Mackenzie King Island
Encyclopedia
Mackenzie King Island is one of the Queen Elizabeth Islands
Queen Elizabeth Islands
The Queen Elizabeth Islands are the northernmost cluster of islands in the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, split between Nunavut and Northwest Territories in Northern Canada.-Geography:...

 in northern Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

. It lies north of Melville Island
Melville Island, Canada
Melville Island is a vast, uninhabited member of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago with an area of . It is the 33rd largest island in the world and Canada's eighth largest island. Melville Island is shared by the Northwest Territories, which is responsible for the western half of the island, and...

 and south of Borden Island
Borden Island
Borden Island is an uninhabited, low-lying island in the Queen Elizabeth Islands of northern Canada. With an area of in size, it is the 172nd largest island in the world, and Canada's 30th largest island...

, and like them is divided. Most of the island is in Northwest Territories
Northwest Territories
The Northwest Territories is a federal territory of Canada.Located in northern Canada, the territory borders Canada's two other territories, Yukon to the west and Nunavut to the east, and three provinces: British Columbia to the southwest, and Alberta and Saskatchewan to the south...

, while its easternmost portion lies in Nunavut
Nunavut
Nunavut is the largest and newest federal territory of Canada; it was separated officially from the Northwest Territories on April 1, 1999, via the Nunavut Act and the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement Act, though the actual boundaries had been established in 1993...

. The border runs along the 110th meridian west
110th meridian west
The meridian 110° west of Greenwich is a line of longitude that extends from the North Pole across the Arctic Ocean, North America, the Pacific Ocean, the Southern Ocean, and Antarctica to the South Pole....

.

Mackenzie King has an area of 5048 km² (1,949 sq mi), making it the 115th largest island in the world, and Canada's 26th largest island.

History

The first known visit to the island was by Vilhjalmur Stefansson
Vilhjalmur Stefansson
Vilhjalmur Stefansson was a Canadian Arctic explorer and ethnologist.-Early life:Stefansson, born William Stephenson, was born at Gimli, Manitoba, Canada, in 1879. His parents had emigrated from Iceland to Manitoba two years earlier...

 in 1915, and it was later named for William Lyon Mackenzie King
William Lyon Mackenzie King
William Lyon Mackenzie King, PC, OM, CMG was the dominant Canadian political leader from the 1920s through the 1940s. He served as the tenth Prime Minister of Canada from December 29, 1921 to June 28, 1926; from September 25, 1926 to August 7, 1930; and from October 23, 1935 to November 15, 1948...

.

Further reading

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