Our Kodiak logo carries Alaska's distressed bear above "Est. 1959," the year of statehood — the shared retro emblem of our Alaska places, drawn in worn black-and-white like an old crate stamp. Nowhere does the bear mean more than here: on Kodiak it is not a motif but a neighbor. What makes this one Kodiak is everything around it — the Emerald Isle green, the Russian bells, the king crab, and the biggest bears alive.
The modern town wears three uniforms: fisherman's raingear, Coast Guard blue, and rocket-crew white. Base Kodiak is the largest Coast Guard installation in the United States, guarding the most dangerous fishing grounds in the country; the Pacific Spaceport Complex on Narrow Cape has launched rockets over the Gulf since 1998; and Fort Abercrombie's WWII gun emplacements stand in spruce and salmonberry above the sea cliffs, a state park now, remembering the war that first brought the military north.
Why People Visit Kodiak Alaska
Kodiak offers Alaska in concentrate — the deepest Russian heritage in the state, a 7,000-year Alutiiq homeland, a top American fishing port, and the only place on Earth to meet the Kodiak bear at home. People come for the bears and the fishing, and find the Emerald Isle: green, rain-washed, and genuinely wild ten minutes from town.
