Mount Foraker is a 17,400-foot (5,304 m) mountain in the central Alaska Range, in Denali National Park, 14 mi (23 km) southwest of Denali. It is the second highest peak in the Alaska Range, and the third highest peak in the United States. It rises almost directly above the standard base camp for Denali, on a fork of the Kahiltna Glacier also near Mount Hunter in the Alaska Range.
Mount Foraker | |
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Highest point | |
Elevation | 17,400 ft (5304 m)[1][2] NAVD88 |
Prominence | 7250 ft (2210 m)[2] |
Parent peak | Denali[2] |
Isolation | 14.27 mi (23.0 km)[2] |
Listing | |
Coordinates | 62°57′39″N 151°23′53″W / 62.96083°N 151.39806°W[3] |
Naming | |
Etymology | Joseph B. Foraker |
Geography | |
Mount Foraker Alaska | |
Location | Denali Borough, Alaska, United States |
Parent range | Alaska Range |
Topo map | USGS Talkeetna D-3 |
Climbing | |
First ascent | August 10, 1934 |
Easiest route | basic snow/ice |
Its north peak was first climbed on August 6, 1934, and its higher south peak was climbed four days later on August 10, by Charles Houston, T. Graham Brown, and Chychele Waterston, via the west ridge.[3][4]
Mount Foraker was named in 1899 by Lt. J. S. Herron after Joseph B. Foraker, then a sitting U.S. Senator from Ohio.[5]
The Koyukon native peoples in the Lake Minchumina area had a broadside view of the mountains and thus gave distinctive names to both Foraker and Denali. According to Hudson Stuck, the Koyukon had two names for Mount Foraker: Sultana meaning "the woman" and Menlale meaning "Denali's wife".[3] The Denaʼina of the Susitna River valley called the mountain Be'u meaning his wife (Denali) and the Lower Tanana Athabascans to the north are reported to have had the same name (Denali) for Mt. Foraker as they had for Denali (previously Mount McKinley), and it appears that the names were not applied to individual peaks but instead to the Denali massif. The mountain, along with Denali, was called Bolshaya Gora ("big mountain") in Russian.[citation needed]
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