Originally Posted by
Mehdron
Seattle has long been the hub for transportation between Alaska and 'Outside'. Seattle was first "made" by outfitters for the Klondike gold rush; the outfitters in Seattle made more money than most of the prospectors. Nowadays, most anything that goes by ship to Alaska goes through Seattle; the Alaska fishing fleet is based in Seattle; etc.
If it makes you feel any better, many of the signs at my local Seattle-area Safeway say Carr's. Fred Meyer is also not based in WA, but in OR/OH.
I did once convince a DL agent that ANC is a perfectly logical connection point to SEA from the Southeastern US. I almost had a VDB on BNA-ATL-SEA and had BNA-CVG-MSP-ANC-SEA as my alternate itinerary as other flights were sold out or required an overnight stay and connecting in ANC got me to SEA by 5:30 am.
Maybe not as much as Hawai'i, but there are some people who think that Alaska is a different country. The Disney movie
Snow Dogs had a scene about this. Apparently that is part of the reason why AS no longer has the Alaskan flag above the entry door of each aircraft, which I believe was after the Gold Rush livery.