40 Years at Prudhoe Bay: Alaskans remember Prudhoe Bay — Arliss Sturgulewski

Nancy Pounds

Most Alaskans don’t remember what Alaska’s economy looked like before the discovery and development of Prudhoe Bay. Only 14 percent of about 670,000 Alaskans today lived in the state in 1968, the year of the Prudhoe Bay discovery, according to Scott Goldsmith, economics professor at the University of Alaska Anchorage’s Institute of Social and Economic Research. So nearly nine out of every 10 residents today know little about Alaska prior to major development on the North Slope, he said. Goldsmith compared 1968 and 2008 in a recent report called, “How North Slope oil has transformed Alaska’s economy.” A few longtime Alaskans, participants and decision-makers during Alaska’s major economic changes, recently recalled events of the era.

Arliss Sturgulewski attended the oil lease sale in 1969 that brought $900 million to the state.

“We just thought we were very rich,” she recalled recently.

Sturgulewski, who came to Alaska in 1952, has seen many changes in the state. She served in the Alaska Legislature from 1978 to 1992.

“It was a really transitional time for Alaska,” Sturgulewski said.

At the time of the Prudhoe Bay discovery, the state needed to build roads and other infrastructure, she said.

“We had some very big land issues to resolve,” she added.

Prudhoe Bay’s oil development was the impetus and made the decisions come faster, she said.

“It was a tumultuous time,” she said.

Alaska’s economy has changed in the last 40 years, due to factors other than oil such as growth from fisheries, military spending and air cargo among others. But the oil industry has been important.

“Without question oil was a driver of good-paying jobs,” she said.

She remembered the economic crash of 1986, but noted that growth since has been more controllable, and the state’s economy is more diversified.

“Without question oil has been a big factor in the state’s economy,” she said.

Editor’s Note: Arliss Sturgulewski is one of Alaska’s reigning public stateswomen. Educated at the University of Washington, she retired in 1992 after 14 years in the Alaska Legislature and twice running as the GOP gubernatorial candidate. She has continued in public service as a major force in policy initiatives aimed at improving economic, educational and social opportunities for Alaskans.