Alaska celebrates 50 years of statehood

This signature on Jan. 3, 1959, made Alaska the nation's 49th state, and touched off a series of celebrations more than 3,000 miles (4,800 kilometers) away while William A. Egan took an oath in a downtown Juneau movie theater to serve as the state's first governor.

For the next 50 years Alaska built on its appeal as rugged and at times untamed, while becoming a key domestic energy provider, a place for critically located military bases during the Cold War, and a state with a highly charged — and of late, hostile — political climate.

Alaska has provided 15 billion barrels of oil — as well as the most costly oil spill in U.S. history that led to a protracted legal battle. Oil has also provided Alaska with nearly 90 percent of its state treasury annually.

It's offered fodder for political pundits and humorists following the unsuccessful Republican vice presidential run of Gov. Sarah Palin, and the federal corruption scandal that stretched from Juneau to Washington, where it ensnared Sen. Ted Stevens.

And it's given writers and directors a place to set a scene for memorable books, movies and television shows.

The state's foundation was built by fishermen, miners, lawyers, merchants, homesteaders. Today, Alaska's leaders still are made up of people unafraid to get dirty, while serving in the Legislature for half a year then casting nets at sea and hunting for food in the interim.

Efforts to make others recognize Alaska predated Eisenhower's signing 50 years ago, of course. It took nearly 10 years of intense lobbying from territorial leaders before Congress gave its final approval for statehood in 1958.

Congress and Eisenhower balked at the notion for much of the 1950s, worrying about potential state interference with military operations during the Cold War's emergence, and whether the state's entry would upset a power balance in Congress.

But in 1958, opponents, including Eisenhower, accepted Alaska's statehood pitch, largely thanks to a relentless push by a delegation made up partly of future Congressmen Ralph Rivers, Ernest Gruening and Bob Bartlett.

The House first backed statehood for the territory on May 28, 1958, with a 210-166 vote. On June 30 of that same year, Alaskans waited anxiously to see if the Senate would concur.

Egan went on to serve two terms as governor and was later elected for a third nonconsecutive term. He worked with budgets in the low millions of dollars before oil started flowing.

Today, Palin, the state's ninth and the first woman governor, works with surplus-generating budgets in the billions generated from oil revenue.

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