Alaska, constituent state of the United States of America. It was admitted to the union as the 49th state on January 3, 1959. Alaska lies at the extreme northwest of the North American continent, and the Alaska Peninsula is the largest in the Western Hemisphere. Because the 180th meridian passes through the state’s Aleutian Islands, Alaska’s westernmost portion is in the Eastern Hemisphere. Thus, technically, Alaska is in both hemispheres.
Alaska is bounded by the Beaufort Sea and the Arctic Ocean to the north; Canada’s Yukon Territory and British Columbia province to the east; the Gulf of Alaska and the Pacific Ocean to the south; the Bering Strait and the Bering Sea to the west; and the Chukchi Sea to the northwest. The capital is Juneau, which lies in the southeast, in the panhandle region.
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