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Zip Code:
Latitude / Longitude: 58° 2′ 57 N, 153° 3′ 9 W
Elevation:
Time Zone: Alaska (AKST) (UTC-9)
Established: 1930s
Disestablished:
Comments: Port Wakefield is a ghost town in the U.S. state of Alaska. It is located on the northeast coast of Raspberry Island in the Kodiak Archipelago, along the western shores of the Gulf of Alaska. The community was established in the 1930s by Lee Howard Wakefield as a herring reduction plant after he relocated the family’s salmon cannery business, Apex Fish Company, from Anacortes, Washington and renamed the company Wakefield Fisheries. Lee’s sons Howard, Lavern and Lowell began fishing for and processing experimentally for king crab in 1939.
Remains:
Current Status:
Remarks: Port Wakefield suffered badly in the 1964 Alaska earthquake and tsunami, when Raspberry Island subsided by as much as six feet. This was the most powerful recorded earthquake in North American history, and the third most powerful ever measured by seismograph; with a moment magnitude of 9.2 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI (Extreme). The town was not destroyed, but the cannery and community were no longer viable. The land was eventually purchased and is now used for tourism, as wilderness lodges.
