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Atlas Alaska |
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History The first Alaskans migrated from Asia to North America from 40,000 years ago during an ice age that squeezed a 900mi (1449km) land bridge out of the ocean separating Siberia and Alaska. Although many of these nomadic tribes continued south, four ethnic groups remained to eke out their existence in the wilderness - the Athabascans, Aleuts, Inupiaq and the coastal tribes of Tlingits and Haidas. The first Caucasian to set foot in Alaska was Virtus Bering, a Danish navigator sailing on behalf of the tsar of Russia in 1728, who quickly took notice of the pelt potential of the large local seal and otter populations. The Russians quickly established a base for the fur trade on Kodiak Island, a lawless cowboy trade, which spat and bit unregulated until the Russian-American Company was organized in the 1790s. Other European invaders, most notably the Spanish and the British, were seduced by this lucrative coast but Russian predominance extended well into the 19th century. The fur trade hit hard times in the 1860s and, with European wars demanding both attention and resources, the Russians decided to downsize their territorial holdings: several offers for the sale of Alaska were made to an initially ambivalent USA. Eventually, in 1867, the Americans signed a canny treaty to purchase the region for US$7.2 million - less than two cents an acre. Despite the bargain buy out, Alaska remained lawless and unorganized, accessible (and interesting) only to a few hardy settlers until its natural riches began to be exploited one by one. First it was whales, taken mostly in the Southeast, and then the enormous salmon stocks, but the real explosion in Alaska's economy, population and profile came in the 1880s with the discovery of gold. Chortling with the confidence which arrives hand in hand with wealth, big hats and the clicking over of a century's clock, Alaskans (all 60,000 of them) began laying claim to their own future. Congress began to grant non-voting legislative privileges but the statehood movement subsided during WWI when many residents departed south for high-paying jobs. Thus depleted, Alaska dozed until mid-1942 when the Japanese rang alarm bells by attacking the Attu and Aleutian Islands. Alaska owes much of its infrastructure to the concerted US response to this military threat to its northwest flank. Most notably, Alaska's only overland link to the rest of the USA, the Alcan, was built, a 1520mi (2447km) engineering masterwork completed in just over eight months. The injection of funds and personnel spurred post-war development, leading to a new drive for statehood. In 1959, President Eisenhower proclaimed the 49th State of the Union, spawning the cute Alaskan monikering of the 'Lower 48'. In 1968, massive oil deposits were discovered underneath Prudhoe Bay in the Arctic Ocean, provoking intense negotiations between a ravenous oil industry, environmentalists and Native Alaskans with moral claims to land which now promised to generate extraordinary wealth. A treaty was signed with the indigenous population in 1971 and a 789mi (1270km) pipeline to the warm-water port of Valdez was constructed. In 1977 the oil which has made Alaska the richest state in the USA began to flow. Oil still accounts for the gleam in the eyes of many Alaskans despite the shadows cast by the 1986 slump in world prices and the tragic Exxon Valdez spill in 1989. The exploitation of 'natural resources,' particularly oil, is a hot topic in Alaska, concentrating the juicy issue of a coveted independence from Washington, the concerns of environmental groups, the desire for economic wealth and the rights of the indigenous population. An increasing awareness that the Alaskan wilderness is an outstanding natural resource all the more valuable if it is left untouched may be the sentiment which saves the fabled frontier.
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