- Capital - Juneau
- Population - about 32,000 people
- Only accessible by plane or boat
- Motto - North to the Future
- Flower - Forget-Me-Not
- Bird - Willow Ptarmigan (pronounced with a silent ‘p’ like pterodactyl)
- Land Mammal - Moose
- Marine Mammal - Bowhead Whale
- Fossil - Wooly Mammoth
- Insect - Four Spot Skimmer Dragonfly
- Mineral - Gold
- Gem - Jade
- Tree - Sitka Spruce
- Fish - King Salmon
- Sport - Dog Mushing
- Flag - Designed by 13-year-old Benny Benson in 1927
- Blue - the sky & the forget-me-not
- North Star - North to the Future & the most northerly state in the union
- Big Dipper (Ursa Major, the Great Bear) - Strength and also bears.
- Purchased - By William H. Seward from Russia in 1867 for 7.2 million USD (2 cents/acre)
- Founded - January 3, 1959 as the 49th state in the Union
- Hawaii followed in August of the same year.
- Name Meaning - from the Aleutian word Alaxsxaq (uh-LUK-suh) meaning “mainland” or “object toward which the sea is directed” also known as Alyeska (ah-lee-eh-skuh) meaning “great land”.
- State Population - about 740,000
- #1 largest city is Anchorage - about 290,000
- #2 Fairbanks - about 33,000
- #3 Juneau - about 32,000
- There’s about 1 bear for every 20 people
- Size - 665,400 sq. mi./ 1.7 million sq. km.
- 2.46 times bigger than Texas, and larger than the next 3 largest US states (Texas, California, Montana) combined.
- Boroughs - 20 (similar to counties)
- Industries - Oil, tourism, commercial fishing, mining (in that order)
- Taxes - No state income tax, no state sales tax, avg. local sales tax rate of 1.75%
- Area Code - 907 - the entire state has the same one
- Time Zone - Alaska Standard Time (AKST)
- On September 15, 1983, Secretary Elizabeth Dole signed a plan to reduce the number of time zones in Alaska from four to two; two weeks later, the plan became effective. Since that date, 90 percent of Alaska residents set their clocks to Alaska Standard Time (same as Yukon), only one hour behind the West Coast. The far reaches of the Aleutian Islands and St. Lawrence Island are in the next zone, Hawaii-Aleutian Standard Time.Alaska does participate in the Daylight Savings program from April to October along with most other states in the US.
- Before this change, Alaska had 4 time zones - Pacific time (southeastern Alaska), Yukon time (Yakutat), Alaska time (from just east of Cold Bay and west of Yakutat northward, including Nome), and Bering time (the north coast of Alaska and the Aleutian chain).
- The shift was made to facilitate doing business in Alaska, improve communications, and unify residents.
- Landscape
- 3 million lakes (largest is Lake Iliamna, 1,012 sq. mi/2,622 sq. km (about the size of Connecticut)
- 1,000 rivers (largest is Yukon 1,980 mi/3,185 km)
- Highest point - Mt. Denali (formerly Mt. McKinley) 20,310 ft./6,190 m. (highest point in North America)
- Lowest point - sea level
- Coastline - 6,640 miles/10,690 km
- Longest in the US, next is Florida at 1,350 mi/2,170 km)
- Touches 3 oceans (Bering Sea, Arctic Ocean, Pacific Ocean)
- Highways - there’s about 17,700 miles of road in Alaska. Texas, which is about 2.5 times smaller, has 687,000 miles of road. Major highways are:
- Parks
- Glenn
- Seward
- Richardson
- Dalton
- Alaska-Canada Highway - AKA “The Alcan” is the only way to access Alaska’s highways from the lower 48. It is 1,520 mi./ and connects Dawson Creek, BC (MP 0) to Delta Junction in AK where it joins the Richardson. 90% is paved, but it can be treacherous in bad weather. Gas, food, and lodging are 50-100 miles apart depending on the season.
- Public Lands - 322 million acres of public lands (over 3x the size of California) including 8 national parks, 120 state parks, 2 national forests, & 16 wildlife refuges.
- State Parks - 120 state parks spanning 3.2 million acres across every region of AK, it is the largest state park system in the US.
- National Forests - AK is home to the 2 largest national forests in the US - Tongass (16.7 million acres) & Chugach (6.9 million acres)
- National Parks - Alaska has 8 of the 63 national parks in the US, including the top 5 largest. They make up about 60% of the total US national park land area at 56 million acres (85 million total in the US).
- Wrangell-St. Elias National Park & Preserve - (southeast) 13.2 million acres (53,320.57 km²)
- Gates of the Arctic National Park & Preserve - (north, mostly above the arctic circle) 8.5 million acres (34,287.02 km²)
- Denali National Park & Preserve - (central) 6.1 million acres (24,584.77 km²)
- Katmai National Park & Preserve - (southwest) 4.1 million acres (16,564.1 km²)
- Lake Clark National Park & Preserve - (southwest) 4 million acres (16,309.36 km²)
- Glacier Bay National Park & Preserve (southeast) - 3.3 million acres (13,291.9 km²)
- Kobuk Valley National Park - (northwest) 1.8 million s (7,084.9 km²)
- Kenai Fjords National Park - (south central) 669,650 acres (2,710 km²)