60 Amazing and Interesting Facts about Alaska | Amazing Facts 4U
- The fact is nearly one-third of Alaska lies within the Arctic Circle.
- Europeans first discovered Alaska in 1741, when Danish explorer Vitus Bering sighted it on his long voyage from Siberia. The first settlement in Alaska was established by Russian whalers and fur traders on Kodiak Island in 1784.
- The amazing fact is that in 1867, U.S. Secretary of State William H. Seward bought Alaska from Russia for just $7,200,000. That works out to a mere 2 cents per acre. When adjusted for inflation, is $118 million which is nearly $2.5 million less than what Real Madrid paid for Cristiano Ronaldo.
- The fact is from 1787 through 1912, the US never went more than 15 years without adding a state. Then 47 years passed before Alaska joined the union and the US is now in the longest period in US history without a state being added (55 years).
- The Alaskan Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) of 1971 remains the most extensive compensation to any Native people in the history of the United States giving Alaska’s aboriginal groups 40 million acres of traditional use lands, plus a billion dollars to be divided among them.
- During the Klondike gold rush in 1897, potatoes were so amazingly valued for their vitamin C content, that miners traded gold for them.
- The fact is Alaska is by far the largest state in the union having a population of 7,10,000 (1/5 area of the entire USA) and is over twice the size of Texas the next largest. From north to south Alaska is approximately 1,400 miles long and 2,700 miles wide from west to east.
- Juneau, Alaska, with over 3,000 square miles within its boundaries, has the largest area of any North American city. The North Slope Borough, at 88,000 square miles is the largest municipally governed entity in the world.
- Amazingly Alaska is as big as England, France, Italy, and Spain combined.
- It’s amazing that of the 20 highest peaks in the United States, 17 are in Alaska, including the highest peak in North America (20,320 ft. above sea level), Mt. McKinley.
- There are more than 3,000 rivers and an amazing 3 million lakes in Alaska.
- The amazing fact is that Alaska has more coastline than the rest of the United States combined (over 34,000 miles). Alaska is the only state to have coastlines on three different seas: the Arctic Ocean, Pacific Ocean, and the Bering Sea.
- Turnagain Arm, an Alaskan fjord along the southern boundary of Chugach State Park, has one of the highest tidal variations in the world at 32 feet (10 m).
- More than half the world’s active glaciers are in Alaska (About 1,00,000). In fact, about 5 percent of Alaska is covered by glaciers.
- Alaska has the lowest population density in the nation at 1.2 people per square mile. Amazingly if New York City had the same population density as Alaska, only 20 people would be living in Manhattan.
- It’s amazing that Juneau has no road access to the rest of the state! It is the only capital city in the United States accessible only by boat or plane. It is also the largest U.S. city covering 3,108 square miles. Only 20 percent of Alaska is accessible by road.
- The world’s largest and busiest seaplane base in Anchorage’s Lake Hood and it accommodates more than 800 takeoffs and landings on a peak summer day.
- Alaska is the most popular state for flying in the U.S. One of every 58 Alaskans is a registered pilot owning a plane.
- Every year Alaska hosts the 1,200 mile-long Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race from Anchorage to Nome, often called the “Last great race on Earth.”
- The amazing fact is that Alaska is the only state that does not collect state sales tax or levy an individual income tax.
- The highest temperature recorded in Alaska was 100 degrees Fahrenheit in Fort Yukon in 1915 while the lowest temperature recorded in Alaska was -80 degrees Fahrenheit at Prospect Creek Camp in 1971.
- Amazingly Alaska accounts for 25% of the oil produced in the United States.
- In 1968, a large oil and gas reservoir near Prudhoe Bay on the Arctic Coast was found. The Prudhoe Bay reservoir, with an estimated recoverable 10 billion barrels of oil and 27 trillion cubic feet of gas, is twice as large as any other oil field in North America.
- Alaska is the only U.S. state to produce platinum. Half a million ounces have been mined from southwestern Alaska since the first platinum nugget was discovered there by an Eskimo named Walter Smith in 1926.
- The amazing fact is that the town of Talkeetna in Alaska has had a cat named Stubbs as mayor for 15 years.
- The Red Dog zinc mine in northwest Alaska is the world’s largest zinc producer.
- Northern lights (Aurora Borealis) can be seen an average of 243 days a year in Fairbanks. The northern lights are produced by charged electrons and protons striking the earth’s upper atmosphere.
- During WWII, the Japanese invaded Alaska, and more Americans were killed or wounded defending Alaska than at Pearl Harbor.
- Amazing thing is that there is a pizza place in Alaska that delivers by plane.
- Alaska is the only US state name that you can type on one row of a keyboard.
- In the United States, Alaska is the state that is farthest north, east, and west (due to the fact that the Aleutian Islands cross the 180° meridian of longitude).
- Because of mainland Alaska’s one time zone, northwest Alaska experiences two sunsets in one calendar day around August 8th.
- An amazing fact is in 1958, Alaska was hit with a mega-tsunami that measured 1720 feet tall, taller than the Empire State Building.
- The 1964 earthquake in Alaska was so big that water sloshed in wells in Africa. It had a magnitude of 9.2, making it the second-largest earthquake in recorded history.
- Amazingly until 1986, you didn’t even need to buy property in Alaska. You could build a house and it would have been yours.
- Alaska has the longest salmon run in the world which is amazing 2,000 miles up the Yukon River.
- Admiralty Island Monument, part of Tongass National Forest, has the greatest known concentration of bald eagles in the world, averaging more than one nest per mile of coastline in Seymour Canal. It also has about 6,000 grizzly bears outnumbering Admiralty’s human inhabitants nearly three to one.
- The amazing fact is there is a species of frog in Alaska that freezes during the winter and while frozen, the frog stops breathing, its heart stops beating, its blood stops flowing, and it cannot move. However, when spring arrives, the frog’s body thaws and the frog returns to normal life.
- Tongass National Forest is the largest national forest in the United States.
- Comparing the population of bears in Alaska, there is 1 bear for every 21 people.
- Beach sand ridges at Alaska’s Cape Krusenstern National Monument, deposited by the ocean over time, curve in graceful arcs parallel to the Chukchi Sea and hide archaeological site having 114 ridges containing artifacts from every known Eskimo occupation of North America in chronological order, dating from 6000 BC.
- Amazingly while it is legal to shoot bears in Alaska, waking a sleeping bear for the purpose of taking a photograph is prohibited.
- The fact is Alaska’s closest point to Russia is Little Diomede Island, located in the Bering Strait between the Alaska mainland and Siberia. Big Diomede, Russia is only 2.4 miles from Little Diomede, Alaska.
- Barrow, 800 miles south of the North Pole, has the longest and shortest day. When the sun rises on May 10, it doesn’t set for nearly 3 months. When it sets on November 18, Barrow residents do not see the sun again for nearly two months.
- The construction of the Alaska Highway from February to November 1942 is heralded as one of the great engineering feats of World War II. The 1,500-mile highway stretches from Fairbanks to Dawson Creek, British Colombia, and then connects to Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Some 4,000 black troops joined approximately 6,000 white troops in Alaska to work on the Alaskan Highway Project.
- The world’s largest rechargeable battery is in Fairbanks, Alaska, weighs 1,400 tons, and costs $35 M to build.
- The Pribilof Islands are home to the largest seal colony with over one million seals.
- An ice worm thrives on the glaciers of Alaska and will actually melt if heated to 41°F.
- In 2001, a drunken Alaskan gunman once shot a hole in the Alaskan oil pipeline. He had to pay for the $17 million cleanups and received 16 years in jail.
- Alaska and Hawaii are tied as the US State with the lowest high temperature, at 100 degrees F.
- Bennie Benson designed Alaska’s flag in 1926 at the age of 13 winning a contest. It would become the official state flag upon Alaska’s adoption into the Union in 1959.
- The long summer days in Alaska regularly produce “Giant Vegetables” by August harvest, with products such as 58 Kg cabbage and 3 ft long beans setting records at the Alaska State Fair.
- A company in Alaska has developed a powdered beer.
- The Adak National Forest in the Aleutian Islands, Alaska, is the smallest National Forest in America, with only 33 trees.
- George Cormack and his two Indian brothers-in-law, Skookum Jim and Tagish Charlie found gold in Alaska’s Klondike Valley at Bonanza Creek on August 17, 1896, sparking North America’s last great gold rush.
- Balto, the famous dog from the 1920′s who helped save countless lives by delivering precious antitoxin from Anchorage to Nome is stuffed and mounted in the Cleveland Museum of Natural History.
- There was a man so dedicated to April Fools Pranks that in 1974, he flew hundreds of tires into Edgecumbe dormant volcano in Alaska and set them on fire, thereby fooling the local populace, and coast guard into thinking the volcano became active.
- Alaska’s first newspaper, The Sitka Times, was published in 1860.
- The 50th anniversary of the State of Alaska marked the end of an indigenous Alaskan Native language, Eyak, which lost its last speaker when Chief Marie Smith Jones died in January 2008.
- Gambler Tex Rickard from Alaska later went on to build Madison Square Garden in New York City.
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