ALASKA HIGHWAY

formerly Alcan Highway, road (1,523 miles [2,451 km] long) through the Yukon, connecting Dawson Creek, B.C., with Fairbanks, Alaska. It was previously called the Alaskan International Highway, the Alaska Military Highway, and the Alcan (Alaska-Canadian) Highway. It was constructed by U.S. Army engineers (March-November 1942) at a cost of $135 million as an emergency war measure to provide an overland military supply route to Alaska. The Canadian part (1,200 miles [1,930 km], mostly gravel) was turned over to Canada in 1946. A scenic route open all year round, it joins highways to Edmonton and Prince George (in the south) and highways to Valdez, Anchorage, Seward, and Haines (in the north). History Explorations As early as 1700, native peoples of Siberia reported the existence of a huge piece of land lying due east. An expedition appointed by the Russian tsar and led by a Danish mariner, Vitus Bering, in 1728 determined that the new land was not linked to the Russian mainland, but because of fog it failed to locate North America. On Bering's second voyage, in 1741, the peak of Mount St. Elias was sighted, and men were sent ashore. Sea otter furs taken back to Russia opened a rich fur commerce between Europe, Asia, and the North American Pacific Coast during the ensuing century. Early settlement The first European settlement was established in 1784 by Russians at Three Saints Bay, near present-day Kodiak. It served as Alaska's capital until 1806, when the Russian-American Company, organized in 1799 under charter from the emperor Paul I, moved its headquarters to richer sea otter grounds in the Alexander Archipelago at Sitka. The company governed Alaska until its purchase by the United States in 1867. Alaska's first governor (then termed chief manager), Aleksandr Baranov, was an aggressive administrator whose severe treatment of the native Indians and Eskimos led in 1802 to a massacre at Sitka. A period of bitter competition among Russian, British, and American fur traders was resolved in 1824 when Russia granted equal trade rights for all. The near extinction of the sea otter and the political consequences of the Crimean War (185356) were factors in Russia's willingness to sell Alaska to the United States. The Russian minister made a formal proposal in 1867, and, after much public opposition, the purchase was approved by the U.S. Congress and the U.S. flag was flown at Sitka on Oct. 18, 1867.