There's a place in Alaska that only a few brave people will ever visit. It's known as the "the city under one roof."
There are different degrees of adventurous people. There is the most mild of adventurers, the traveler, who enjoys exploring exotic lands. Then there’s the short-term adventurer, the daredevil, who gets their kicks from quick adrenaline rushes brought on by jumping out of planes and swimming with alligators. Then you have your true swashbuckler — a person who, like a pirate, makes adventure their lifestyle.
And then there are the folks who are brave in their bones — those who don't give a second thought to living in relative isolation in one of the most remote parts of the United States. Those folks live in Whittier, AK — a town that exists inside of one 14-story building.
Inside this building there is a police department, a post office, a grocery store, a church, and a population of 200. In order to get to this town, which is 60 miles outside of Anchorage, you need to use its only road — a 2.5-mile-long, single-lane railroad tunnel that cuts through the middle of a mountain and only allows traffic through twice an hour for 15 minutes…on a good day. Whittier is also prone to earthquakes and its wind is so strong that it’s been known to shatter windshields and bend car doors in half.
Begich Towers (or BTI, as the residents call it) is the name of the building which houses the town. The U.S. Army built the concrete condo in the ’50s for officers and their families, and the Alaskan locale was chosen for very strategic reasons. Whittier has a deepwater port, which never freezes, and its terrible weather creates an almost never-ending cloud cover, which kept it hidden from enemy aircraft looming overhead.
But why, years later, do people still live in this town?
Photographer Reed Young and writer Erin Sheehy went to Whittier in 2012. This is what they discovered…
This is Begich Towers in the town of Whittier, AK.
Though residents have cheered up the building by adding fresh coats of paint, the inside still has the feel of a military facility.
Although 200 people live in tight quarters in a concrete building, the views of the surrounding environment are quite breathtaking.
In fact, in the summer you can see whales in the harbor and mountain goats nibbling on grass. But that’s not why June Miller, who runs a bed and breakfast inside of the building, keeps a pair of binoculars on her windowsill. It’s actually for spying.
“These are for finding out if your husband’s at the bar!” she told Erin Sheehy. Along with a school, the local inn/bar are some of the only other structures in the area.
The residents have many creature comforts inside the building, including a grocery store.
Kozy Korner Store is on the ground floor.
The Church.
Pastor Kevin Jones wanted to spread his Southern Baptist beliefs in Alaska and ended up in Whittier. He baptizes some former Catholics in the town with the aid of an inflatable pool that he sets up in the middle of his church because the nearby harbor is too cold.
There's also a playground.
The school is a structure outside of Begich Towers but, because of extreme weather conditions, an underground tunnel connects the two. Inside the school, there is an indoor playground.
And a community garden.
Joey Lipscomb, a teenage boy, runs a hydroponic garden. The police department donated the natural spectrum grow lights — which people sometimes sit under during the bleakest of days — after a marijuana bust occurred on the 10th floor.
You can even have healthy teeth and gums…at least part of the year.
Dr. Michael Costa and Erik Linduska, a dental health aide, travel between Alaskan villages through out the year.
"The city under one roof" is protected by a police department.
Don’t mess with Dave Schofield, the chief of police in Whittier.
This woman owns two reindeer that live outside of the "town within four walls."
Brenda Tolman isn’t only known for her resident reindeer, she’s also a talented craftswoman who sells her wares like dolls, jewelry, and wood carvings to tourists during the summer.
This girl's family moved from Guam to Whittier.
Lucky Medez, a teenage girl, dreams of moving to Anchorage.
“In Guam, I used to sneak out of the house, so my dad moved us to the perfect place,” she told Erin Sheehy.
And though Begich Towers is a self-functioning town, not every resident of Whittier lives inside the building.
Ed Hedges lives on a 28-foot sailboat with his cat. You can live in the harbor in Whittier because it’s so deep that the water never freezes, but in order to do this you have to be selected from a waiting list…which can take 10–20 years.
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