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Alexander Deedy

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80 years of the Alaska Highway The 11,000 workers who built the Alaska Highway over the course of eight months in 1942 were divided into units that were tasked with constructing a section of the 1,600-mile road. These crews forced their way through the wilderness toward one another, until the road sections connected. The most famous of these meetings took place near Beaver Creek on October 25, 1942, when two bulldozer operators came crashing through the woods toward one another. Photographer Harold W. Richardson of Engineering News-Record posed Corporal Refines Sims, Jr. and Private Alfred Jalufka for a photo of the two men shaking hands. The image was widely reprinted in newspapers and magazines and the press heralded the construction success as a feat of engineering. The official ceremony for the opening of the Alcan, as it was called at the time, took place nearly a month later on November…

Borealis Basecamp launches new offerings Three nights deep in the backcountry of the million-acre White Mountains National Recreation Area outside Fairbanks is a good example of a hard adventure. A soft adventure, says Adriel Butler, could be one hour riding a snowmachine through a powder field. Butler is the owner of Borealis Basecamp, which he aims to make the go-to resort in interior Alaska for those types of soft adventures. Borealis Basecamp opened in 2017 on a 100-acre parcel of forest 25 miles north of Fairbanks. It was open only during winter months and primarily a destination for aurora viewing. The team used time during the early months of the pandemic to plan new accommodations and adventures that launched in 2022. The basecamp is now open through the summer months and offers excursions like six-hour UTV rides and guided driving trips north of the Arctic Circle. In November, the resort…

Citizen council remains vigilant three decades after the Exxon Valdez oil spill Donna Schantz has worked with Prince William Sound Regional Citizen’s Advisory Council since 1999 and served as its executive director since 2016. After the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill, PWSRCAC was created to give a voice to those who have the most to lose in the event of another spill. The council includes representatives from communities in the spill region and industries like aquaculture, commercial fishing, and tourism. It is mandated by Congress and funded by the oil industry but has complete independence. The Prince William Sound council is one of two such organizations in the United States. The other represents Alaska’s Cook Inlet. Can you share something that the council has accomplished recently that you are proud of? This is always an interesting question because it’s really hard to hold up the oil spill that…