Council is an abandoned townsite in the Nome Census Area

Nome Census Area, Alaska

Nome Census Area is a census area located in the state of Alaska, United States. As of the 2000 census, the population was 9,196. It is part of the unorganized borough and therefore has no borough seat. Its largest community by far is the city of Nome....

 in the U.S. state

U.S. state

A U.S. state is any one of the 50 federated states of the United States of America that share sovereignty with the federal government. Because of this shared sovereignty, an American is a citizen both of the federal entity and of his or her state of domicile. Four states use the official title of...

 of Alaska

Alaska

Alaska is the largest state in the United States by area. It is situated in the northwest extremity of the North American continent, with Canada to the east, the Arctic Ocean to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the west and south, with Russia further west across the Bering Strait...

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Geography

Council is located at about 64°53′42"N 163°40′35"W , about 57 miles east by northeast of Nome

Nome, Alaska

Nome is a city in the Nome Census Area in the Unorganized Borough of the U.S. state of Alaska, located on the southern Seward Peninsula coast on Norton Sound of the Bering Sea. According to the 2010 Census, the city population was 3,598. Nome was incorporated on April 9, 1901, and was once the...

. It is located on the banks of the Niukluk River on the central Seward Peninsula

Seward Peninsula

The Seward Peninsula is a large peninsula on the western coast of the U.S. state of Alaska. It projects about into the Bering Sea between Norton Sound, the Bering Strait, the Chukchi Sea, and Kotzebue Sound, just below the Arctic Circle...

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History

Council was built in 1897 and 1898 when gold was discovered near the Ophir Creek. Council may have had had as many as 15,000 inhabitants during those years. The residents left after larger discoveries of gold near Nome around 1900. Council has about 25 old buildings and much old mining equipment, including a dredge, laying about. During the summer, Council is used as a fish camp and a recreational location for residents of Nome and White Mountain.

Council is connected to Nome by a gravel road, the Nome-Council Road. Council is the nearest site to Nome that has trees, and some Nome residents cut spruce trees at Council for use as Christmas trees.

A second, larger, dredge is located at 15 Mile Camp on Ophir Creek. There are several mine buildings on the site, including a powerhouse with a moderate diameter Pelton (undershot) waterwheel. A number of new buildings have been added in recent years, mostly for summer second-home usage. Occasionally one or two people winter at Council. In the Fall of 2004 the telephone lines which had not been used since a brief period of re-habitation in the 1970s were removed by the utility. Utility poles remain in place with wires connecting to a defunct power plant from the same period.

There is one bed and breakfast operating in summer at Council, used heavily by government survey crews.