15,000 - 4,000 BCE
First people
arrived in
Alaska over
Bering
Land Bridge
HISTORY & TIMELINE
1741
Russian Navy Officer, Vitus
Bering arrived in Alaska
1872
Gold discovered near Sitka
1880
Pacific Coast Steamship
Company offered first
passenger voyage
to Alaska
12,000 - 10,000 BCE
Oldest confirmed
prehistoric sites in Alaska
8,000 BCE
Alaska Native cultures
thrive, creating art—
including petroglyphs—
in the southeast region
1,000 BCE
South Bering Sea and
North Pacific people
become North Alaska Inuit
Found in Wrangell, Alaska
1778
Captain James Cook
sailed Alaska's coastline,
including Cook Inlet, while
looking for the Northwest
Passage
1912
Alaska became a
U.S. Territory
1913
First person
stood on
Denali's
true summit
ATHABASCAN, WALTER HARPER
1897
Start of the
Klondike
Gold Rush
1923
Alaska Railroad is
completed: 470 miles
of track lad from
Seward to Fairbanks
1900s
1867
U.S. purchased Alaska from
Russia for $7.2 million in
gold, later known as
Seward's Folly
Fort Wrangell, Alaska
Prospectors
moving over
Chilkoot Pass
15
©
State of Alaska/Mark Kelley
