Yukon River

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Lore & Background

The name Yukon, or ųųg han, is a contraction of the words in the phrase Gwichʼin: chųų gąįį han, which means 'white water river' and refers to 'the pale colour' of glacial runoff in the Yukon River. In the 1840s, the Holikachuks told the Russian-American Company that their name for the river was Yukkhana and that this name meant 'big river.' However, Yukkhana does not literally correspond to a Holikachuk phrase that means big river. Two years later, the Gwich'ins told the Hudson's Bay Company that their name for the river was Yukon and that the name meant 'white water river.' The documentary evidence suggests that the Holikachuks had borrowed the contraction Ųųg Han from Gwich'in, and erroneously assumed that this contraction had the same literal meaning as the corresponding Yup'ik name Kuig-pak ['River-big']. The Lewes River is the former name of the upper course of the Yukon, from Marsh Lake to the confluence of the Pelly River at Fort Selkirk. The river passes through the communities of Whitehorse, Carmacks, and Dawson City in Yukon, and crossing Alaska into Eagle, Circle, Fort Yukon, Stevens Village, Rampart, Tanana, Ruby, Galena, Nulato, Grayling, Holy Cross, Russian Mission, Marshall, Pilot Station, St. Marys, and Mountain Village. After Mountain Village, the main Yukon channel frays into many channels, sprawling across the delta. Navigational obstacles on the Yukon River are the Five Finger Rapids and Rink Rapids downstream from Carmacks. Despite its length, there are only four vehicle-carrying bridges across the river. A car ferry crosses the river at Dawson City in the summer; it is replaced by an ice bridge over the frozen river during the winter.

Reader's Guide

The Yukon River was one of the principal means of transportation during the 1896–1903 Klondike Gold Rush. A portion of the river in Yukon—'The Thirty Mile' section, from Lake Laberge to the Teslin River—is a national heritage river and a unit of Klondike Gold Rush International Historical Park. Paddle-wheel riverboats continued to ply the river until the 1950s, when the Klondike Highway was completed. After the purchase of Alaska by the United States in 1867, the Alaska Commercial Company acquired the assets of the Russian-American Company and constructed several posts at various locations on the Yukon River. The Yukon River is home to one of the longest salmon runs in the world. Each year Chinook, coho, and chum salmon return to their terminal streams in Alaska, the Yukon Territory, and British Columbia. The Chinook, which arrive at the mouth of the Yukon River in early June, have the longest journey – as many as 2,000 miles against the current, with an estimated 35–50% bound for Canada. The villages along the Yukon have historically relied on and continue to rely on salmon for their cultural, subsistence, and commercial needs. The Yukon River Inter-Tribal Watershed Council, a cooperative effort of 70 First Nations and tribes in Alaska and Canada, has the goal of making the river and its tributaries safe to drink from again by supplementing and scrutinizing government data. The river flows into several parklands and refuges including Innoko National Wildlife Refuge, Nowitna National Wildlife Refuge, Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve, Yukon Delta National Wildlife Refuge, and Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge.

Did You Know?

• The total drainage area of the Yukon River is more than 25% larger than Texas or Alberta.
• The name Yukon derives from the Gwich'in phrase chųų gąįį han, meaning 'white water river,' referring to the pale color of glacial runoff.
• The Thirty Mile section of the river, from Lake Laberge to the Teslin River, is a national heritage river and a unit of Klondike Gold Rush International Historical Park.
• Despite its length, there are only four vehicle-carrying bridges across the entire Yukon River.
• In the summer of 2023, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service counted 58,500 Chinook salmon, the second lowest season on record.