Alaska Joins the Whitewater Union: The Birth of Whitewater Boating from the Colorado to the Yukon

At first glance, Alaska seems to be a prime location for whitewater, and many of its rivers are run on both guided and unguided trips. The state’s isolation, difficult internal travel, and focus on resources over recreation delayed the development of a recreational river-running outlook and economy of the type that grew in the Intermountain West after World War II. Traces of a recreational boating outlook did appear early in these years, however, and soon Alaska was sharing many of the characteristics and paths of other whitewater states. Cheap military surplus inflatable boats appeared on the rivers. Locals and new arrivals began to push the boundaries of what rivers and what whitewater could be run safely and successfully, and rivers that were previously avoided were now sought. Later, entrepreneurs began to take advantage of this expanding outlook, starting businesses whose purpose was running rivers. The advent and growth of recreational river running in Alaska changed the idea of outdoor recreation in the territory/state. As in the rest of the country, wilderness took on new meanings, ones that were less forbidding and more appealing, and whole industries sprang up to take advantage of these new meanings.