McCarthy, Alaska

Episode 533 / 3 October 2024 / 173 min / full

Mountain Massacre

"And this is McCarthy, Alaska... It's in southeastern Alaska over there." about 0:04:43

The case: The McCarthy massacre (March 1st, 1983); Killing of Ralph Berg (April 1993). Read the case file.

The figures, as told in 2024

Median age

significantly above state average

Median household income

significantly below state average

Median home value

significantly below state average

Cost of living

104

Religious

about 35%

Property crime

zero

Violent crime

zero

People killed

▼ six

History, in brief

• Native people hunted in the area for a long time and collected copper nuggets from the creek. about 0:06:04
• Their permanent camp was on the Copper River at the village of Tural near Chitina, where they fished for salmon. about 0:06:14
• Copper was discovered between the Kennecott Glacier and McCarthy Creek in 1900. about 0:06:23
• After the discovery the Kennecott Mining Company and the company town of Kennecott were created. about 0:06:39
• There were no towns there before the copper was found; Kennecott was built to get the copper out. about 0:06:46
• Kennecott and McCarthy were sister towns because alcohol and prostitution were forbidden in Kennecott. about 0:06:52
• McCarthy grew as a place to provide booze and women for the copper miners. about 0:07:15
• McCarthy quickly became a major town with a gymnasium, a hospital, a school, a bar and a brothel. about 0:07:26
• The Copper River and Northwestern Railway reached McCarthy in 1911. about 0:07:44
• By 1938 the copper deposits were gone and the railroad discontinued service to the town. about 0:07:49
• About $200 million in ore was extracted from the mine, the richest concentration of copper ore in the world at the time. about 0:08:04
• The population of McCarthy and Kennecott fell to almost nothing until about the 1970s. about 0:08:32
• In the 1970s hippies looking for a naturalist lifestyle and workers on the Trans-Alaska Pipeline began arriving. about 0:08:43
• In the 1980s the area was designated the Wrangell-St. Elias National Park. about 0:09:01
• The Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve was established in December 1980. about 0:22:10
• There has been at least one family living in the McCarthy area since 1953. about 0:09:17
• The McCarthy and Kennecott area ranks as one of the United States' most endangered landmarks by the National Trust for Historic Places. about 0:09:43
• The McCarthy Road begins where the pavement ends just outside Chitina, 61 miles west. about 0:26:23
• In 1983 the road was covered with gravel and often scarred by washouts and washboard ruts; railroad ties and spikes occasionally resurfaced and shredded tyres. about 0:26:27
• The road from Chitina was improved in the early 1970s and the state built the bridge over the Kennecott River, bringing more people and property buyers. about 0:58:10
• Wrangell-St. Elias National Park is roughly the size of West Virginia and six times the size of Yellowstone. about 0:22:15
• Four major mountain ranges converge in the park and nine of the 16 tallest peaks in the United States rise within its boundaries. about 0:22:43
• More than a million acres within the park's boundaries are still privately owned. about 0:23:19
• Year-round residents are cut off from roads by a river bluff; in summer the only way across is a hand-powered cable car. about 0:23:28

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