Alaska purchase - wikipedia Alaska purchase The US $7.2 million check used to pay for Alaska ( roughly $105 million in 2016 ). The Alaska Purchase ( Russian : Продажа Аляски, tr. Prodazha Alyaski ) was the United States ' acquisition of Alaska from the Russian Empire on March 30, 1867, by a treaty ratified by the United States Senate, and signed by President Andrew Johnson. Russia wanted to sell its Alaskan territory, due to the difficulty of living there, lack of natural resources ( until later found out ) and fearing that it might be easily seized by the United Kingdom in case of war between the two countries. Russia 's primary activities in the territory had been fur trade and missionary work among the Native Alaskans. The land added 586,412 square miles ( 1,518,800 km ) of new territory to the United States. Reactions to the purchase in the United States were mostly positive ; some opponents called it `` Seward 's Folly '' ( after Secretary of State William H. Seward ), while others praised the move for weakening both the UK and Russia as rivals to American commercial expansion in the Pacific region. Originally organized as the Department of Alaska, the area was renamed the District of Alaska and the Alaska Territory before becoming the modern state of Alaska upon being admitted to the Union as a state in 1959. Contents 1 Background 2 American ownership 2.1 Public opinion in the United States 3 Transfer ceremony 4 Aftermath 5 Financial return 6 Alaska Day 7 Notes 8 Further reading 8.1 Primary sources 9 External links Background Part of a series on the History of Alaska Prehistory Russian America ( 1733 -- 1867 ) Department of Alaska ( 1867 -- 1884 ) District of Alaska ( 1884 -- 1912 ) Territory of Alaska ( 1912 -- 1959 ) State of Alaska ( 1959 -- present ) Other topics Russian America was settled by promyshlenniki, merchants and fur trappers that expanded through Siberia. They arrived in Alaska in 1732, and in 1799 the Russian - American Company ( RAC ) received a charter to hunt for fur. No colony was established, but the Russian Orthodox Church sent missionaries to the natives and built churches. About 700 Russians enforced sovereignty in a territory twice as large as Texas. By the 1850s a population of 300,000 sea otters was almost extinct, and Russia needed money after being defeated by Britain in the Crimean War. The California gold rush showed that if gold were discovered in Alaska, Americans and Canadians would overwhelm the Russian presence in what one scholar later described as `` Siberia 's Siberia ''. In any future war with Britain, the hard - to - defend colony would be easily captured. Therefore, Emperor Alexander II decided to sell the territory. The Russian government discussed the proposal in 1857 and 1858. Perhaps in the hope of starting a bidding war, both the British and the Americans were approached in 1859. However, British Prime Minister Lord Palmerston steadfastly rejected the offer, arguing that Canada ( which was n't a country at the time and under British rule ) had enough uncharted wilderness to deal with and that Britain would overstretch its resources in maintaining Alaska as well as its territories and colonies outside North America. Then the Russians offered to sell the territory to the United States, hoping that its presence in the region would offset the plans of Britain. However, no deal was reached, as the risk of an American Civil War was a more pressing concern in Washington. Grand Duke Konstantin, a younger brother of the Tsar, began to press for the handover of Russian America to the United States in 1857. In a memorandum to Foreign Minister Alexander Gorchakov he stated that we must not deceive ourselves and must foresee that the United States, aiming constantly to round out their possessions and desiring to dominate undividedly the whole of North America will take the afore - mentioned colonies from us and we shall not be able to regain them. Konstantin 's letter was shown to his brother, Tsar Alexander II, who wrote `` this idea is worth considering '' on the front page. Supporters of Konstantin 's proposal to immediately withdraw from North America included Admiral Yevfimy Putyatin and the Russian minister to the United States, Eduard de Stoeckl. Gorchakov agreed with the necessity of abandoning Russian America, but argued for a gradual process leading to its sale. He found a supporter in the naval minister and former chief manager of the Russian - American Company, Ferdinand von Wrangel. Wrangel pressed for some proceeds to be invested in the economic development of Kamchatka and the Amur Basin. The Emperor eventually sided with Gorchakov, deciding to postpone negotiations until the end of the RAC 's patent, set to expire in 1861. Over the winter of 1859 -- 1860 de Stoeckl held meetings with American officials, though he had been instructed not to initiate discussions about the sale of the RAC assets. Communicating primarily with Assistant Secretary of State John Appleton and Senator William M. Gwin, de Stoeckl reported the interest expressed by the Americans in acquiring Russian America. While President James Buchanan kept these hearings informal, preparations were made for further negotiations. Senator Gwin tendered a hypothetical offer of five million dollars for the Russian colony, a figure Gorchakov found far too low. De Stoeckl informed Appleton and Gwin of this, the latter saying that his Congressional colleagues in Oregon and California would support a larger figure. Buchanan 's increasingly unpopular presidency forced the matter to be shelved until a new presidential election. With the oncoming American Civil War, de Stoeckl proposed a renewal of the RAC 's charter. Two of its ports were to be open to foreign traders and commercial agreements with Peru and Chile to be signed to give `` a fresh jolt '' to the company. Additionally, the Russian Crown sought to repay money to its landowners after its emancipation reform of 1861 and borrowed 15 million pounds sterling from Rothschilds at 5 % annually. When the time came to repay the loan, the Russian government was short of funds. The first page of Tsar Alexander II 's ratification of the treaty. This page just contains the Tsar 's full style. Wikimedia Commons has a file available for full text of ratification. Russia continued to see an opportunity to weaken British power by causing British Columbia, including the Royal Navy base at Esquimalt, to be surrounded or annexed by American territory. Following the Union victory in the Civil War, the Tsar instructed the Russian minister to the United States, Eduard de Stoeckl, to re-enter into negotiations with William H. Seward in the beginning of March 1867. President Johnson was entangled in negotiations about Reconstruction and Seward had alienated a number of Republicans, so they believed that the purchase would help divert attention from the domestic issues. The negotiations concluded after an all - night session with the signing of the treaty at 04 : 00 on March 30, 1867, with the purchase price set at $7.2 million ( $105 million in 2016 ), or about 2 cents per acre ( $4.74 / km ). American ownership An Aleut name, `` Alaska '', was chosen by the Americans. This name had earlier, in the Russian era, denoted the Alaska Peninsula, which the Russians had called `` Аляска '' ( Alyaska ) ( also Alyaksa is attested, especially in older sources ). Seward and many other Americans believed that Asia would become an important market for the country 's products, and expected that Alaska would serve as a base for American trade with Asia and globally and for American power in the Pacific. While agreeing with Seward about the benefit to trade, Senator Charles Sumner was unusual in expecting that the territory would be valuable on its own ; having studied the records of explorers, he believed that it contained valuable animals and forests. He compared the acquisition to contemporary European colonialism, such as the French conquest of Algeria. As chair of the Foreign Relations Committee, he sponsored the bill to acquire the territory. Seward told the nation that the Russians estimated that Alaska contained about 2,500 Russians and those of mixed race ( that is, a Russian father and native mother ), and 8,000 indigenous people, in all about 10,000 people under the direct government of the Russian fur company, and possibly 50,000 Inuit and Alaska Natives living outside its jurisdiction. The Russians were settled at 23 trading posts, placed at accessible islands and coastal points. At smaller stations only four or five Russians were stationed to collect furs from the natives for storage and shipment when the company 's boats arrived to take it away. There were two larger towns. New Archangel, now named Sitka, had been established in 1804 to handle the valuable trade in the skins of the sea otter and in 1867 contained 116 small log cabins with 968 residents. St. Paul in the Pribilof Islands had 100 homes and 283 people and was the center of the seal fur industry. The treaty passed the United States Senate with 37 votes for versus 2 opposed. Public opinion in the United States Many Americans believed in 1867 that the purchase process had been corrupt, but W.H. Dall in 1872 wrote that ``... there can be no doubt that the feelings of a majority of the citizens of the United States are in favor of it... '' while referring to purchasing the territories of Russia in America. The notion that the purchase was unpopular among Americans is, a scholar wrote 120 years later, `` one of the strongest historical myths in American history. It persists despite conclusive evidence to the contrary, and the efforts of the best historians to dispel it '', likely in part because it fits American and Alaskan writers ' view of the territory as distinct and filled with self - reliant pioneers. A majority of newspapers supported the purchase or were neutral. A review of dozens of contemporary newspapers found general support for the purchase, especially in California ; most of 48 major newspapers supported the purchase. Public opinion was not universally positive ; to some the purchase was known as `` Seward 's folly '', `` Walrussia '', or `` Seward 's icebox ''. Editorials contended that taxpayer money had been wasted on a `` Polar bear garden ''. Nonetheless, most newspaper editors argued that the U.S. would probably derive great economic benefits from the purchase ; friendship with Russia was important ; and it would facilitate the acquisition of British Columbia. Forty - five percent of supportive newspapers cited the increased potential for annexing British Columbia in their support, and The New York Times stated that, consistent with Seward 's reason, Alaska would increase American trade with East Asia. The principal urban newspaper that opposed the purchase was the New York Tribune, published by Seward opponent Horace Greeley. The ongoing controversy over Reconstruction spread to other acts, such as the Alaska purchase. Some opposed the United States obtaining its first non-contiguous territory, seeing it as a colony ; others saw no need to pay for land that they expected the country to obtain through manifest destiny. Historian Ellis Paxson Oberholtzer summarized the minority opinion of some American newspaper editors who opposed the purchase : Already, so it was said, we were burdened with territory we had no population to fill. The Indians within the present boundaries of the republic strained our power to govern aboriginal peoples. Could it be that we would now, with open eyes, seek to add to our difficulties by increasing the number of such peoples under our national care ? The purchase price was small ; the annual charges for administration, civil and military, would be yet greater, and continuing. The territory included in the proposed cession was not contiguous to the national domain. It lay away at an inconvenient and a dangerous distance. The treaty had been secretly prepared, and signed and foisted upon the country at one o'clock in the morning. It was a dark deed done in the night... The New York World said that it was a `` sucked orange. '' It contained nothing of value but furbearing animals, and these had been hunted until they were nearly extinct. Except for the Aleutian Islands and a narrow strip of land extending along the southern coast the country would be not worth taking as a gift... Unless gold were found in the country much time would elapse before it would be blessed with Hoe printing presses, Methodist chapels and a metropolitan police. It was `` a frozen wilderness. '' Transfer ceremony The signing of the Alaska Treaty of Cessation on March 30, 1867. L -- R : Robert S. Chew, William H. Seward, William Hunter, Mr. Bodisco, Eduard de Stoeckl, Charles Sumner and Frederick W. Seward. The transfer ceremony took place in Sitka on October 18, 1867. Russian and American soldiers paraded in front of the governor 's house ; the Russian flag was lowered and the American flag raised amid peals of artillery. A description of the events was published in Finland six years later, written by a blacksmith named T. Ahllund, who had been recruited to work in Sitka only less than two years previously. We had not spent many weeks at Sitka when two large steam ships arrived there, bringing things that belonged to the American crown, and a few days later the new governor also arrived in a ship together with his soldiers. The wooden two - story mansion of the Russian governor stood on a high hill, and in front of it in the yard at the end of a tall spar flew the Russian flag with the double - headed eagle in the middle of it. Of course, this flag now had to give way to the flag of the United States, which is full of stripes and stars. On a predetermined day in the afternoon a group of soldiers came from the American ships, led by one who carried the flag. Marching solemnly, but without accompaniment, they came to the governor 's mansion, where the Russian troops were already lined up and waiting for the Americans. Now they started to pull the ( Russian double - headed ) eagle down, but -- whatever had gone into its head -- it only came down a little bit, and then entangled its claws around the spar so that it could not be pulled down any further. A Russian soldier was therefore ordered to climb up the spar and disentangle it, but it seems that the eagle cast a spell on his hands, too -- for he was not able to arrive at where the flag was, but instead slipped down without it. The next one to try was not able to do any better ; only the third soldier was able to bring the unwilling eagle down to the ground. While the flag was brought down, music was played and cannons were fired off from the shore ; and then while the other flag was hoisted the Americans fired off their cannons from the ships equally many times. After that American soldiers replaced the Russian ones at the gates of the fence surrounding the Kolosh ( i.e. Tlingit ) village. When the business with the flags was finally over, Captain of 2nd Rank Aleksei Alekseyevich Peshchurov said : `` General Rousseau, by authority from His Majesty, the Emperor of Russia, I transfer to the United States the territory of Alaska. '' General Lovell Rousseau accepted the territory. ( Peshchurov had been sent to Sitka as commissioner of the Russian government in the transfer of Alaska. ) A number of forts, blockhouses and timber buildings were handed over to the Americans. The troops occupied the barracks ; General Jefferson C. Davis established his residence in the governor 's house, and most of the Russian citizens went home, leaving a few traders and priests who chose to remain. Aftermath After the transfer, a number of Russian citizens remained in Sitka, but very soon nearly all of them decided to return to Russia, which was still possible at the expense of the Russian - American Company. Ahllund 's story `` corroborates other accounts of the transfer ceremony, and the dismay felt by many of the Russians and creoles, jobless and in want, at the rowdy troops and gun - toting civilians who looked on Sitka as merely one more western frontier settlement. '' Ahllund gives a vivid account of what life was like for civilians in Sitka under U.S. rule, and it helps to explain why hardly any of the Russian subjects wanted to stay there. Moreover, Ahllund 's article is the only known description of the return voyage on the Winged Arrow, a ship especially purchased in order to transport the Russians back to their native country. `` The over-crowded vessel, with crewmen who got roaring drunk at every port, must have made the voyage a memorable one. '' Ahllund mentions stops at the Sandwich ( Hawaiian ) Islands, Tahiti, Brazil, London, and finally Kronstadt, the port for St. Petersburg, where they arrived on August 28, 1869. American settlers who shared Sumner 's belief in the riches of Alaska rushed to the territory, but found that much capital was required to exploit its resources, many of which were also found closer to markets in the contiguous United States. Most soon left ; by 1873 Sitka 's population had declined from about 2,500 to a few hundred. The United States acquired an area twice as large as Texas, but it was not until the great Klondike gold strike in 1896 that Alaska came to be seen generally as a valuable addition to American territory. The seal fishery was one of the chief considerations that induced the United States to purchase Alaska. It provided considerable revenue to the United States by the lease of the privilege of taking seals, in fact an amount in excess of the price paid for Alaska. From 1870 to 1890, the seal fisheries yielded 100,000 skins a year. The company to which the administration of the fisheries was entrusted by a lease from the U.S. government paid a rental of $50,000 per annum and in addition thereto $2.62 1⁄2 per skin for the total number taken. The skins were transported to London to be dressed and prepared for world markets. The business grew so large that the earnings of English laborers after the acquisition of Alaska by the United States amounted by 1890 to $12,000,000. However, exclusive U.S. control of this resource was eventually challenged, and the Bering Sea Controversy resulted when the United States seized over 150 sealing ships flying the British flag, based out of the coast of British Columbia. The conflict between the United States and Great Britain was resolved by an arbitration tribunal in 1893. The waters of the Bering Sea were deemed to be international waters, contrary to the U.S. 's contention that they were an internal sea. The U.S. was required to make a payment to Great Britain, and both nations were required to follow regulations which were developed to preserve the resource. Financial return Economist David R. Barker has argued that the U.S. federal government has not earned a positive financial return on the purchase of Alaska. According to Barker, tax revenue and mineral and energy royalties to the federal government have been less than federal costs of governing Alaska plus interest on the borrowed funds used for the purchase. John M. Miller has taken the argument further, contending that U.S. oil companies that developed Alaskan petroleum resources did not earn profits sufficient to compensate for the risks they have incurred. Other economists and scholars, including Scott Goldsmith and Terrence Cole, have criticized the metrics used to reach those conclusions, noting that most continental Western states would fail to meet the bar of `` positive financial return '' using the same criteria and contending that looking at the increase in net national income, instead of simply U.S. Treasury revenue, paints a much more accurate picture of the financial return of Alaska as an investment. Alaska day Main article : Alaska Day In Alaska, Alaska Day celebrates the formal transfer of Alaska from Russia to the United States, which took place on October 18, 1867. The date is by the Gregorian calendar, which came into effect in Alaska the following day to replace the Julian calendar used by the Russians ( the Julian calendar in the 19th century was 12 days behind the Gregorian calendar ). Alaska Day is a holiday for all state workers. Notes ^ Jump up to : Thomas, Ryland ; Williamson, Samuel H. ( 2018 ). `` What Was the U.S. GDP Then ? ''. MeasuringWorth. Retrieved 5 January 2018. United States Gross Domestic Product deflator figures follow the Measuring Worth series. ^ Jump up to : Montaigne, Fen ( 2016 - 07 - 07 ). `` Tracing Alaska 's Russian Heritage ''. Smithsonian Journeys Travel Quarterly. Retrieved 2018 - 01 - 20. ^ Jump up to : Russian Opinion on the Cession of Alaska. The American Historical Review 48, No. 3 ( 1943 ), pp. 521 -- 531. Jump up ^ `` Purchase of Alaska, 1867 ''. Office of the Historian, U.S. Department of State. Retrieved December 4, 2014. Jump up ^ Claus - M Naske ; Herman E. Slotnick ( 15 March 1994 ). Alaska : A History of the 49th State. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 330. ISBN 978 - 0 - 8061 - 2573 - 2. ^ Jump up to : Bolkhovitinov, Nikolay N. ( 1990 ). `` The Crimean War and the Emergence of Proposals for the Sale of Russian America, 1853 -- 1861 ''. Pacific Historical Review. 59 ( 1 ) : 15 -- 49. JSTOR 3640094. Jump up ^ Кто и как продавал Аляску ( Who and how was selling Alaska ) Archived 2012 - 09 - 11 at the Wayback Machine... Russian portal. ^ Jump up to : Neunherz, R.E. ( 1989 ). `` '' Hemmed In `` : Reactions in British Columbia to the Purchase of Russian America ''. The Pacific Northwest Quarterly. 80 ( 3 ) : 101 -- 111. doi : 10.2307 / 40491056. JSTOR 40491056. Jump up ^ Kennedy, Robert C. `` The Big Thing ''. Harp Week. Archived from the original on March 26, 2013. Retrieved 31 August 2015. Jump up ^ Seward, Frederick W., Seward at Washington as Senator and Secretary of State. Volume : 3, 1891, p. 348. Jump up ^ `` Treaty with Russia for the Purchase of Alaska ''. Library of Congress. Archived from the original on 29 March 2015. Retrieved 30 August 2015. ^ Jump up to : Haycox, Stephen ( 1990 ). `` Haycox, Stephen. `` Truth and Expectation : Myth in Alaska History ''. Northern Review. 6. Retrieved 31 August 2015. ^ Jump up to : Cook, Mary Alice ( Spring 2011 ). `` Manifest Opportunity : The Alaska Purchase as a Bridge Between United States Expansion and Imperialism '' ( PDF ). Alaska History. 26 ( 1 ) : 1 -- 10. Jump up ^ Seward ( 1869 ). Jump up ^ `` A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation : U.S. Congressional Documents and Debates, 1774 -- 1875 ''. loc.gov. Jump up ^ Dall, W.H. ( 1872 ). `` Is Alaska a Paying Investment ''. Harper 's New Monthly Magazine. NY : Harper & Brothers. XLIV : 252. Jump up ^ photographs, Preston Jones ; ; Holland, illustrations edited by Neal ( 2013 ). The fires of patriotism : Alaskans in the days of the First World War 1910 -- 1920. p. 21. ISBN 978 - 1 - 60223 - 205 - 1. Retrieved 30 August 2015. Jump up ^ Welch, Richard E., Jr. ( 1958 ). `` American Public Opinion and the Purchase of Russian America ''. American Slavic and East European Review. 17 ( 4 ) : 481 -- 494. JSTOR 3001132. Jump up ^ Howard I. Kushner, `` ' Seward 's Folly ' ? : American Commerce in Russian America and the Alaska Purchase ''. California Historical Quarterly ( 1975 ) : 4 -- 26. JSTOR 25157541. Jump up ^ `` Biographer calls Seward 's Folly a myth ''. The Seward Phoenix LOG. 3 April 2014. Retrieved 31 August 2015. Jump up ^ Founding of Anchorage, Alaska ( Adobe Flash ). Featured Speaker, Professor Preston Jones. CSPAN. July 9, 2015. Retrieved 2017 - 12 - 22. Jump up ^ Ellis Paxson Oberholtzer, A History of the United States since the Civil War ( 1917 ) 1 : 541. Jump up ^ Ahllund, T. ( 1873 / 2006 ). Jump up ^ Bancroft, H.H., ( 1885 ) pp. 590 -- 629. Jump up ^ Pierce, R. ( 1990 ), p 395. Jump up ^ Richard Pierce, introduction to Ahllund, T., From the Memoirs of a Finnish Workman ( 2006 ). ^ Jump up to : Gilman, D.C. ; Peck, H.T. ; Colby, F.M., eds. ( 1905 ). `` Sealing ''. New International Encyclopedia ( 1st ed. ). New York : Dodd, Mead. Jump up ^ Powell, Michael ( 18 August 2010 ). `` How Alaska Became a Federal Aid Magnet ''. The New York Times. Retrieved 27 April 2014. Jump up ^ Miller, John. The Last Alaskan Barrel : An Arctic Oil Bonanza that Never Was. Caseman Publishing. ISBN 978 - 0 - 9828780 - 0 - 2. Jump up ^ Powell, Michael ( 20 August 2010 ). `` Was the Alaska Purchase a Good Deal ? ''. The New York Times. Retrieved 24 September 2014. Jump up ^ State of Alaska 2014 Holiday Calendar ( PDF ), archived from the original ( PDF ) on 20 August 2014, retrieved 18 December 2014 Further reading Bancroft, Hubert Howe : History of Alaska : 1730 -- 1885 ( 1886 ). Dunning, William. A. `` Paying for Alaska '', Political Science Quarterly Vol. 27, No. 3 ( September 1912 ), pp. 385 -- 398. JSTOR 2141366. Farrow, Lee A. Seward 's Folly : A New Look at the Alaska Purchase ( University of Alaska Press, 2016 ). xiv, 225 pp. Grinëv, Andrei. V., and Richard L. Bland. `` A Brief Survey of the Russian Historiography of Russian America of Recent Years '', Pacific Historical Review, May 2010, Vol. 79 Issue 2, pp. 265 -- 278. Pierce, Richard : Russian America : A Biographical Dictionary, p. 395. Alaska History no. 33, The Limestone Press ; Kingston, Ontario & Fairbanks, Alaska, 1990. Holbo, Paul S ( 1983 ). Tarnished Expansion : The Alaska Scandal, the Press, and Congress 1867 -- 1871. Knoxville : The University of Tennessee Press. Jensen, Ronald ( 1975 ). The Alaska Purchase and Russian - American Relations. Oberholtzer, Ellis ( 1917 ). A History of the United States since the Civil War. Vol. 1. online Primary sources Ahllund, T., From the Memoirs of a Finnish Workman, trans. Panu Hallamaa, ed. Richard Pierce, Alaska History, 21 ( Fall 2006 ), 1 -- 25. ( Originally published in Finnish in Suomen Kuvalehti ( editor - in - chief Julius Krohn ) No. 15 / 1873 ( 1 August ) -- No. 19 / 1873 ( 1 October ) ). Seward, William H. Alaska : Speech of William H. Seward at Sitka, August 12, 1869 ( 1869 ; Digitized page images & text ), a primary source External links Wikimedia Commons has media related to Alaska Purchase. Wikisource has original text related to this article : Alaska Purchase Treaty with Russia for the Purchase of Alaska and related resources at the Library of Congress Meeting of Frontiers, Library of Congress `` Inside the Archivist 's Office ''. American Artifacts. C - SPAN. December 26, 2011. Retrieved April 3, 2017. Program featuring the purchase check cashed for gold at Riggs Bank ( 17 : 00 minute mark ). Original Document of Check to Purchase Alaska ( registration required ) History of Alaska Timeline of Alaska Prehistory Russian America ( 1733 -- 1867 ) Department of Alaska ( 1867 -- 1884 ) District of Alaska ( 1884 -- 1912 ) Territory of Alaska ( 1912 -- 1959 ) Recent history ( 1959 -- present ) Topics and events Russian - American Company Alaska Purchase Gold Rush era Klondike Nome Fairbanks Alaska boundary dispute 1925 serum run to Nome World War II Aleutian Islands Campaign Project Hula Alaska Statehood Act 1964 earthquake Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act Exxon Valdez oil spill History of Anchorage timeline History of Fairbanks Other topics Territorial expansion of the United States Thirteen Colonies ( 1776 ) Treaty of Paris ( 1783 ) Louisiana Purchase ( 1803 ) Red River Cession ( 1818 ) Adams -- Onís Treaty ( 1819 ) Texas Annexation ( 1845 ) Oregon Treaty ( 1846 ) Mexican Cession ( 1848 ) Gadsden Purchase ( 1853 ) Guano Islands Act ( 1856 ) Alaska Purchase ( 1867 ) Annexation of Hawaii ( 1898 ) Treaty of Paris ( 1898 ) Tripartite Convention ( 1899 ) Treaty of Cession of Tutuila ( 1900 ) Treaty of Cession of Manuʻa ( 1904 ) Treaty of the Danish West Indies ( 1917 ) Concept : Manifest destiny Retrieved from `` https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Alaska_Purchase&oldid=847842836 '' Categories : 1867 in Alaska 1867 in the Russian Empire 1867 in the United States 1867 treaties Aboriginal title in the United States Colonial United States ( Russian ) History of United States expansionism March 1867 events Russian America Russian Empire -- United States relations Treaties involving territorial changes Treaties of the Russian Empire Treaties of the United States Purchased territories Territorial evolution of Russia Hidden categories : Webarchive template wayback links Wikipedia articles incorporating a citation from the New International Encyclopedia Articles containing Russian - language text Wikipedia articles needing clarification from January 2015 Talk Contents About Wikipedia Wikisource Azərbaycanca বাংলা Беларуская Български Català Чӑвашла Čeština Dansk Deutsch Español Esperanto Euskara فارسی Français 한국어 Հայերեն Bahasa Indonesia Italiano עברית Қазақша മലയാളം Bahasa Melayu Nederlands 日本 語 Norsk Polski Português Română Русский Simple English Suomi Svenska Tagalog ไทย Türkçe Українська اردو Tiếng Việt 中文 31 more Edit links This page was last edited on 28 June 2018, at 04 : 53 ( UTC ). 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Question: how much did russia sell alaska to the us for
Answer: $7.2 million