Dorothy G. Page

Who was Dorothy G. Page?

Dorothy G. Page was best known as "Mother of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race", the 1,049-mile dog sled race across the U.S. state of Alaska.

Page moved from New Mexico to Alaska in 1960. She became the president of the Wasilla-Knik Centennial Committee in 1966, and was in charge of coming up with an event to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the purchase of Alaska from Russia. In her own words, the self-described "history buff" wanted "a spectacular dog race to wake Alaskans up to what mushers and their dogs had done for Alaska."

Page saw her first dog sled race in 1960. At the time, nearly every household in the rural Alaska Bush and Interior had a team of sled dogs for transportation. During the 1960s snowmachines started to replace the dogs, which all but vanished. The historic Iditarod Trail that passed through both Wasilla and Knik was an ideal stage. Dog mushing had been the primary means of communication and transportation in the Bush and Interior by Alaska Natives for centuries; remained so for the Russian, American, and French Canadian fur trappers in the 19th century; and reached its peak during the gold rushes of the late 19th to early 20th centuries.