America's last true frontier, Alaska is, by a very wide margin, the largest of
the 50 states. The next competitor for the title,
Texas, is less than half its size. If it were
overlaid over the contiguous 48 states
, then Anchorage, its largest city, would be in Missouri; Barrow, its northernmost town, would be in Minnesota; Ketchikan, its southernmost, would be in Florida; Nome would be in South Dakota; Juneau, the state capital, would be in Georgia; and the Aleutian Islands would stretch all the way into
California. Bottom line: Alaska is flippin'
huge.
But Alaska is also very sparsely populated. As of the 2010 census, there were just over 710,000 people living in Alaska, making the state the fourth least-populated in the nation – ahead of only North Dakota, Vermont and Wyoming. Please note that this is
after a huge population surge (with many immigrants coming in from Washington, Oregon, and California for economic opportunities) – in the 2000 and 1990 Censuses, Alaska was firmly the second-smallest state by population, just barely ahead of Wyoming. More than half of those people live in only one tiny corner of the state: the Anchorage metropolitan area. The state has, by far, the lowest population density in the country. Part of this likely has to do with the fact that most of Alaska is either
frozen tundra or forbidding mountains, something of an American version of Siberia, with only the coastal regions in the south being really hospitable.
note Although in the future, Global Warming may push the line between "cold" and "oh god this is fuckin' freezing!" further north, making the state more welcoming to new arrivals. The lowest temperature ever recorded in the US, -80 degrees
Fahrenheit, was taken in Prospect Creek, Alaska.
Alaska was the first place in the Americas that human beings laid eyes on, as the last ice age lowered sea levels enough so that a land bridge, known as Beringia, formed between Alaska and Siberia.
note The remnants of this bridge are the Bering Sea Islands of St. Lawrence, Nunivak, and the Diomedes. The people who crossed Beringia are the ancestors of all the aboriginal tribes of North and South America, from
the Iroquois and the Sioux to
the Aztecs and the Inca. Some of them, of course, stayed in Alaska, living off the ample supplies of fish in the waters off the state's long coastline. Collectively, they are known as the Alaska Natives, a group that encompasses the Tlingit, the Haida, the Tsimshian, the Aleut, the Yupik, the Alutiiq, the Gwich'in, and the Inuit.
The first Europeans to lay eyes on Alaska were the Russians in 1741, who colonized it for the same reason that everybody else in Europe wanted a piece of the Americas: getting rich. Specifically, the Russians were there for the fur trade, and claimed an area that includes much of the
Pacific Northwest. As the US and Canada expanded west, the Russian claims were pushed back to the present-day area of Alaska. The colony was never very profitable for Russia, and was increasingly under pressure from Canada and its British protectors, so when the Americans came knocking at their door in 1867 asking to buy it from them for the
cool sum of $7.2 million, the Russians were happy to oblige. The purchase of Alaska was highly controversial initially, with many people calling it "Seward's Folly" or "Seward's Icebox" (after Secretary of State William H. Seward, the man who organized the purchase) and viewing it as a worthless wasteland that America would find no better use for than Russia did.
In time, however, America would soon realize just what a great deal it had gotten. Some 30 years after the purchase, a series of gold rushes in both Alaska and, more importantly, in the neighboring Yukon Territory of Canada
note despite most of the gold being in Canadian territory, the easiest way to get there was by boat, followed by a relatively short over-land trek; this meant the majority of prospectors had to start in Alaska, and it made Skagway into a boom-town, turned the area into
The Wild West on ice!, allowing it to gain enough people to be incorporated as a territory in 1912. After that, the Aleutian Islands were the site of a few minor battles during
World War II (and the only part of the United States to be
invaded during the war).
Alaska's true value, however, was completely unforeseeable to the 19th-century Americans, and only became obvious in the late 1940s: ladies and gentlemen, imagine
Soviet Alaska. The West really dodged a bullet on that one, no? Anyway, with the onset of the
Cold War, Alaska became the cornerstone of America's defense against
Soviet bombers. The two wars, and the resulting military investment, caused a population surge in Alaska, allowing it to be inaugurated as the 49th state in 1959, followed by
Hawaii a few months later.
* Fun Fact: the reason the two states weren't admitted at the same time is apparently because, since the U.S. flag can only be officially changed on July 4th, flag-makers wanted to be able to have one year of selling 49-star flags – thus Alaska was admitted before the 4th and Hawaii after.note If only it had come in before Oklahoma and Arizona. Then it could've been called "AK-47"!
The two moments that defined Alaska's modern existence were the discovery of oil in Prudhoe Bay in 1968, and the completion of the Alaskan Pipeline in 1977 to bring that oil to the rest of the country. Oil money sent Alaska from a backwater to one of the richest states in America, and the state has set up a permanent fund to invest some of its oil revenue for the benefit of the people. Every Alaskan receives a dividend (of varying amounts-2011 was $1281; 2012 was $878), meaning that a family of four has a guaranteed welfare check of about $5000... which just about makes up for the substantially higher cost of living. While it's gotten better in Anchorage and, to a lesser extent, Fairbanks, prices for basic goods are still ridiculously expensive in most of the state, due to the isolation of many towns and the harsh conditions making freight transport
quite difficult.
And now, for the part you've been waiting for.
Sarah Palin. Yes, she was one of the previous governors.
Now let's limit discussion about her, okay?
Some fun facts:
- The capital of Alaska, Juneau, is the only state capital located on an international border (the Canadian border, not the Russian one),note Currently, that is; for a few years in the 1830s and 40s, the capital of Michigan was in Detroit, also on the border with (then-British) Canada; this was moved for reasons of logistics and fear of British invasion. and is one of the state capitals that cannot be accessed by land*
Honolulu, Hawaii's capital, is the other, of course
. To reach Juneau, you must fly or take a boat in.
- Considering that Juneau is many hundreds of miles from Anchorage and its environs (the state's major population center), along with the whole can't-drive-there thing making access very inconvenient, there have naturally been several votes to move the state's capital to either Anchorage or some town close to it. The capital remains in Juneau, however, because no one is willing to pay the extra taxes it would take to relocate the government.note Some of Alaska's state agencies are already headquartered in Anchorage for convenience, but many of the most important ones are not. Moving involves more than just telling the governor and elected officials to meet elsewhere; there are innumerable files and archives, computer servers, and equipment that would have to be moved, to say nothing of relocating the workers and building new facilities to house it all. Plus, the people would surely want a proper statehouse (Alaska's legislature currently meets in a disused bank). Doing all of that would cost hundreds of millions of dollars, so nobody wants to foot the bill.
- It is true that, in much of the state, nighttime can go for several weeks in the winter, and daylight can do the same in the summer. However, "six months of light, six months of darkness" is something of an overstatement. In Barrow, which is basically the worst-case scenario, the sun doesn't officially rise between about November 20 and January 20. However, locals still get about three hours of twilight per day. The opposite is true around the summer solstice, where even in Anchorage the sun doesn't completely vanish from view for several weeks.
- Alaska has more registered pilots per capita than any other state. In a place where the drivability of the roads is often in doubt, and some places just don't have roads, and still other places are islands, this is very much justified.
- On a related note, the terrain in southwestern Alaska is so unpredictable that delivery service to the villages is often conducted by hovercraft.
- Unlike the other 49 states, not all of Alaska is organized into counties (or "parishes" as in Louisiana, or "boroughs" as in Alaska itself). In the "unorganized borough" covering more than half the state, the only local services are municipalities and school boards, with everything else handled directly by the state or by the tribal government.
- The tallest mountain in North America, Mt. McKinley (or Denali), is in Alaska. This mountain incidentally has one the tallest base-to-summit heights in the world (Everest, for one, may have a much higher summit, but its base does not begin until at least 15,000' above sea level).
- There is a town west of Fairbanks called North Pole, which is the official-unofficial place the United States Postal Service sends all the childrens' letters to Santa Claus. Incidentally, it is nowhere near Barrow, the American town closest to the actual north pole.
Alaska in popular culture:
Comic Books
Film
Literature
- A lot of Jack London's stories, such as Call of the Wild, White Fang, and Batard, take place in Alaska.
- Into The Wild.
- In Twilight, the Cullens are stated to have lived in Alaska before moving down to Forks.
- Julie Of The Wolves.
- The 2009 short story "New Archangel" by Desmond Warzel takes place in Sitka at various points in Alaskan history.
- In The Heroes of Olympus, it is literally "the land beyond the gods." It is also where the titan Alcyoneus has his lair.
- The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon is set in an Alternate History where, during World War II, the US settled Jewish refugees from Europe in Sitka, Alaska, turning it into an autonomous state for sixty years. By the present day of 2007, the lease is about to expire, with the evangelical US president hoping to resettle the Sitka Jews in Palestine.
Live-Action TV
- Northern Exposure.
- Sarah Palin's Alaska.
- In The Event, the government is holding the aliens at a secret base in northern Alaska.
- Deadliest Catch.
- Seasons 3 and 4 of Ice Road Truckers.
- Flying Wild Alaska
- The X-Files has the season 1 episode "Ice", and homage to The Thing (1982) takes place in isolated Alaska.
- Will Riker was (will be?) born in Valdez, Alaska (in the year 2338).
- An episode of River Monsters took place in Alaska, even had a rather unnerving run-in with a grizzly.
- Gold Rush
- Ax Men features one crew harvesting timber on several different islands in Southeast Alaska in seasons 4 and 5.
- Alaska State Troopers, a program similar to COPS is naturally set in Alaska
- In Season 3 of Malcolm in the Middle, older brother Francis emancipates himself from the military academy, in order to work in a mining camp somewhere in the wilds of Alaska. The rest of the season is spent with him trying to escape the indentured servitude he so willingly threw himself into.
Music
- Folk singer-songwriter Jewel is from the town of Homer. (She wasn't born in Alaska, but then again, not many of its residents are.)
- Marian Call makes her home in Alaska (though, like Jewel, was not born there). Very much One of Us, as her music usually contains themes from geek culture, especially from her album Got To Fly (which even has a Nerd Anthem).
Video Games
- In the Fallout universe, Red China invades Alaska for its increasingly valuable oil supplies, precipitating World War III between them and the US. The Fallout 3 DLC Operation Anchorage allows you to play a virtual reality simulation of the US Army's liberation of Anchorage.
- In the Soviet campaign of Command and Conquer: Red Alert 2, the Allies make their Last Stand at Point Hope, Alaska.
- Abigail Black from Clive Barkers Jericho is from Fairbanks.
- In Shattered Union, the Russians invade Alaska after the US collapses. The final mission, after you reunite America, has you invading Alaska to drive out the Russians. Despite it being the largest map in the game, it still only covers roughly a fifth of the state.
- In Metal Gear Solid, Shadow Moses Island is located in the Aleutians while Solid Snake lives near Twin Lakes.
Web Original
- The Memetic Mutation "series of tubes" came from a gaffe made by Alaskan Senator Ted Stevens, who has an airport named after him in Anchorage.
Western Animation
- In the Futurama movie, Bender's Game, Mom has a dark matter mine operating out of Alaska.
- It is implied later that Mom hails from Alaska (although she sounds nothing like it).
- On an episode of Ugly Americans, Leonard briefly works in a cannery in Alaska.
, then Anchorage, its largest city, would be in Missouri; Barrow, its northernmost town, would be in Minnesota; Ketchikan, its southernmost, would be in Florida; Nome would be in South Dakota; Juneau, the state capital, would be in Georgia; and the Aleutian Islands would stretch all the way into California. Bottom line: Alaska is flippin' huge.
But Alaska is also very sparsely populated. As of the 2010 census, there were just over 710,000 people living in Alaska, making the state the fourth least-populated in the nation – ahead of only North Dakota, Vermont and Wyoming. Please note that this is after a huge population surge (with many immigrants coming in from Washington, Oregon, and California for economic opportunities) – in the 2000 and 1990 Censuses, Alaska was firmly the second-smallest state by population, just barely ahead of Wyoming. More than half of those people live in only one tiny corner of the state: the Anchorage metropolitan area. The state has, by far, the lowest population density in the country. Part of this likely has to do with the fact that most of Alaska is either frozen tundra or forbidding mountains, something of an American version of Siberia, with only the coastal regions in the south being really hospitable.note The lowest temperature ever recorded in the US, -80 degrees Fahrenheit, was taken in Prospect Creek, Alaska.
Alaska was the first place in the Americas that human beings laid eyes on, as the last ice age lowered sea levels enough so that a land bridge, known as Beringia, formed between Alaska and Siberia.note The people who crossed Beringia are the ancestors of all the aboriginal tribes of North and South America, from the Iroquois and the Sioux to the Aztecs and the Inca. Some of them, of course, stayed in Alaska, living off the ample supplies of fish in the waters off the state's long coastline. Collectively, they are known as the Alaska Natives, a group that encompasses the Tlingit, the Haida, the Tsimshian, the Aleut, the Yupik, the Alutiiq, the Gwich'in, and the Inuit.
The first Europeans to lay eyes on Alaska were the Russians in 1741, who colonized it for the same reason that everybody else in Europe wanted a piece of the Americas: getting rich. Specifically, the Russians were there for the fur trade, and claimed an area that includes much of the Pacific Northwest. As the US and Canada expanded west, the Russian claims were pushed back to the present-day area of Alaska. The colony was never very profitable for Russia, and was increasingly under pressure from Canada and its British protectors, so when the Americans came knocking at their door in 1867 asking to buy it from them for the cool sum of $7.2 million, the Russians were happy to oblige. The purchase of Alaska was highly controversial initially, with many people calling it "Seward's Folly" or "Seward's Icebox" (after Secretary of State William H. Seward, the man who organized the purchase) and viewing it as a worthless wasteland that America would find no better use for than Russia did.
In time, however, America would soon realize just what a great deal it had gotten. Some 30 years after the purchase, a series of gold rushes in both Alaska and, more importantly, in the neighboring Yukon Territory of Canadanote turned the area into The Wild West on ice!, allowing it to gain enough people to be incorporated as a territory in 1912. After that, the Aleutian Islands were the site of a few minor battles during World War II (and the only part of the United States to be invaded during the war).
Alaska's true value, however, was completely unforeseeable to the 19th-century Americans, and only became obvious in the late 1940s: ladies and gentlemen, imagine Soviet Alaska. The West really dodged a bullet on that one, no? Anyway, with the onset of the Cold War, Alaska became the cornerstone of America's defense against Soviet bombers. The two wars, and the resulting military investment, caused a population surge in Alaska, allowing it to be inaugurated as the 49th state in 1959, followed by Hawaii a few months later.* note
The two moments that defined Alaska's modern existence were the discovery of oil in Prudhoe Bay in 1968, and the completion of the Alaskan Pipeline in 1977 to bring that oil to the rest of the country. Oil money sent Alaska from a backwater to one of the richest states in America, and the state has set up a permanent fund to invest some of its oil revenue for the benefit of the people. Every Alaskan receives a dividend (of varying amounts-2011 was $1281; 2012 was $878), meaning that a family of four has a guaranteed welfare check of about $5000... which just about makes up for the substantially higher cost of living. While it's gotten better in Anchorage and, to a lesser extent, Fairbanks, prices for basic goods are still ridiculously expensive in most of the state, due to the isolation of many towns and the harsh conditions making freight transport quite difficult.
And now, for the part you've been waiting for. Sarah Palin. Yes, she was one of the previous governors. Now let's limit discussion about her, okay?
Some fun facts:
