Alaska: Its Relation and Its Value to the United States

ALASKA, in its greatest extent, is included hetween the meridiansof 1300 west longitude and 1730 east longitude and between the parallels of 510 and 72 ° north latitude. It is bounded on the north by the Arctic Ocean; on the west by the Arctic Ocean, Bering Strait and the Bering Sea; on the south and southwest by the Gulf of Alaska and the Pacific Ocean; and on the east by the Yukon Territory and British Columbia of Canada. The area of Alaska is about 586,400 square miles or about one fifth of that of the United States. The popular conception of the size of Alaska is based on maps of North America, which always distort it. A map of Alaska, superimposed on one of the United States, shows that the distance from the easternmost to the westernmost point in Alaska is equal to the distance from the Atlantic to the Pacific Oceans at about the latitude of Los Angeles, and that its northernmost and southernmost points are nearly as far apart as the Mexican and Canadian houndaries of the United States. The main mass of Alaska is nearly rectangular and is carved out from the continent by the Arctic Ocean on the North and the Gulf of Alaska on the south. An extension to the southeast is furnished by the so-called panhandle of southeastern Alaska, and to the southwest by the Alaska Peninsula and the Aleutian Islands. Alaska is essentially a country of very bold relief. Along the entire southern coast line, mountain ranges rise, abrupt and rugged, direct from the sea. This continuous chain of mountains along the coast has done much to retard the development of Alaska, since it presents to the visitor a forbidding and discouraging aspect and it has always greatly increased the difficulties of access to the interior. Beyond these mountains, there lies a broad stretch of rolling upland country comprising the valleys of the Copper, Susitna and Nushagok Rivers. Beyond these valleys is the Alaska Range, which rises to great heights and may be called the backbone of Alaska. This range i