One of the better-preserved boomtowns of the Alaskan mining era, Eagle is a quaint hamlet of log cabins and clapboard houses, inhabited by friendly folks with a sense of history. Located at the north end of the Taylor Highway and just six miles west of the Canada/Alaska border, Eagle overlooks the Yukon River below Eagle Bluff and seems to have almost as many historical buildings as the 129 year-round residents.
Eagle is said to have the state's largest 'museum system,' boasting five restored turn-of-the-20th-century buildings. Most visitors see the buildings and learn the town's history through the Eagle Historical Society, which stages a three-hour town walking tour throughout the summer that includes Wickersham's Courthouse, Eagle City Hall, the Log Church, Fort Egbert, Redmen Hall, the Customs Building Museum and Amundsen Park, where a plaque commemorates explorer Roald Amundsen's visit.
Historically an important riverboat landing, Eagle is still a popular jumping-off point for Yukon River travelers. Summer float trips from Eagle downriver through the Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve to Circle are a popular activity. It can take anywhere from 5 to 10 days to cover the 154 river miles between Eagle and Circle. Many float the Yukon from Dawson City, Yukon to Circle, with Eagle a popular stop along the way. The Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve Visitor Center (907-547-2233) on the banks of the Yukon River is the best place for information on float trips in the 3,906-square-mile preserve.
The Athabascans established the original settlement, today called Eagle Village, long before Francois Mercier arrived in the early 1880s and built a trading post in the area. A permanent community of miners took up residence in 1898. A year later, the U.S. Army decided to move in and build a fort as part of its effort to maintain law and order in the Alaskan Interior. Judge James Wickersham established a federal court at Eagle in 1900, and the next year President Theodore Roosevelt issued a charter that made Eagle the first incorporated city of the Interior. Eagle reached its peak at the turn of the 20th century, when it boasted a population of more than 1,500 residents, some of whom went so far as to call their town the ”Paris of the North.”