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Sweeping from rocky coastline to glacier-crowned peaks, Kenai Fjords National
Park encompasses 607,805 acres of unspoiled wilderness on the southeast
coast of Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula. The park is capped by the Harding
Icefield, a relic from past ice-ages and the largest icefield entirely within
U.S. borders.
Visitors witness a landscape continuously shaped by glaciers, earthquakes,
and storms. Orcas, otters, puffins, bear, moose and mountain goats are just
a few of the numerous animals that make their home in this ever-changing
place where mountains, ice and ocean meet.
The Park offers a range of opportunities for visitors, students and scientists
to explore, study and enjoy this special piece of our nation’s natural
and cultural heritage.
The Alaska National Interest Lands Act of 1980 created Kenai Fjords National
Park. The act directs that the park "be managed for the following
purposes, among others: To maintain unimpaired the scenic and environmental
integrity of the Harding icefield, its outflowing glaciers, and coastal
fjords and islands in their natural state; and to protect seals, sea lions,
other marine mammals, and marine and other birds, and to maintain their
hauling and breeding areas in their natural state, free of human activity
which is disruptive to their natural processes..."
Although cultural resources are not specifically cited in the implementing
language, they are part of the National Park Service management. In addition,
in order to properly manage and interpret the natural environment, animal
populations and plant communities of this unit it is necessary to develop
a diachronic perspective. Humans have been part of this ecosystem and
interacting with it for at least 8000 years. A basic inventory and evaluation
of the archeological resources of Kenai Fjords National Park will provide
essential information about human presence and activities of the centuries.
Human have had little lasting impact on this environment, although the
park includes a few Native American archeological sites and isolated gold
extraction locations. The park's overwhelming significance is as a living
laboratory of change. Plants and wildlife subsist here amidst dynamic
interactions of water, ice and a glacier-carved landscape relentlessly
pulled down by the Earth's crustal movements. The Harriman Expedition,
a steamship-borne venture visiting the fjords in 1899, predicted this
area's future value as a scenic tourist attraction. To protect this life
and landscape, a national monument was proclaimed in 1978 and the 5880,000
- acre Kenai Fjords National Park was established in 1980.
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