'TELEPHONE HILL - The City and Borough of Juneau

TELEPHONE HILL SITE DESCRIPTION
Telephone Hill encompasses 4.66 .acres within the townsite of Juneau.
This
conspi cuous promontory is located on the southern portion of the area
formerl y
known by local residents as Court House Hill. The site lies south of Third
Stree.t andi sbordered by Main Street and Willoughby Avenue.
The upper portion,
north of Third. Street, was once the .location of the G.overnment Court House until.
the late 1960s. Today the State Office Building occupies the site. While the
hill has undergone many name changes .throughout its 100-year history, the names
reflect various activities unique to the site (Heery 1983).
United States Navy Commander Henry.G.lass chose the hill as a site for a
military barracks in 1881". Glass sent Lt. Commander C.H. Rockwell to construct
buildings for a. garrison where "enlisted men
order in the new mining district would live.'
responsible for maintaining law and
The land was declared an official
government reserve. and the site utilized for one year•.
But after that year,
Naval .. officials decided Juneau residents could be monitored from naval vessels
and chose to vacate the military site (DeArmond 1967).
During the 1880s, cit.izens ref.erred to the area as Chicken Ridge due to the
ease of hunting fowl.. A portion of Juneau continues to carry that name. Other
names associated with the site during this period include Navy Hill, Telegraph
Hi 11 and Knob Hi 11 .
Twelve years after the Navy's occupation of the government reserve,
construction of the f i rs t Government Court House in Juneau prompted the name
change to Court House or Government Hill. The wood building caught fire in
1898, and $50,000 was quickly appropriated for a new court house. By 1904 a new
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