STATE OF ALASKA INFORMATION
Official State of Alaska Web Site
Alaska is a state of the United States of America. Alaska is located in the extreme northwest portion of North America. It is by far the largest U.S. state in area, but one of the least populated. It is the 49th state, having been admitted to the Union on January 3, 1959. The name "Alaska" is most likely derived from the Aleut Alyeska, meaning "great country", "mainland" or "great land."
Alaska is one of the two U.S. states not bordered by another state, Hawaii being the other. It is the only non-contiguous state in North America; about 500 miles (800 km) of Canadian territory separate Alaska from Washington. Alaska is thus an exclave of the United States that is part of the continental U.S. but is not part of the contiguous U.S. (The other two exclaves of the United States are the Northwest Angle of Minnesota, and Point Roberts, Washington.) Alaska is also the only mainland state whose capital city is accessible only via ship or air. No roads connect Juneau to the rest of the state.
It is bordered by Yukon Territory and British Columbia, Canada to the east, the Gulf of Alaska and the Pacific Ocean to the south, the Bering Sea, Bering Strait, and Chukchi Sea to the west, and the Beaufort Sea and the Arctic Ocean to the north.
Alaska is the largest state in the United States in terms of land area (it is larger in area than all but 18 of the world's nations) at 570,380 square miles (1,477,261 km²), over twice as large as Texas, the next largest state. If a map of Alaska were superimposed upon a map of the 48 contiguous states, Alaska would overlap Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, New Mexico and Colorado, and if the state's westernmost point were superimposed on San Francisco, California, its easternmost point would be in Jacksonville, Florida. Alaska also has more coastline than all of the contiguous U.S. combined.
As of 2005, Alaska has an estimated population of 663,661, which is an increase of 5,906, or 0.9%, from the prior year and an increase of 36,730, or 5.9%, since the year 2000. This includes a natural increase since the last census of 36,590 people (53,132 births minus 16,542 deaths), and an increase due to net migration of 1,181 people into the state. Immigration from outside the United States resulted in a net increase of 5,800 people, and migration within the country produced a net loss of 4,619 people.
With a population of 626,932, according to the 2000 U.S. census, Alaska is ranked 48th out of the 50 States. But ranked by population density, Alaska is the least densely populated at 1.1 people per square mile (List of U.S. states by population density), with the next nearest ranking state, Wyoming, at 5.1 per square mile, and the most densely populated, New Jersey, at 1,134.4 per square mile.
For purposes of the federal census, the state is divided into artificial divisions defined geographically by the United States Census Bureau for statistical purposes only.
The center of population of Alaska is located approximately 40 miles east of Anchorage.
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