Alaska+and+Hawaii+become+states+(1959)+group3

=Alaska and Hawaii=

Alaska
Alaska becomes the 49th state. On January 3, 1959 Alaska joined the United States. Alaska means "great-land". Alaska is a great peninsula that is located on the north western edge of Canada. It is not connected to the continental United States but it is still part of the country. When President Abe Lincoln was in office his secretary of state, William Henry Steward, started to negotiate a deal in buying the land of Alaska. Russia had owned it at the time and they would sell in for 2 cents an acre. The peninsula sold for 7.2 million dollars. Seward signed the agreement in 1867 and many people called it "Sewards folly" or "Sewards icebox" because Alaska was cold and snowy. Many tourists, oil companies and gold seekers soon found Alaska to be rather inviting.

Hawaii
Hawaii becomes the 50th and final state of the United States of America. Hawaii became a United states territory in 1900. The US was allowed to have a naval base at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. Hawaii then became a very important part of the United States when it was attacked by the Japanese in 1941, this brought America into World War Two. The war ended in 1945, then fourteen years later Hawaii became a state. Mark twain said that Hawaii was "the loveliest fleet of islands that lies in any ocean."