Latest news with #Koyukon
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Climate
- Yahoo
Search Underway For Skier After 3,000-Foot Fall On Denali
A 41-year-old ski mountaineer has gone missing after slipping and falling down a 3,000-foot face on Denali, North America's tallest peak. The incident occurred in an area called Squirrel Point on Monday, June 2, and search and rescue teams have been working to find him ever since. Severe weather, however, has complicated the search and rescue mission and forced a pause. A Tuesday press release from the National Parks Service says the missing skier was un-roped when he fell over the 'exposed rocky and serac-covered 3,000-foot face.' The Squirrel Hill section, the area which the accident occurred, is at an elevation of approximately 12,500 feet — a little more than halfway between sea level and Denali's peak. The two skiers with him who witnessed the fall then lowered over the edge as far as possible but could not see or hear him. At that point they descended the West Buttress route to seek more help and an official search began. On Tuesday, NPS said the ground and air search was on pause due to high winds and snow. The missing skier is reportedly from Washington state. There is no word as of yet when the search for the missing skier will be continued on Denali. An executive order from President Trump has attempted to change the name Denali to Mount McKinley. National Parks Service (a federal entity) acknowledges the new legal name but still lists it by the more well-known 'Denali' on its webpage. The name is rooted in the native Koyukon language and translates to 'the high one' or 'the great one.'
New York Times
14-03-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Denali Will Always Be Denali
In 1896, a gold prospector named William Dickey led a journey through what he called the 'wonderful wilderness' of Alaska, where he glimpsed an enormous mountain that compelled his 'unbounded admiration.' When he emerged from the Alaskan interior, the first news he heard was that William McKinley, the former governor of Ohio, had received the Republican nomination for president. And so, in the kind of random act that so often accompanies the colonial naming of geographic 'discoveries,' Dickey and his comrades decided to bestow the name McKinley upon the huge peak. It caught on enough that Congress made the name official in 1917 when it created Mount McKinley National Park. But the mountain — the tallest in North America, scraping the sky at 20,310 feet — had already held another name for centuries. In Koyukon, a language of the Athabaskan people for whom the mountain plays a central role in their creation story, it is known as 'the high one' or 'the great one': Denali. In 2015 President Barack Obama officially restored that name, noting that McKinley had 'never set foot in Alaska' and that 'Denali is a site of significant cultural importance to many Alaska Natives.' What to call the mountain had been a matter of debate even before Congress officially named it 108 years ago. The British-born mountaineer Hudson Stuck, an Alaska transplant who was a leader of the 1913 expedition that first summited the peak, called for 'the restoration to the greatest mountain in North America of its immemorial native name' in his 1914 book, 'The Ascent of Denali.' He pointed out 'a certain ruthless arrogance' that 'contemptuously ignores the native names of conspicuous natural objects' that are 'almost always appropriate and significant, and overlays them with names that are, commonly, neither the one nor the other.' Now President Trump has done exactly that. In one of the first acts on his return to the White House, he issued an executive order restoring McKinley as the mountain's official name. (The national park that surrounds it will remain Denali National Park and Preserve; changing it would most likely require Congress to amend the law that gave the park that name in 1980.) The McKinley name change was recently entered into the government's Geographic Names Information System, which lists the official names and locations of geographic features in the United States. Which raises a question: Do we really need another mountain named McKinley? In addition to what used to be called Denali, there are at least a dozen other mountains or ridges in the country named McKinley, including in Arkansas, California, Colorado, Montana, New York, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee and Washington, according to the Geographic Names Information System. Then again, William McKinley is a favorite of Mr. Trump, who has lauded that president's championing of tariffs and expansionism. During his tenure, Hawaii was annexed and Guam, Puerto Rico and the Philippines were seized by the United States. 'He should be honored for his steadfast commitment to American greatness,' Mr. Trump asserted in his executive order. The president noted the name change in his recent address before Congress, adding, 'Beautiful Alaska, we love Alaska.' But Mr. Trump's decision has not gone over well with his crush. Even before he changed the name, a poll found Alaskans opposed it by a 2-to-1 margin. The State Legislature passed a resolution last month urging the president to reverse the decision. And the state's two Republican senators, Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan, are sponsoring legislation to rename the mountain. 'In Alaska, it's Denali,' Senator Murkowski said in a statement, Emily Edenshaw, president and chief executive of the Alaska Native Heritage Center, said that the name Denali 'reflects a profound spiritual and cultural relationship with the land' and 'recognizes the enduring contributions of Alaska Native peoples.' Before Mr. Obama's 2015 declaration, lawmakers in Alaska had been pushing for Denali as the mountain's official name for decades. In 1975, the governor and State Legislature formally requested that the Interior Department name the mountain Denali, but that effort and subsequent requests were blocked by the members of Congress from Ohio, McKinley's home state. Mr. Trump's decision to return to the McKinley name is a slap in the face of recent efforts to acknowledge America's history of colonialism and restore Indigenous place names. Mr. Trump's executive order also ignores the history that cemented the mountain's original name in our lexicon. Over the last century, the name Denali became entwined with mountaineering, the pursuit that made the peak famous outside Alaska, embossing its Koyukon Athabaskan name on American minds. General Motors even named one of its vehicles Denali. In June 1913, the Athabaskan Walter Harper became the first person to stand on Denali's summit as part of Stuck's expedition. The endeavor took three months, starting with dog sledding through subzero temperatures; navigating the thick boreal forest, braided rivers and huge glaciers that had stymied the expeditions that came before; and climbing the flanks of the mountain that rises 18,000 feet from its base — 6,000 feet more than Everest from its base. In 1970, the first all-women's team to ascend the mountain carried a flag to the summit emblazoned with the moniker 'Denali Damsels.' When President Obama used his executive power to officially call the peak Denali, he was only confirming the long reach of its Indigenous name. Regardless of Mr. Trump's efforts to force upon it the name of a president who had never even visited Alaska, the mountain has always been, and will always be, Denali.
The National
11-02-2025
- Politics
- The National
Google Maps changes 'Gulf of Mexico' to 'Gulf of America' for US users
Google has changed 'Gulf of Mexico' to 'Gulf of America' on its Maps app for US users, after US President Donald Trump announced the official name change at the federal level. 'As we announced two weeks ago and consistent with our long-standing practices, we've begun rolling out changes to reflect this update. People using Maps in the US will see 'Gulf of America' and people in Mexico will see 'Gulf of Mexico',' Google said on its blog. 'Everyone else will see both names.' The company stated its intention to make the change in late January, saying it was policy to adjust names when they have been updated in official government sources. It added that the names users see are based on country location, which is determined by information from phone operating system, including SIM card, network and locale. For web users, the names are based on the region you select in Search settings or the device's location. During Mr Trump's inaugural speech on January 20, he stated his intention to make the change, saying: 'America will reclaim its rightful place as the greatest, most powerful, most respected nation on Earth, inspiring the awe and admiration of the entire world.' He later signed an executive order focused on 'restoring names that honour American greatness', which included the renaming of Alaska's Denali – a name the native Koyukon people have used to refer to the peak for centuries – to Mt McKinley. 'It is in the national interest to promote the extraordinary heritage of our Nation and ensure future generations of American citizens celebrate the legacy of our American heroes,' the order stated. After Mr Trump first floated the idea ahead of his inauguration, in early January, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum presented a map from 1607 at her morning news conference and proposed her own name change. 'Why don't we call it Mexican America?' Ms Sheinbaum said, indicating the map's name for the modern US. 'It would sound nice, right?'
Yahoo
28-01-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Google Maps will make Trump's changes to show Gulf of America and Mount McKinley
The Gulf of America and Mount McKinley will soon appear on Google Maps to reflect President Trump's decision to rename the two topographical features, the company announced Monday. The navigation mainstay will make the changes as soon as the Department of the Interior updates the Geographic Names Information System, Google said. 'We've received a few questions about naming within Google Maps,' the tech giant posted on X Monday evening. 'We have a longstanding practice of applying name changes when they have been updated in official government sources.' When the GNIS makes the change, Google will then move to 'update Google Maps in the U.S. quickly to show Mount McKinley and Gulf of America.' The company said the forthcoming update follows their longstanding practice regarding official names of places that vary between countries. Google Map users will still 'see their official local name' based on their location. So, for users outside of the United States, Google Maps will likely still have the previous names, the Gulf of Mexico and Mount Denali, listed alongside the new ones. 'Everyone in the rest of the world sees both names,' Google said in its X post. 'That applies here too.' Mount Denali, soon to be reverted to Mount McKinley, was renamed by President Obama in 2015 per the request of the Koyukon, an Alaskan native group. They had been fighting to have the name changed to Denali since 1975.
Yahoo
27-01-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Trump says McKinley, but Denali forever is a popular sentiment
A common sentiment in Alaska is that while President Donald Trump has ordered the name of North America's tallest peak to be changed from Denali to McKinley, Alaskans will call it what they want. And popular consensus seems to favor Denali. Jeff King, a four-time winner of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, whose kennel operates just outside Denali National Park and Preserve, told the Associated Press: 'I don't know a single person that likes the idea, and we're pretty vocal about it,' King said. 'Denali respects the Indigenous people that have been here and around Denali for tens of thousands of years.' The 20,310-foot peak had been known as Denali until 1896, when a gold prospector unofficially named the peak after William McKinley in support of the then-presidential candidate. Even though McKinley had never been to the mountain and had no special connection to Alaska, the peak was officially named in the late Republican president's honor in 1917. (McKinley served as president from 1987 until his assassination in 1901.) The name was officially changed to Denali, as a symbolic gesture to the Koyukon people, by the Obama administration in 2015. On Monday, two resolutions were introduced by Democratic Reps. to register the Alaska Legislature's opposition to the change back to McKinley. One resolution quotes Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski: 'It is called Denali, which means the great one. So I would just suggest to President Trump, who wants to make everything great, they already have a great name for it.' Last week, Alaska News Source asked residents via social media what they thought of the name change. The responses were mostly favored Denali over McKinley. Th top comment reads: 'It's Denali. I don't know why we are fighting so hard to name it after a President that didn't even go to AK let alone trying to erase its original and indigenous name.' A comment in favor of the change: 'Mt. McKinley, as it was before Obama.' –Image showing Mt. Denali in September 2020 courtesy of ©Jay Christensen This article originally appeared on For The Win: Trump says McKinley, but Denali forever is a popular sentiment
