Alaska - Political   Capital Juneau Largest City Anchorage Major Cities Fairbanks, Nome, Ketchikan, Sitka, Barrow,Valdez, Dutch Harbor, Cordova Nicknames The Last Frontier, Land of the Midnight Sun Area 591,004 sq. miles Population 648,818

 

Alaska - Physical features   Mountain Ranges Brooks Range, Alaska Range, Aleutian Range, Kuskokwim Mts, Saint Elias Mts, Chugach Mts, Wrangell Mts, Coast Mountains, Coast Ranges Peaks Mt McKinley, Mt Shishaldin, Mt Pavlof, Mt Spurr, Mt Saint Elias, Mt Katmai, Novarupta Passes Chilkoot, White Bodies of Water Pacific Ocean, Gulf of Alaska, Prince William Sound, Norton Sound, Kotzebue Sound, Cook Inlet, Bristol Bay, Beaufort Sea, Arctic Ocean Lakes Lake Iliamna Straits Bering Strait, Shelikof Strait, Inside Passage Peninsulas Seward Peninsula, Kenai Peninsula, Alaska Peninsula Rivers Yukon, Kuskokwim, Colville, Copper, Matanuska, Tanana Highest Point Mt McKinley Islands Kodiak, Afognak, Saint Lawrence, Nunivak, Baranof, Chichagof, Kupreanof, Prince of Wales, Attu, Agattu, Kiska, Unimak, Umnak, Unalaska Borders Canada-Yukon Territory and British Columbia (east) National Parks Gates of the Arctic National Park, Kobuk Valley National Park, Wrangell-St Elias, Kenai Fjords National Park, Lake Clark National Park, Glacier Bay National Park, Katmai National Park, Denali National Park Key Products Petroleum, Fishing, Forestry, Tourism Natural Resources Timber

 

Alaska - History   1741 Vitus Bering, a Danish explorer working for the Russians, discovers Alaska. 1867 Secretary of State William Seward purchases Alaska at 3 cents and acre, which is critisized heavily by many as "Seward’s Folly", or "Seward’s Icebox." 1897 Gold was discovered near Klondike, in the Yukon Territory of Canada, thus beginning the Klondike Gold Rush. 1964 The most powerful earthquake in US History, 9.2 magnitude on the Richter Scale, strikes Anchorage, sending a killer tsunami wave that reached Hawaii. 1968 Oil discovered near Prudhoe Bay. 1977 Trans-Alaska pipeline completed, transporting oil from Prudhoe Bay to the southern ice-free port of Valdez. 1989 The Exxon Valdez oil spill had a massive impact on the US economy. Present Day "The Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes", an area of active volcanoes, is located in Katmai NP.

 

Alaska - Facts   Tongass National Forest, which covers the southern half of the Alaska Panhandle, is the largest national forest in the United States. Alaska has a higher percentage of Native Americans in its population than any other state. (Note: This includes native Alaskan populations like the Aleut, Inuit, and Yupik.) The Alaska Highway runs from Dawson Creek, British Columbia, Canada to Fairbanks, Alaska’s largest interior city. Alaska has a higher number of lakes than any other state, Lake Iliamna being the largest. The Pribilof Islands in the Bering Sea are well-noted as a source for sealskins. Wrangell-Saint Elias NP is the largest national park in the United States by land area and contains its second highest peak- Mt. St. Elias at 18,008 feet (5,489 meters) Alaska has the longest coastline.