1741 Bering, with fellow explorer Aleksei Chirikov, reaches landfall in Alaska, going ashore on Kayak Island near Prince William Sound. Bering's expedition returns to Russia with sea otter pelts. Bering dies on what is now known as Bering Island, off the Kamchatka Peninsula. 1742 Russian explorers and traders return and begin mass hunting of sea otters for pelts, the beginning of a Russian fur trading industry based in Alaska that became the mainstay of the Alaska colonial economy for much of the rest of the century. 1759 Russian explorer and commander Stephan Glotov lands on Unimak Island and hears the Aleut natives refer to the land as Alyaska or Alyeska, which became the basis for the name Alaska.
Russian explorers land on the mainland on the Alaska Peninsula.
1762 Glotov lands at Unalaska in the Aleutian Island chain, and in 1763 on Kodiak Island. Fighting between Russians and Aleuts. 1772 Russian settlement established at Unalaska. In 1778, during his exploration of the southern Alaska coast, British explorer Capt. James Cook reports finding a Russian settlement at Unalaska.