Donald Trump Vows to Rename Mount Denali to its Previous Name, Mount McKinley

Here’s Why Trump Might Like William McKinley So Much

Denali National Park and Preserve, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

“They took his name off Mount McKinley. He was a great president,” My administration will bring back the name of Mount McKinley because I think he deserves it.” — Donald Trump

America’s highest mountain had a name before a gold prospector in 1896 decided to call it Mount McKinley after a presidential candidate he liked, William McKinley. The Koyukon people who inhabited the area around the mountain have referred to the peak as “Denali” for centuries. During the Russian ownership of Alaska, the mountain's common name was Bolshaya Gora, the Russian translation of Denali. It was briefly called Densmore’s Mountain in the late 1880s and early 1890s after Frank Densmore, a gold prospector who was the first non-native Alaskan to reach the mountain base.

The United States formally recognized the name Mount McKinley after President Wilson signed the Mount McKinley National Park Act of February 26, 1917. In 1965, Lyndon B. Johnson declared the north and south peaks of the mountain the “Churchill Peaks” in honor of British statesman Winston Churchill. The Alaska Board of…