Purchase by the USA from France in 1803 of an area covering 2,144,000 sq km/828,000 sq mi, including the present-day states of Louisiana, Missouri, Arkansas, Iowa, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Oklahoma. The price paid was $15 million (60 million francs), or roughly 4 cents an acre.
The purchase, which doubled the size of the USA, marked the end of Napoleon's plans for a colonial empire and ensured free navigation on the Mississippi River for the USA.
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