the name of McKinley should have been attached to it.”In 1930, Sheldon’s The Wilderness of Denali was published and the memoir closes by making another case for the mountain’s name:“The Indians [sic] who have lived for countless generations in the presence of these colossal mountains have given them names that are both euphonious and appropriate . Alaska State Representative In February 2015, in response to the objections from Ohio, Senator After the 2016 presidential election, President Trump and Interior Secretary Alaska Board of Geographic Names attempts to change nameAlaska Board of Geographic Names attempts to change name Another Russian name used to describe the mountain was Bulshaia Gora and means “Big One.”The US purchased Alaska from Russia in 1867 and a couple of decades later, a gold prospector named Frank Densmore explored Interior Alaska and effused about the tremendous mountain. The controversy started before the establishment of the park and has continued into the present. Charles Sheldon and Belmore Browne, who were the strongest advocates for the formation of the park, probably would have been pleased to hear about the 2015 decision by the Secretary of the Interior to restore the name “Denali” to North America’s highest peak.On January 13th, 1916, hunter-naturalist Charles Sheldon made an appeal to Thomas Riggs of the Alaska Engineering Commission regarding the naming of the park and its crown jewel:“I hope that in the bill you will call it ‘Mt Denali National Park’ so that the true old Indian [sic] name of Mt McKinley (meaning ‘the Great One’) will thus be preserved.”Sheldon, Browne, and Riggs were part of a team that was drafting legislation to establish a national park protecting wildlife.