Alaska is the 49th state and largest state of the united states of America by area . The U.S senate approved the purchase of Alaska from the Russian empire on march 30th, 1867 , for $7.2 million . The land went through several changes before becoming a organized territory . The name Alaska was already introduced in the russian colonial time, when it was used only for the peninsula, and derived from the mainland . Alaska is also known as Alyeska which means “the great land”, an Aleut word derived from the same root . Alaskas state motto is “north to the future” and has received the nicknames “the last frontier”,“land of the midnight sun”, and “Seward's icebox” . Some things you would specifically find in alaska are the four spot skimmer dragonfly, the flower forget-me-not, the king salmon, the bowhead whale, the sitka spruce, and the wooly mammoth .