Mount Cooper and Lamplugh Glacier are a stunning sight at sunset.
NPS Photo/S. Schaller
Elevation: 6,753 feet (2,053 meters) In Glacier Bay there are many examples of how glaciers can change the land, as well as the plants and animals. The mountain towering above Lamplugh Glacier tells a story of how Glacier Bay can change people. The mountain is named Mt Cooper – for William Cooper, a scientist who first came here in 1916 not for glaciers, but to learn about the how life returns to a landscape covered by ice. After spending a few field seasons here he was amazed and awestruck by this wild intact landscape. He described it as a place where “Mountain, glacier, water, forest, and animal life combine to make an ensemble unexcelled”. He and the Ecological Society of America petitioned President Calvin Coolidge to make Glacier Bay part of the new National Park Service, as a National Monument in 1925. Glacier Bay continues to inspire scientists from all over the world as a living laboratory to learn about topics ranging from Climate Change to Harbor seals. It’s a rare intact ecosystem from which we can learn the processes of life.
