Driving Alaska's Haul Road, circa 1978

An interview with truck driver Arlo Wells plays over scenes of him driving Alaska's Dalton Highway, then known as the "Haul Road," in about 1978. Construction of the 414-mile road, built to serve the trans-Alaska oil pipeline and North Slope oilfields, was completed on September 29, 1974. The road celebrates its 50th year in 2024 (Color/Sound/U-matic videotape).
The Alyeska Pipeline Service Company funded the first stretch of road from Livengood (80 miles north of Fairbanks) to the Yukon River in 1969. The remainder of the road to Prudhoe Bay on Alaska's North Slope was finished in a flurry of activity over a five-month period in 1974. In 1979, Alyeska turned control of the road over to the State of Alaska, and it was later officially named the "James W. Dalton Highway" after an engineer involved in early oil exploration on the North Slope. In 1981, the highway was partially opened to the public, and in 1994, access to the entire length of the highway was granted to the public.
This sequence is from AAF-3632 from the Alaska Review collection held by the Alaska Film Archives, a unit of the Alaska and Polar Regions Collections & Archives Department in the Elmer E. Rasmuson Library, University of Alaska Fairbanks. For more information please contact the Alaska Film Archives.
These scenes and interview were recorded for use in "Alaska Review" episode 14, about the Haul Road. Airing from 1976 to 1987, Alaska Review was the first statewide public affairs television program in Alaska. The show was designed to explore public policy issues confronting Alaska, and to assist citizens in making decisions about the future of their land. Produced by Independent Public Television, Inc., (IPTV), the series eventually consisted of 16 one-hour shows, 46 half-hour shows, and one three-hour special broadcast. Funded through the Alaska Humanities Forum and State of Alaska, the series won multiple awards for public service and educational programming. IPTV dissolved in 1988. Videotapes for all finished productions and raw footage were later moved to the University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF), where they became housed with the Alaska Film Archives, a unit of the Alaska and Polar Regions Collections & Archives department in the Rasmuson Library at UAF, shortly after the unit was founded in 1993. The Alaska Film Archives is currently seeking funding to preserve and digitize all of the original full interviews gathered in the making of the Alaska Review series. Copies of finished productions are also held by Alaska State Library Historical Collections in Juneau.
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