Why Russia Sold Alaska for Cheap | The True Story

From Little Diomede Island, in Alaska, you can see Russia just 2.4 miles away, and over there it's already tomorrow. All that land behind you used to be Russia's. In 1867, Russia sold Alaska to the United States for $7.2 million, about 2 cents an acre, for a territory more than twice the size of Texas, with gold and the biggest oil field in North America. So why would an empire give it up for pennies? In this video we explain, through maps, how Russia ended up in North America in the first place: Vitus Bering, the sea otter fur rush, the Russian-American Company and Fort Ross in California. Then we look at why Alaska became a problem Russia couldn't solve. It was too far to supply, the Crimean War showed it was impossible to defend against Britain, and Russia was afraid American gold miners would simply flood in. Then comes the midnight deal: Secretary of State William Seward, Russian minister Eduard de Stoeckl, and a treaty signed at 4 a.m. on March 30, 1867. After that: "Seward's Folly", the tangled flag at Sitka, the bribery rumors, and the myth almost nobody knows. Most Americans actually liked the deal. Finally, we follow Alaska from "icebox" to jackpot: the Klondike and Nome gold rushes, Japan's invasion of the Aleutians in WWII, the Cold War, the Diomede Islands and the International Date Line, Prudhoe Bay oil and the Permanent Fund. Then we ask the big question: what if Russia had kept Alaska? Orbit History: America explained through maps and what-ifs. Subscribe for more stories about why the map looks the way it does. CHAPTERS 0:00 Russia Sold Alaska for 2 Cents an Acre 0:44 Siberia's Siberia: Russia's Fur Empire 2:48 Too Far, Too Cold, Too Broke 5:10 The Midnight Deal 7:13 Seward's Folly? The Myth Nobody Tells You 10:00 The Icebox Pays Off 11:55 What If Russia Kept Alaska? 13:40 The Real Deal Notes: 2 cents an acre = $7.2M ÷ ~375 million acres (1.9¢). "Roughly $130 million today" is a CPI estimate. The bribery claims rest on Seward's private remarks; the 1868 House investigation proved nothing. The "What if" section is speculation. #history #americanhistory #alternatehistory