Before the Federal government began construction of the Alaska Railroad in 1914, there were only scattered homesteads in the Matanuska and Susitna valleys. However, even before the Alaska Engineering Commission (AEC), the federal agency...
Red and Marydith Beeman’s cabin at Byers Lake in 2011 Just a few minutes walk from Byers Lake campground, which is near Mile 138 of the Parks Highway, lies the picturesque remains of an...
Nagley’s Store in the 1970s when it was the B & K (Barrett & Kennedy) Trading Post Horace Nagley (1875-1966) was one of the first merchants to establish a store in the Susitna Basin....
Talkeetna Roadhouse as it looked in the mid 1970s When I first visited Talkeetna in the early 1970s it was a sleepy little hamlet. The Talkeetna Spur Road had just been paved, but Talkeetna...
Old freighter’s cabin at Talkeetna in 2005 Gold was discovered at Valdez Creek (near the headwaters of the Susitna River) in 1903. The first pack-horse and winter sled routes that supplied the mining...
On our last trip down the Parks Highway we over-nighted at Byers Lake campground. In the afternoon we rented a canoe an paddled across the lake. It was clear and sunny and we got...
Here are a few more photos of old buildings in Talkeetna. See my previous post for a short history of the town. At the corner of First and C Street. Between First and Main ...
Talkeetna Roadhouse, built between 1914 and 1917 Here are some photos of historic buildings in Talkeetna. We have been stopping there as part of our job for the past three months, and had a...
The things you find in the supposed hinterlands. This is a mid-1960s Mercedes Benz 1113 cab-over fire truck I saw in front of the Fairview Inn at Talkeetna. The model 1113s were called “kurzhaubers,”...
