The United States Army celebrates its 200th birthday on June 14, 1975 it is appropriate to look at the Army's heritage in Alaska. The 172d Infantry Brigade (Alaska) proudly presents this program covering 108 years of service in the great land.

The steam sloop OSSIPPEE brought officials to Sitka for the transfer of Russian America to the United States on October 18, 1867. During the ceremony, as the Russian flag was being lowered, this ship began the firing of a 21-gun salute which was answered by the Russian shore batteries.

Brigadier General, Lovell H. Rousseau accepted the newly acquired territory on behalf of the United States. As his 15-year old son raised the stars and stripes to the head of the staff, the Russian guns began the salute and the OSSIPPEE answered. Russian America became Alaska and American soil. At a cost of $7,200,000 - it was a great bargain.

Brevet Major General Jefferson C. Davis was the first commander of the military district of Alaska, serving from 1867 - 1870. He took charge of the newly acquired government property, supported the U.S. Collector of Customs and maintained law and order in Alaska.

A Russian-made building served as the commanding general's headquarters from 1867 to 1877. Alaska was under the U.S. Treasury Department for the next two years, and then was governed by the Navy from 1879 to 1884 from the same structure.

During 1868 and 1869, the Army headquarters at Sitka established additional posts at the strategic sites of Wrangell, Tongass, Kodiak and Kenay. Fort Wrangell was situated on a island of the same name near the mouth of the Stikine (Stikeen) River in southeast Alaska.

The historic town of Kodiak as it was in 1888. It was the first permanent Russian settlement in the new world, a dominant location in the North Pacific. The U.S. Army established Fort Kodiak here on June 6, 1868. It supported the U.S. Collector of Customs in the Pribilof Islands. The fort was closed in 1870.

The first attempt by the Army to establish Fort Kenay ended in shipwreck. Survivors were quartered at Fort Kodiak. The following year, Battery F, of the Second Artillery established a post at the old Russian site of Fort St. Nicholas, the present location of Kenai, on April 17, 1869.

An old Russian blockhouse was on the site of the American Fort St. Michael. Toward the end of the 19th century and during the early years of this century, the Army was mainly concerned with the exploration of the vast interior of Alaska, maintaining law and order in the gold rush camps, giving aid to starving stampeders and building trails and telegraph lines.

Fort St. Michael originally served the Army as a weather observatory. The Fort was established in 1897. It was the headquarters of the department of Alaska from January 1900 to September 1901.