Extremis

Yesterday I highlighted  Angle Inlet - the most northerly settlement in the forty eight contiguous states of America. Today I am heading further north - to Alaska in fact. That is where you will find the most northerly location in all of America. It is called Point Barrow and its co-ordinates are 71° 23′ 20″ N, 156° 28′ 45″ W.

Though it is a remote spot and pretty inhospitable in the depths of wintertime, the area had special significance to  indigenous Iñupiat  people for over a thousand years before Point Barrow was "discovered". It was named after Sir John Barrow, a senior figure in the British Admiralty. That was as recently as 1826.

Frederick Beechey named the headland on behalf of Sir John Barrow

At Point Barrow there are burial mounds and there have been other archaeological finds. Even today it remains a base for Inuit fishing and hunting trips. I am pleased to note that the nearby village of Barrow had its name changed back to Utqiagvik in 2016.

How audacious and disrespectful  it was for European newcomers to ignore indigenous place names in past times. Not just on the northern shores of Alaska but elsewhere in the world from New Zealand  to South Africa.

Finally - and this is totally unrelated - my Citroen 2CV picture came fourth in the picture of the week competition over at Geograph and my image of the old windmill in a sea of flowering rapeseed came second. So near and yet so far - just like Point Barrow.

from Yorkshire Pudding https://ift.tt/pOisrYn