Contributed by Helen Hegener
Only a River…
Visible from most higher areas of the Valley, Knik Arm is the northernmost branch of Cook Inlet, a great body of water which stretches 180 miles north from the Gulf of Alaska and splits at Anchorage into Knik Arm and the more southern Turnagain Arm.
The 25-mile long Knik River, which gives the Arm its name, begins under the Knik Glacier. The word derives from the Inupiaq word igniq, meaning fire; the Denaina term for the river was Skitnu, which means brush river. The Matanuska, Eklutna, and Eagle rivers also drain into Knik Arm, and Wasilla Creek, Peters Creek, and Fish Creek are also major tributaries.
William Bligh, who served as Captain Cook’s Sailing Master on his third and final voyage to Alaska in 1778, thought that both Knik Arm and Turnagain Arm were the mouths of rivers and not the opening to the long-sought Northwest Passage. To be certain, under Cook’s orders, Bligh organized a party to travel up Knik Arm, and they returned to report that Knik Arm indeed led only to a river
Boats of any kind are a rare sight on the silty, churning, tide-wrenched waters Knik Arm today, but in times long past the Arm was traversed by rowboats, freighters, and sailing ships.
George Palmer, a merchant who owned stores in Knik and near the later site of Palmer, frequently crossed Knik Arm, as cited by Valley historian Colleen Miekle:
“Palmer’s first schooner, the two masted ‘C. T. Hill,’ arrived at Knik Harbor June 7, 1913. Leaving his store in the hands of a clerk, Palmer and crew sailed the schooner from Goose Bay to San Francisco two or three times a summer and brought back merchandise for his store.” And: “In the spring of 1915, Palmer traveled to Seward by dog sled, where he boarded a steamer to San Francisco to purchase a newer schooner named ‘The Lucy.’ Palmer and ‘The Lucy’ arrived at Goose Bay on May 3, 1915.”
George Palmer reportedly made routine trips from Knik to points on the Kenai Peninsula and along the western shore of Cook Inlet. A few others, including the Father of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, Joe Redington Sr., have likewise plied the turbulent waters of Knik Arm. Joe’s boat, the famed ‘Nomad,’ once ferried Joe and his family, his sled dogs, and tons of building supplies, machinery, and other freight between Knik and Joe’s homestead at Flathorn Lake. The historic little craft now sits peacefully in the marshland at Knik, having recently enjoyed a restoration by local carpenters and friends of the boat.
The more recent history of Knik Arm is no less fascinating than its past. After the discovery of oil reserves at Prudhoe Bay in January 1968, a concept for a futuristic city on the west side of Knik Arm was advanced, a planned mega-community of 40,000 residents, with residential, office, recreational and commercial spaces all fitting snugly under a fully enclosed dome at Point MacKenzie.
Named ‘Seward’s Success,’ features such as climate control, moving sidewalks, a rapid-transit train and an aerial tramway to Anchorage were part of the plan for a car-free community, as detailed in an article, “An Entire City Under Glass,” in the March, 1970 issue of Popular Science. The fate of the city was told in the title to Peter Porco’s November 3, 2002 article for the Anchorage Daily News: “"City of tomorrow a failed dream of yesterday - Thinking big: Domed suburb across Knik Arm was planned in detail.”
More recent plans include the long-discussed, relentlessly controversial Knik Arm Crossing from Anchorage to Point MacKenzie. First envisioned in 1923 by Alaska Railroad engineers looking for a more efficient route to Alaska's interior, the Alaska Legislature created the Knik Arm Bridge And Toll Authority (KABATA) in 2003, to develop a method of construction, financing, design, operation and maintenance of the bridge. In 2018, the Alaska Legislature included funding to restart the project, but the funding was vetoed by Governor Walker, and without funding, the project is effectively dormant for the foreseeable future.
What is not dormant, but vibrant and active, is the port at Point MacKenzie, which moves heavy industrial and bulk materials through Alaska and beyond with a barge dock, a deep draft dock, a 7,000 square foot terminal building, and a rail link to the main line of the Alaska Railroad. From the Port MacKenzie website: “We specialize in bulk commodities such as gravel, coal, wood chips, cement, etc. However, we have also shipped modular homes, oil field modules for the North Slope, logs, and heavy equipment. Most of our exports have gone to the North Slope, South Korea, Japan, and China.”
Photos:
1. Boats at waterfront of village of Knik, Alaska, June 1914. By James Lennox McPherson, a civil engineer for the Alaska Railroad Commission expedition. The A.E.C. had assigned McPherson to research the feasibility of building a branch railroad from Anchorage west to the mining districts on the Kuskokwim and Iditarod Rivers. [Wikimedia Commons]
2. Knik Arm, looking northeast from Point Mackenzie. [Helen Hegener/NLM]
3. “Seward’s Success,’ visionary city from Popular Science, March, 1970