Hughes, AK

Perched on a bluff along the Koyukuk River in interior Alaska, Hughes is a tiny, tight-knit village of fewer than a hundred residents. The community began over a century ago as a riverboat supply stop for nearby gold fields, and daily life today still revolves closely around the water and the local K-12 Johnny Oldman School. Like many remote Interior settlements, Hughes is off the road system, offering a quiet, self-reliant way of life centered on subsistence hunting, fishing, and community tradition.