Alaska: The United States’ 49th and Largest State

Alaska, 49th State of the United States

Fun Facts About Alaska

In 1867, United States Secretary of State William H. Seward offered Russia $7,200,000. How much was that per acre?

two cents.

Where does the word ‘Alaska’ come from?

An Eskimo word Alakshak meaning great lands or peninsula.

How many times could Rhode Island fit into Alaska?

425.

What is Alaska’s official state sport?

dog mushing. The Alaska Legislature adopted this in 1972.

Anchorage, AK

What is Alaska’s largest city in population?

Anchorage. Alaska’s second largest city is Fairbanks. The third is Juneau.

Secretary of State, William H. Seward circa 1860-1865

On what date did Alaska officially became the property of the United States?

October 18, 1867. The purchase of Alaska was called ‘Seward’s Folly’ by many Americans.

What is Alaska’s official state gemstone?

Jade.

Alaska State Flag

In what year did Bennie Benson design Alaska’s state flag?

1926. Bennie Benson was only 13 years old when he designed Alaska’s state flag.

Mt. Augustine

In what year did Mount Augustine erupt?

1986. Mt. Augustine is 104 miles southwest of Anchorage.

Tongass National Forest

True or False? Alaska contains the largest national forest in the United States.

True . The name of this forest is the Tongass National Forest.

Juneau, capital of Alaska

True or False? Juneau is only accessible by boat or plane.

True . It is the only capital city in the United States that is only accessible by boat or plane.

Prospect Creek Camp

What is the lowest recorded temperature for Alaska?

-80 degrees F. This temperature was recorded at Prospect Creek Camp in 1971.

The Yukon River

How many rivers does Alaska have?

Over 3,000. The largest of these is the Yukon, which flows for 1,980 miles into the Bering Sea.

Barrow, AK

What Alaskan city is the northernmost in the US?

Barrow. It’s only 800 miles from the North Pole. Wonder if Santa stops there first?

Libby Riddle

What is Alaskan Libby Riddles noted for?

First woman to win the Iditarod. In 1985 she won the Iditarod, Alaska’s famous 1,049-mile dogsled race. Her time, from Anchorage to Nome, was 18 days, 2 minutes, 17 seconds.

Sitka, former capital of Alaska

What was the capital of Alaska when it belonged to Russia?

Sitka.

Wrangell-St. Elias National Park

Which Alaskan National Park is the nation’s largest?

Wrangell- St. Elias. It encompasses 12.4 million acres, including ten of America’s highest peaks.

What’s the meaning of the term ‘Cheechako’?

Newcomer to Alaska. Term meaning first-time Alaskan traveler or newcomer to the area.

Muktuk, an Eskimo delicacy

If you ordered muktuk, what would you be served?

Raw whale blubber. This is considered a delicacy by the Eskimos.

Juneau, AK

What is the capital of Alaska?

Juneau. Anchorage is the largest city, but Juneau is the state capital.

In Alaska the length of daylight is ___________ ?

more in the summer. The days are much shorter(darker)in the winter and, in the the summer the days are much longer(lighter). This is due to the tilt in the earth’s axis.

In 1998 which Alaskan High school won the 4A state championship for football?

Service. The Service Cougars won the state championship in 1997,1998,and 1999.

In 2002 Anchorage had a record snowfall for a 24 hour period. How much did they get?

30 inches. In the deepest spots it was inches but, the at the airport were the official depth is recorded it was 28 inches.

Mt. McKinley, US's largest mountain

North America’s largest mountain (Mt. McKinley) is in Alaska. What is the name of the national park it is in?

Denali National Park.

From what country did the U.S buy Alaska?

Russia. It was bought from Russia in 1867 at two cents an acre. At the time it was known as “Seward’s Folly”, after the Secretary of State who arranged the purchase.

The forget-me-not

The Alaskan state flower is a_____ ?

forget-me-not.

The Alaskan oil pipeline

Alaska is known for the great Alaskan pipe line. What runs through it?

Oil. The great Alaskan Pipeline carries oil from the north slope to Valdez. This is a distance of about 800 miles.

Willow Ptarmigan

What is Alaska’s state bird?

Willow ptarmigan. The origin of the word “ptarmigan” is unknown. One theory is that it comes from a Gaelic word meaning “mountaineer”. Feathered feet help this bird conserve heat and it can survive the winter by eating nothing more than willow buds. Also in the winter, the birds are camouflaged by turning completely white.

Sitka Spruce

What is the state tree?

Sitka spruce. Spruce needles are usually sharp and four-sided and emit a pungent odor when crushed. The mature cones hang down from a branch, instead of erect like the cones of a fir. Spruces are typically tall and conical, but soil and climate can change their growth pattern.

Bowhead Whale

What is the state sea animal?

Bowhead whale. Other wildlife found in Alaska are bears, moose, elk, deer, wolves, mountain goats, and many kinds of birds and fish.

What is the state fish?

King salmon. A salmon’s appearance is molded by the environment to an extraordinary degree; therefore, scientists do not know the exact number of species in the group. There are believed to be about 40 species native to North America.

Special thanks to www.funtrivia.com

OPEC: Influential Oil Producing Cartel with “Diplomatic Immunity”

OPEC Cartel Logo

Fun Facts About OPEC

Members of OPEC meet

 

 

Current Members: Algeria, Angola, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Nigeria, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Venezuela

Cartel: By definition, OPEC is a cartel — a group of producers which tries to restrict output in an effort to keep prices higher than the competitive level.

It no longer sets crude oil prices: OPEC admits to setting crude oil prices in the ‘70s and’ 80s — they would look ridiculous to try and deny it. However, the oil market underwent a transformation in the 1990s and today, prices for crude oil are established according to three markets: 1) The New York Mercantile Exchange; 2) The International Petroleum Exchange in London; and, 3) The Singapore International Monetary Exchange.

This isn’t to suggest that OPEC has no influence on prices; quite the contrary. Prices established by the exchanges are based on supply and demand; therefore any decision OPEC makes concerning restricting production, for example, will have some effect on prices. These decisions, however, can have a direct consequence on profit margin, so it isn’t always in their best interests.

Its practices are considered to be illegal: Simply put: Cartels are illegal in many countries. In the U.S., for example, OPEC is in direct violation of antitrust laws, such as the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 — the same act that broke up Standard Oil, American Tobacco and Ma Bell. Antitrust laws don’t criminalize monopolies per se, only if the monopoly is used to eliminate its competition through methods of production or price-fixing.

Ordinarily, U.S. antitrust laws explicitly prohibit dealing with cartels. What makes OPEC so special? Simple: Congress grants OPEC diplomatic immunity from prosecution and in essence treats it as though it were a sovereign nation, even though this is not remotely the case. This status was tested in 1978, when the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM), a non-profit labor organization in the U.S., filed suit against OPEC under the Sherman Act. In 1981, the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the case, claiming OPEC was protected by its sovereign immunity status.

In 2007, a pair of controversial bills were introduced in Congress designed to amend antitrust laws to include OPEC. If the measures are approved in both houses and the president doesn’t veto it, individuals harmed by OPEC in the U.S. can begin to sue the organization. If this were to happen, few expect OPEC to continue doing business with the U.S.

It isn’t the only game in town: If one only paid passing attention to the media, you might get the impression that OPEC is the only oil game in town. Granted, its member countries control anywhere from two-thirds to three-quarters of the world’s proven oil reserves and over 40% of the globe’s oil production; however, there are other sets of somewhat substantial oil-producing groups.

Originally formed as an agent of the Marshall Plan following World War II, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) is a vast and all-encompassing organization with all sorts of arms and legs. Of its 30 member countries, a minority are oil producers, including the USA, Canada, Mexico, and the UK. Together they account for about 23% of the world’s oil production.

Additionally, the Russian Federation and a handful of former-Soviet states, such as Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, are responsible for about 15% of global oil production.

OPEC Member Nations

It was formed to fight the “Seven Sisters”: The world’s wealthy oil barons have not always resided in the Middle East. In fact, for most of the 20th century, the member nations of OPEC were at the mercy of the so-called “Seven Sisters,” a non-organizational set of oil producers and distributors which, perhaps due to that non-organizational status, somehow eluded antitrust prosecution. The Seven Sisters was composed of Standard Oil of New Jersey, Royal Dutch Shell, Anglo-Persian Oil, Standard Oil of New York, Standard Oil of California, Gulf Oil, and Texaco.

By 1960, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Venezuela had grown tired of exporting their oil and then having to buy it back at higher prices. They formed OPEC to assert their “legitimate rights in an international oil market,” and by the 1970s, thanks in part to strategic maneuvers such as the Arab oil embargo, began to dominate the market.

It’s “customers” see bigger oil prices than its members: Oil taxes by countries that regularly import oil from OPEC, such as the U.S., the UK, Japan, and Italy, are often as much to blame for high oil prices as OPEC. Such taxes allow some countries to see oil-related revenues that are three or four times higher than some OPEC members see from exports. In addition, the production and development of oil requires huge investments, a fact that further chips away at OPEC-member profit margins.

As gasoline prices soar, more and more attention gets paid to OPEC. In the Western press its easily vilified and is a common ”fall guy“ for every issue related to oil and oil prices — not always unjustifiably so.

More than a few people would be pleased to see OPEC’s influence reduced or even made moribund. However, proven oil reserves are defined in the industry as the amount of oil that can be recovered and produced using today’s technologies, and as of 2006, the world total was 1,195,318 million barrels of crude oil; OPEC’s share of that amount was 922,482 million barrels or 77.2% (if you accept OPEC’s figures; hardly everyone does). Thus, unless a drastic change occurs in the energy-consumption habits of much of the world’s oil-hungry population, interest in OPEC is unlikely to recede for some time.

Special thanks to www.askmen.com