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Yukon/Alaska Chronology:
200,000,000 BP - 1799 AD
- 200,000,000 BP
- None of what is now Alaska or southwestern Yukon existed. Since then, dozen of terranes (pieces of the earth's crust) have "docked" against the main body of North America to form the present land.
- 25,000 - 12,000 BP
- Lower sea levels caused by the Ice Age create a land bridge, now known as Beringia, between Asia and North America.
- 24,000 BP
- The first humans arrive from Asia (this is still very much a subject of controversy). According to First Nations legends, Crow created the world, and made people from pieces of poplar tree bark.
- 12,000 - 9,000 BP
- Many of the large mammals in the North die off, including the wooly mammoth, mastodons and giant beavers. Nobody is certain what caused this environmental disaster.
- ca. 740 AD
- A huge volcano erupts near the head of the White River, in what is now Wrangell/St.Elias National Park. The ash from the eruption spreads east across most of the Yukon, forcing both the animals and people that survived to flee the southern Yukon for generations. The ash layer now provides archaeologists with a convenient, accurate dating layer.
- 1350-1870
- The Little Ice Age caused ice caps and glaciers to expand enormously.
- 1648
- A party of Russian fur hunters led by Semen Dezhnev sail around the Chukotskii Peninsula, proving that Russia and America were not joined by land.
- 1728
- - August: Vitus Jonassen Bering sails through what was later named Bering Strait, separating Asia and North America. St. Lawrence Island becomes the first part of Alaska to be sighted and named by whites.
- 1732
- - August 21: A Russian expedition under surveyor Mikhail Gvozdev sights the Alaska mainland at Cape Prince of Wales.
- 1741
- - July 16: Vitus Bering, on St.Elias Day, sights the Alaskan mainland. In honour of the saint, the most prominent peak was named; this was the first point on the northwest coast named by Europeans.
- - December 8: Vitus Bering dies after his ship was wrecked on an island off the Alaskan coast.
- 1745
- - September 25: A Russian fur hunter, Mikhail Nevodchikov, reaches Attu in his search for sea otters.
- 1774
- - July 18-21: Captain Juan Perez discovers Forrester Island and touches the southern coast of Alaska in his search for Russian fur traders who were regarded as intruders on Spanish territory.
- 1775
- Francisco Bodega y Quadra and Francisco Mourelle discover Bucareli Bay and reach the latitude of today's Juneau before returning to Mexico.
- 1778
- - May 12: Captain James Cook enters Prince William Sound. Fourteen days later, he discovered Cook Inlet, near the site of present-day Anchorage. On August 25, he turned back south, having reached Lat. 71 North, Long. 197 West.
- 1784
- Grigori Shelikhov establishes a village on Kodiak Island, and claims the adjoining coast for Russia.
- 1786
- - July: While charting Lituya Bay, 2 small boats are swamped by rip tides, and 21 French sailors drown.
- 1794
- The first church in Alaska is built on Kodiak Island by missionaries from the Valaam Monastery of the Russian Orthodox Church.
- 1799
- - July 8: The Russian American Company is formed by Royal Charter; they were given a 20-year monopoly on trading on the coast from 55 degrees north.
200,000,000 BP - 1799 AD
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