Repeat Photography in Denali

Photo pairs featured on this site have come from a variety of sources.  A rich regional history of explorers, homesteaders, and researchers has created an impressive legacy of photographs, journals, and field notes concerning the natural history of the Denali area.  In recent years, historians, ecologists, and others interested in landscape history have worked together to gather this valuable evidence and put it to a new use.

In Denali, many individuals have spent hours searching archives, scanning slides, and pouring over maps to gather the information needed to retake historical photos.  Photographers then trekked for hours by foot, vehicle, airplane, and helicopter, with some locations proving difficult to find due to dramatic changes that had taken place over the intervening years, while others appeared frozen in time, remaining somewhat static.  This hard work has now produced a new legacy – matched historical and recent photo pairs – that reveal a wealth of information.

airplane

Aerial photography projects produced photo pairs that capture a unique bird’s eye view of the landscape.  Although these photos are difficult to retake because they must be lined up in three dimensional space, some great matches were made.

 

Visitor

Roadside photography created many photo pairs spanning the history of Denali National Park and Preserve. Photos feature the development of some of the park’s most visible structures; and highlight changes in construction technology.

 

Pack train in snow

Expedition photography projects have stemmed from individuals dedicated to retracing the steps of some of Denali’s first modern day explorers, and are a fascinating study in how changes to the landscape may affect the movement of people.

 

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