- In 1867, then Secretary of State William H. Seward negotiated the purchase of Alaska from the Russians for the sum of $7.2 million. Critics at the time called the purchase “Seward’s folly,” but their criticism turned to praise when gold was discovered in the 1890s.
- During World War II, the Japanese landed on the Aleutian islands of Attu and Kiska in 1942.
- Five percent of Alaska is covered by an estimated 100,000 glaciers.
- Both Alaska Natives and non-Natives may participate in subsistence fisheries and subsistence hunts. In Alaska state law, subsistence uses include the customary and traditional uses of fish and wildlife outside nonsubsistence areas, regardless of ethnicity. In the 1990s, average rural subsistence harvest statewide was about 375 pounds of food per person per year. That is more than the U.S. average consumption of 255 pounds of domestic meat, fish, and poultry per year. (The average American uses a total of 1,371 pounds of all foods per year.)
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