style="mso-bidi-font-style:italic">Svyato-Pavlovskoy Gavani) which
became the nucleus of modern Kodiak. Baranov considered Three Saints Bay a poor
location because it was too indefensible. The relocated settlement was first
named
Pavlovskaya.
A warehouse was built in what became one of the key posts of the
Shelikhov-Golikov Company, a precursor of the Russian-American Company and a
center for harvesting the area's vast population of sea otters for their prized
pelts. The warehouse still stands as the Baranov Museum. Because the First
Native cultures revered this animal and would never harm it, wars with and
enslavement of the Aleuts occurred during this era. Eastern Orthodox
missionaries settled on the island by the end of the 18th century, continuing
European settlement of the island, which eventually became the capital of
Russian Alaska. The Russian-American Company was established as a partnership
between the two countries in the following century to continue the sea otter
harvest. By the mid-19th century, the sea otter was almost extinct and 85% of
the First Native population had disappeared from violence and exposure to
European diseases.
When Russia sold Alaska to the United States in 1867, Kodiak became a center
for commercial fishing, and canneries dotted the island in the early 20th
century until global farm-raised salmon eliminated these businesses. New
processing centers emerged and the industry continues to evolve, even today.
During the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt, animals such as the mountain goat,
Sitka Deer(black tail), rabbits, muskrats, beavers, squirrels, and others were
introduced to the island and the Kodiak National Wildlife Refuge was created.
As Kodiak was incorporated in 1941, the U.S. feared attack from Japanese
during World War II, and turned the town into a fortress. Roads, the airport,
Fort Abercrombie, and gun fortifications improved the island's infrastructure.
When
