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State Song

• Alaska was inducted into the Union as the 49th state on January 3, 1959 and was purchased from Russia in 1867 for $7,200,000 which amounted to less than 2 cents an acre (0.4 hectares). As a result of the "organic act" which was passed by congress in 1912, Alaska and was organized as a territory and was no longer a district.

• Alaska is one-fifth the size of the continental United States and has a land area of 570,373 square miles (1,482,970 square kilometers); thus, making it the largest state in the Union. In fact, if Alaska's land area was divided in half, each half would still be larger than the state of Texas.

• Alaska also abounds with miles and miles of shoreline-- more than 33,900 miles of it. More than twice the shoreline of the Lower 48 (the continental U.S.) and the tidal range in the Cook Inlet near Anchorage has a diurnal (daily) range of almost 39 feet (11.7 meters) making it the second largest tidal range in North America.

• Approximately 5% of Alaska's land mass (almost 28,500 sq. miles) is covered with glaciers which is over half of the world's glaciers. Only the polar ice caps and Greenland have more ice than Alaska. The Malaspina glacier is the largest at approximately 850 square miles (2,210 square kilometers). If you include its tributaries, this glacial system would be almost 2000 square miles in size (3200 square meters), larger than the state of Rhode Island.

• Of the 39 mountain ranges found in Alaska, the Alaska Range has the distinction of Denali (Mt. McKinley). At 20,320 feet (6194 meters), it's massive presence is prodigious and is quite unmistakable when viewed from a far. The vertical rise of the Wickersham Wall exceeds 14,000 feet (4,200 meters). Other well known mountain ranges in Alaska are: The Wrangell Mountains, Talkeetna Mountains, Fairweather Range, Brooks Range, and the Chugach Mountains. The latter has the distinction of occupying the most climbed mountain in Alaska-- Flattop Mountain which stands at approximately 3,500 feet (1050 meters) and is easily accessible and within the Anchorage area.

• Climatic Regions in Alaska: There are five climatic regions in Alaska-- the arctic, continental, maritime, and two transition zones. The arctic region covers the North Slope which is the area north of the Brooks Range. The continental region includes all of Interior of Alaska and stretches south of the Brooks Range to, but not including the coastal areas. The maritime region includes the Aleutian Chain, Gulf Coast, and the Southeast area. One of the transition regions covers part of the southcentral region including the coastal mountain range to the Alaska Range in the Interior. The other transition region stretches from the Point Hope on the Chukchi Sea (north of Kotzebue Sound) to north of the Aleutian Chain.
  
  

• Temperatures in Alaska: January and December have the lowest average temperatures and July and August have the highest average temperatures throughout most of the state. The following table shows average temperatures for a few cities and villages. For more precise information about an area, city, or village, check out the Alaska Department of Community and Regional Affairs' Alaska Community Database.
  
  

  City	January	April	July	October	Record High	Record Low
  Anchorage	14.9°F	35.8°F	58.4°F	34.6°F	85°F/29°C	-34°F/-36°C
  Barrow	-13.4°F	-2.2°F	39.3°F	13.5°F	79°F/26°C	-56°F/-48°C
  Fairbanks	-10.1°F	30.7°F	62.5°F	25.1°F	96°F/35°C	-62°F/-52°C
  Juneau	24.2°F	39.7°F	56°F	42.5°F	90°F/32°C	22°F/-30°C

  * The above data was obtained from the National Weather Service.

What is akutaq (ah-GOO-tuck)?
Whipped seal oil, berries, and snow.
Ice Cream-- Eskimo style.

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