4th of July Creek Mining Camp: Cultural Landscapes Inventory, Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve

Region 11 Park Cultural Landscapes Program

Inventory Unit Description: Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve in eastern interior Alaska. The 4th of July Creek Mining Camp (CHR-080) is one of several mining related sites located along the 4th of July Creek drainage. Historic mining activities along the drainage stretch from the Nation town site at the mouth of the creek upriver twenty-two miles and include cabins, caches, boilers, mining equipment, ditches, and placer mining waste piles. CHR-265, the 4th of July Creek Mining District, has been developed but has yet to be submitted for state or national recognition. CHR-080 was by far the largest mining camp on the 4th of July drainage. It is a historic site that operated primarily between 1898 and 1943, but after World War II the site experienced further activity until 1951. Thereafter it was used sporadically until the claims expired in the early 1990s and the land reverted to public domain. CHR-080 is located 8 miles up-river from the mouth of 4th of July Creek, along the historic 4th of July Road (now impassable), that originates at the former site of Nation City and ends at CHR-080. The site is ¼ mile above the mouth of Ten Gulch on the west bank of 4th of July Creek. The site consists of two cabins, a blacksmith shop, a cabin ruin, an outhouse, a boiler, an abandoned ‘donkey engine’, a placer mining waste pile, an overgrown airstrip and a wide variety of mining and earth-moving equipment from various eras of development. The remoteness of the site, 8 miles up the drainage along an impassable overgrown road, has resulted in little impact from visitors. The site is only accessible by helicopter and integrity at CHR-080 is present. The site maintains its integrity of location, design, workmanship, materials, feeling, association and setting. Historic character is perceivable as that of a classic placer gold mining camp due to the presence of original log buildings, a blacksmith shop, a wide assortment of mining equipment and placer mining waste piles. The site, while used in non-historic times, still maintains its historic integrity to an impressive degree, and through its varied collection of mining equipment provides the visitor with historical and modern examples of placer gold mining techniques, as well as insight into the lifestyles of the miners.

4th of July Creek Mining Camp: Cultural Landscapes Inventory, Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve

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