Cape Krusenstern National Monument

Cape Krusenstern National Monument in Detail.

Incomplete record. National Historic Landmark.

A series of 114 marine beach ridges, formed at an average of perhaps 60 years each since the time of the highest post-glacial sea level, the district contains the remains of peoples who have inhabited these beaches for 5,000 or more years. Adjacent to the ridges on unglaciated uplands in the Iguchuk Hills are surface deposits that extend the record backward to the time of the end of the Pleistocene. Cape Krusenstern beach ridges place in a broad, horizontal stratigraphy virtually all phases of cultural history known in northwest Alaska and have made possible the identification of several new phases previously unknown.