Peter M. Osika, age 10, of North Brunswick, New Jersey, for his question:

 When was Alaska first discovered?

We live in the twentieth century and it is right and proper for us to enjoy our wondrous Age of Science to the full. But some of us tend to think that nothing important happened before this modern era. We forget that many of our modern miracles were started by inventions and discoveries that were made in the past. It is nice to know that one of Andy's young friends does not think that the story of Alaska began in 1959 when it became our 49th state. That story actually dates back long before the Vikings and Columbus discovered the New World.

Old World explorers did not discover Alaska until the eighteenth century. In 1725, an expedition led by Vitus Bering sailed through the Bering Strait and found an island off the shores of Alaska. In 1741, Bering led another expedition and visited several Alaskan Islands. Traders and settlers followed up these discoveries and explored deeper into the mainland.  They found the region already populated by Eskimos  Aleuts and other American Indians.  These original settlers had discovered Alaska before our recorded history.  Experts tell us that they crossed from Asia to Alaska by land bridge that has long since sunk below the wave.  Several groups from Asia used that old route during the Ice Age of maybe 30,000 years ago.