Capital: Juneau

Governor: Tony Knowles, D (to Dec. 2002)

Lieut. Governor: Fran Ulmer, D (to Dec. 2002)

Senators: Frank H. Murkowski, R (to Jan. 2005); Ted Stevens, R (to Jan. 2003)

Commissioner of Administration: Jim Duncan

Atty. General: Bruce M. Bothelho, D

Organized as territory: 1912

Entered Union (rank): Jan. 3, 1959 (49)

Constitution ratified: April 24, 1956

Motto: North to the Future

State Symbols:

Alaska - America's Wild Frontier

Vitus Bering, a Dane working for the Russians, and Alexei Chirikov discovered the Alaskan mainland and the Aleutian Islands in 1741. The tremendous land mass of Alaska-equal to one-fifth of the continental U.S.-was unexplored in 1867 when Secretary of State William Seward arranged for its purchase from the Russians for $7,200,000. The transfer of the territory took place on Oct. 18, 1867. Despite a price of about two cents an acre, the purchase was widely ridiculed as "Seward's Folly." The first official census (1880) reported a total of 33,426 Alaskans, all but 430 being of aboriginal stock. The Gold Rush of 1898 resulted in a mass influx of more than 30,000 people. Since then, Alaska has contributed billions of dollars' worth of products to the U.S. economy.

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. The Trans-Alaska pipeline was completed in 1977 at a cost of $7.7 billion. On June 20, oil started flowing through the 800-mile-long pipeline from Prudhoe Bay to the port of Valdez.

Other important industries are fisheries, wood and wood products, furs, and tourism.

Denali National Park and Mendenhall Glacier in North Tongass National Forest are of interest, as is the large totem pole collection at Sitka National Historical Park. The Katmai National Park includes the "Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes," an area of active volcanoes.

The Alaska Native population, the indigenous peoples of Alaska, include Eskimos, Indians, and Aleuts. More than half of all Alaska Natives are Eskimos. (Eskimo is used for Alaska Natives; Inuit is used for Eskimos living in Canada.) The two main Eskimo groups, Inupiat and Yupik, are distinguished by their language and geography. The former live in the north and northwest parts of Alaska and speak Inupiaq, while the latter live in the south and southwest and speak Yupik.

About 36% of Alaska Natives are American Indians. The major tribes are the Alaskan Athabaskan (11,696) in the central part of the state, and the Tlingit (9,448), Tsimshian (1,653), and Haida (1,083) in the southeast.

The Aleuts, native to the Aleutian Islands, Kodiak Island, the lower Alaska and Kenai Peninsulas, and Prince William Sound, are physically and culturally related to the Eskimos. About 12% of Alaska Natives are Aleuts, and in 1990, they made up 10,052 of the indigenous population.

Nickname: The state is commonly called "The Last Frontier" or "Land of the Midnight Sun"

Origin of name: Corruption of Aleut word meaning "great land" or "that which the sea breaks against"

10 largest cities (1999 est.): Anchorage, 257,808; Fairbanks, 32,769; Juneau, 30,192; Sitka, 8,193; Kenai, 8,184; Ketchikan, 7,861; Kodiak, 7,680; Bethel, 6,517; Wasilla, 6,118; Homer, 4,887

Land area: 570,374 sq mi. (1,477,267 sq km)

Geographic center: 60 mi. NW of Mt. McKinley

Number of boroughs: 16

Largest boroughs by population and area: : Anchorage, 257,808 (1999 est.); Yukon-Koyukuk, 157,121 sq mi.

State parks: more than 100 (3.5 million acres)

Residents: Alaskan

1999 resident population est.: 619,500

1990 resident census population (rank): 550,043 (49). Male: 289,867; Female: 260,176. White: 415,492 (75.5%); Black: 22,451 (4.1%); American Indian: 85,698 (15.6%); Asian: 19,728 (3.6%); Other race: 6,675 (1.2%); Hispanic: 17,803 (3.2%). 1990 percent population under 18: 31.3; 65 and over: 4.1; median age: 29.3.