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Discover the Past.  Share the Future

The Iditarod National Historic Trail

Before Seward was founded in 1903, there were trails from Resurrection Bay to the gold towns of Hope and Sunrise on Turnagain Arm and into the Susitna District.  What we know today as the Iditarod Trail began in 1908 when the Alaska Road Commission surveyed a trail from Seward to Nome to provide a more direct winter mail route.

After the discovery of gold in the Iditarod country on Christmas Day in 1908, the Road Commission had a trail from Nome to Iditarod to Seward cleared and marked during the winter of 1910-1911.  The Trail was heavily used until the 1920s, when mining declined and the airplane began to replace the dog team.  

A renewed interest in the old trail was developed in 1973 with the first running of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race from Anchorage to Nome.  This annual race commemorates the important role sled dogs played in opening the frontier in Alaska.  In 1978, the Iditarod Trail was declared a National Historic Trail.

The Iditarod National Historic Trail, Inc.

The Iditarod National Historic Trail, Inc. was formed as a non-profit corporation in November 1998.  It's goals are:

• Promote appropriate multi-use recreational activities along the trail.

• Establish, maintain, and preserve the trail system and related historic sites.

• Mark the historic trail.

• Promote the acquisition and retention of rights-of-way.

• Support and encourage existing and new Trail Blazer Chapters and other organizations which subscribe to these purposes.  

• Provide educational information about the trail system.

• Assist the Bureau of Land Management and other land management entities in the implementation of the Iditarod Management Plan.

• Preserve the history of the trail by setting up historical archives, doing historical research, and taping oral histories.

The Iditarod National Historic Trail, Inc. Board of Directors consists of eleven members:  one from each of the five regions that make up the trail, five at-large positions, and one representative from the Iditarod Trail Committee (the organizing body of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race).

Click Here to Become a Member of the Iditarod National Historic Trail

For More Information, visit the Iditarod National Historic Trail, Inc. website at:
www.iditarodhistorictrail.org