Finding the great earthquake of 1900 near Kodiak Published March 6 Share on Facebook Print article In 1900, Alaska was home to Native people in scattered villages and camps and recently arrived miners who scraped the creeks for gold. Many of the 60,000 souls on the rivers and hills of Alaska stumbled through a big shake that fall, especially those living on Kodiak Island. The largest earthquake on the planet that year happened somewhere near Kodiak on Oct. 9, 1900. Scientists know it was big, but how big? And could it happen again? Seismologist Carl Tape wanted to know more about the great 1900 earthquake. He works at UAF’s Geophysical Institute, studying Alaska earthquakes and what causes them. He became interested in the 1900 earthquake because he suspected it was a big one, maybe a magnitude 8.