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Yukon River
Yukon River (formerly Lewes River) at Whitehorse, Yukon, Canada.
Lewes River
river, Canada
Lewes River, former name for the upper course of the Yukon River in Yukon, Canada. It flows from Tagish Lake on the British Columbia border northward through Lake Marsh past Whitehorse for about 340 miles (550 km) to join the Pelly River at Selkirk. A main artery for prospectors during gold-rush days, it was originally named in 1843 for John Lee Lewes, a Hudson’s Bay Company agent, and was renamed Yukon in the early 1950s.
This article was most recently revised and updated by Amy Tikkanen.
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