Yesterday I spent an hour or so trying to get the header photo to look right on this blog, and this morning it still looks like the top of Denali is chopped off by the top of the frame. The specs call for an image 1440 x 600 pixels, which is what I put up there originally, but after several attempts the current image is around 1200 x 400 pixels and still doesn’t look right. I tried cropping the image, framing the image, reloading the page, and all the other tricks I’ve learned over the years to make technology cooperate, but the answer to this mystery still eludes me. So here is the image as it should appear:

This is one of my favorites by Alaskan artist Sydney Laurence, titled ‘Mount McKinley from the Rapids of the Tokositna River.’ This image is in the public domain.

The Tokositna River marks the southeast corner of Denali National Park, and this image of Denali as viewed from the hills above the rapids of the Tokositna River became Sydney Laurence’s trademark. He painted many different renditions of the view, and it is this image more than any other which personifies Laurence for his many admirers and collectors.

If you’d like to see this view for yourself, a friend of my mother’s, gold miner Dennis Garrett, has provided an excellent free online access guide to the area, which is off the Petersville Road northwest of Talkeetna: “A very nice trail takes off from here, and by following it for a mile or so, you can overlook the Tokositna Valley and Glacier, the Tokosha Mountains, and of course, Denali, the ‘Great One.’ (aka Mt. McKinley) In the 1920s, the world-renowned Alaskan artist Sydney Laurence painted from this vantage point.”