USA > Alaska > Alaska and the Klondike > Part 11
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It was its historic character and its importance in the period of the Russian occupation that excited our chief interest in old St. Paul, or Kodiak, as it is commonly known now, when the senatorial party arrived there on the morning of August 12, in the course of their long Alaskan tour. Kodiak is on the south shore of Kadiak Island. A singular inconsistency will be observed in the spelling of the name of the island and the name of the village
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which custom now sanctions. But what terrible things the gutturals and the aspirates of the Russians and the natives have done for the place nomenclature of the Alaskan coast, is not even remotely suggested by this name, so com- paratively smooth and pronounceable, notwithstanding its rough edges. Once the seat of authority in Russian America, Kodiak retains some of the evidences of its commercial and military importance of a hundred years ago. Among these relics of its past are its Greek church and the immense log warehouses, whose massive con- struction has withstood the lapse of years and prom- ises to stand many decades more as a monument to the past.
Kodiak is one of the most attractive spots scenically on the south Alaskan coast, but is no longer of commercial importance, although, since the American occupation, it has been one of the most flourishing trading posts of the Alaska Commercial company. It was of interest to the senatorial committee chiefly because of the experiment now being made there in live-stock raising. Three years ago a company with headquarters in Seattle placed several hundred sheep on the island in the expectation that in this mild climate these animals could make their own way the year round without any attention. The experiment under those conditions was not altogether successful. There is an abundance of forage, but the island is cut by deep ravines in which there is a heavy growth of small shrubbery in which the sheep often become entangled unless they are attended; and the spring season is so wet
Columbia Glacier, Prince William Sound
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and the air is so cold and damp that, left without shelter, the young lambs perished by the hundreds. The same people, however, not satisfied with their first experiment, brought to the island for their second trial 7,500 sheep and 500 head of cattle. It is their plan to provide shelter for the animals at the time the young are born, and with this reasonable provision the experiment seems likely to prove a success. It is not practicable, however, to turn loose either cattle or sheep on this island without attendance, as they wander over wide areas and cannot be rounded up as they can on the plains or even among the foothills in Montana. The animals are also exposed to the depreda- tions of a particularly large and ferocious species of brown bear which inhabits the island in considerable numbers. There is reason to expect, however, that with proper care and at a moderate expense the extensive grass lands on the lower levels will sustain large herds of both sheep and cattle, and that the industry will be highly profitable.
On these islands off the coast of southwest Alaska a new and peculiar industry is found in the experimental stage. Fox-ranching is an effort to restore an important natural resource. At an expense of $1.50 a year for feed for one of these animals, skins are obtained from the blue and the silver-grey foxes valued at from $20 to $50. The skins are rare now and more valuable than the much- prized pelts of the fur seal. Some of the animals for stocking these ranches have been brought from far-off Attu at the extreme western end of the Aleutian chain.
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Whether this unique industry is to be successful and how profitable it is likely to become have not yet been satis- factorily shown.
From Kodiak our course lay northeast 315 miles to Valdez, at the upper end of Prince William Sound. Val- dez is the future great city of Alaska. Its name suggests the presence of the Spaniard. The Spaniards, becoming jealous of the spread of Russian domination in the North Pacific, sent an expedition up into these waters in 1790, which penetrated to the head of Prince William Sound and conferred upon the great glacier, upon the front of which the most ambitious town in Alaska now stands, the name which the sanguine inhabitants of the town think has something in it.
Prince William Sound penetrates the mainland for a distance of 75 miles and the ride up this grand estuary affords a view of the finest scenery on the whole Alaskan coast. Snow-capped mountains rise precipitously on either side from whose white summits unnumbered glaciers slide slowly and silently into the valleys between, while from beneath these immense fields of ice and snow beautiful cascades break down over the mountain fronts and leap from ledges into the sea like showers of molten silver. Only one glacier, the Columbian, delivers its frozen stream into the sea, but its cold and glittering front, white streaked with deep blue, rises like a solid wall straight across the valley through which it emerges from the moun- tain slopes behind. The air is moist with the constant melting of the snow, and even when the skies are cloud-
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less, is filled with a soft, blue haze which adds an inde- scribable charm to the scene-a sort of Inness impression- ist effect which the memory will recall with never-failing delight.
Valdez is a town of 1,000 inhabitants built on a moraine lying across the foot of a great glacier which comes down within four miles of the town. As one looks up toward that great field of ice now resting with its foot against the moraine, he can be pardoned if he should indulge in a moment's speculation as to what would happen if that big glacier should slip a cog some night and shove the moraine out into the harbour. You know what the boy philosopher said, that " just 'cause nothin' ain't ever got you 'tain't no sign nothin' ain't ever goin' to git you," but the people of Valdez aren't afraid. Their principal busi- ness just now is waiting for something to turn up and they go on working at it without any apprehension about the glacier. The something they are waiting for to turn up is a railroad. They have got there first and they are hold- ing what they regard as the key to the situation-the most practicable and perhaps the only available open-all-the- year-round port from which a railroad can be built from the south coast of Alaska to the interior. Their hopes are centred upon the construction of a railroad from that point, northeast through the Copper River valley, across the valley of the Tanana, through the Forty-Mile district to Eagle on the Yukon. In 1899 the United States Gov- ernment sent a military expedition into this country to explore and open a military trail which should be made a
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Valdez
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mail route from Valdez to Eagle. Over that route mail is carried weekly during the summer on pack horses.
Hon. John G. Brady, Governor of Alaska, when asked what Alaska needed most, replied: " The great essential to the development of Alaska is transportation." And this is the fact which impresses the student of Alaska's future more than anything else. He is especially impressed with this thought after having visited Yukon territory on the Canadian side, and having seen there what has been done by the Dominion Government for the development of its most northern possession by the construction of wagon roads. One of the most important branches of the organisation of that territory is the department of roads. The British Yukon is young compared with our district of Alaska. Prior to the discoveries on the Klondike in 1896 and 1897 there was practically no settlement and no development in that country. But during the last five or six years, according to Mr. S. A. D. Bertrand, territorial superintendent of public works and buildings, at Dawson, there has been expended in the Yukon territory $1,030,- 118 in the building of wagon roads. This represents the first cost of 875 miles of roads and winter trails, one- fourth of which is graded and surfaced wagon roads on which heavy loads may be drawn by teams of from two to ten or twelve horses and over which it is possible now to move heavy mining machinery at any time of the year as easily as it could be drawn over the roads of central New York.
When the senatorial committee, while in Dawson, were
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invited by United States Consul McGowan and General Manager Washburn of the Northern Commercial com- pany to visit the mines on Bonanza and Eldorado creeks, one important end to be accomplished by that trip was to show to the senators what the Yukon territory, by the aid of the Dominion Government, had done for the develop- ment of the country in building roads and cheapening transportation through the mining districts. The drive of 35 or 40 miles was made in stages drawn by 4 horses and carrying 12 passengers to the wagon. There is no place in Alaska where this performance could have been repeated. The method pursued in the Yukon is briefly this: The territorial government determines where roads shall be built and makes an estimate of the cost. This estimate is presented to the Dominion Parliament at Ottawa and an appropriation is made for the purpose. They do not wait in the British Yukon until all the burden of settlement has been borne by the people at the great expense which the absence of passable roads implies, but whenever a discovery is made which promises to be of importance and gives evidence of permanence, engineers are sent out to survey a route for a wagon road, and men are put at work at once on its construction. The result is that the great mining district known as the Klondike is covered with a network of excellent roads reaching back from the Yukon for a distance of sixty miles. Originally conditions here were substantially those which obtain in Alaska to-day so far as transportation is concerned.
A member of a firm engaged in freighting over these
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roads from Dawson is authority for the statement that in 1898, prior to the construction of these roads, freighting by pack horses for a distance of 15 to 25 miles was done at the rate of 15 cents a pound, or $300 a ton. Now the same freight is transported 25 to 50 miles for a cent a pound or less in ton lots, and in smaller quantities for a cent and a half a pound. This firm runs stages 290 miles a day over these various routes and daily transportation may be had for passengers and freight between Dawson and all points in the Klondike region.
It is the estimate of this firm that the cost of living in the Klondike camps, taking all things into account, but crediting the reduction chiefly to good roads, has been re- duced to one-fourth what it was five years ago before these roads were built. What this means to the development of the country can scarcely be overstated. Compare, for in- stance, the cost of living where freights for supplies for a distance of 20 to 40 miles ranges from a cent to a cent and a half a pound, with the conditions described by Consul McGowan on Chicken Creek, 100 miles away, on the American side. Freights from Seattle to Eagle, which is as near to Chicken Creek as is Dawson, are substantially the same as to Dawson, but there are no roads of any kind between Eagle on the American side and the impor- tant mining camps in the Forty-Mile district, of which Chicken Creek is a part. And while only a cent to a cent and a half a pound must be added for freight charges from Dawson to camps forty miles away in the Klondike, the contrast between Dawson prices and Chicken Creek prices
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MEATSOLD AT SEATTLE PRICES
ATMARKET
It Snows in Valdez
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shows what the wagon roads have done for the miner on the British side.
For instance, in the spring of 1902 when flour was $7 a hundred at Dawson, it was $32 a hundred on Chicken Creek. Hams and bacon, when 25 cents a pound in Daw- son, cost 50 cents on Chicken Creek ; condensed cream $10 a case in Dawson, $22 on Chicken Creek; potatoes 6 1-2 cents a pound in Dawson, 25 cents on Chicken Creek; onions 12 1-2 cents a pound in Dawson, 30 to 32 cents on Chicken Creek ; beef in carcass, 75 cents a pound; eggs, $35 a case in summer. On all canned goods there was an advance of 65 per cent. on Dawson prices at Chicken Creek and this difference is chargeable chiefly to the cost of freighting the last 100 miles. The trade of this entire Forty-Mile district should be handled from Eagle, on the American side, but it is practically monopolised from Daw- son by the aid of a wagon road built from Dawson west- ward to the boundary line. Dawson would have wagon roads all through the Forty-Mile district if it were all on British territory.
But the Forty-Mile district does not by any means pre- sent the worst conditions with respect to transportation. Here is a list of prices for supplies in the region of Copper Centre, about seventy-five miles inland from Valdez. All supplies must be carried over the military trail on pack horses, and a Minneapolis man who has recently visited that section reports the following scale of prices : Hay, $600 a ton; oats, 35 cents a pound; flour, 35 cents a pound; potatoes, $11.20 a bushel; butter, $1 a pound;
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roast beef, in cans, $1.25 a pound; condensed milk, 75 cents a package; ham and bacon, 65 cents a pound; rice, 40 cents a pound; baking powder, $ I a can ; pepper, $I a can ; soap, 50 cents a cake ; dried fruit, 60 cents a pound; tomatoes and corn, $ I a can; oil, $3.50 a gallon; window glass, 10 x 12, $1.50 a pane; horseshoes, $2.50 apiece; tin pails, $2.50; coffee pot, $2.50; wash tub, $8; hand saw, $12 ; a joint of stove pipe, $1.
It should be understood, too, that transportation to Valdez, the point of departure from the coast, is cheap, and that prices are not exorbitant there. In fact, the ad- vance over Seattle prices at Alaska coast points is very moderate. It is this item of transportation from the coast to the interior which makes living there so expensive, and, indeed, prohibitive, unless the miner is working in rich gravel and taking out large returns for his labour every day.
Another illustration is furnished by Judge D. A. Mc- Kenzie, United States commissioner at Coldfoot on the Koyukuk. The Koyukuk is navigated by small boats a distance of 600 miles north from the Yukon River and Coldfoot is one of the most northern settlements in Alaska. There are, however, about 400 whites in that region engaged in mining. Freight from Seattle or San Francisco must go up by Dutch Harbour, north to St. Michael, and up the Yukon and the Koyukuk, and the rate is over $300 a ton. When it gets to Coldfoot it must be distributed back on the creeks among the miners at an added expense of 15 to 20 cents a pound, making the total
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charge for transportation reach the rate of about $600 a ton. Of course, no country can be occupied where the expense of living is so great that does not produce liberally in gold. Some claims in that section pay from $115 to $125 per man for ten hours' work, and large quantities of low-grade gravel are handled at from $15 to $20 per man per day.
Such facts as these explain better than anything else the retarded development of Alaska and the more rapid and advanced development on the British side. Hundreds of claims are worked on the British side at a moderate profit which could not be worked at all if the expense of living there were as great as on the American side. There is nothing in the natural conditions, however, which should give greater impetus to the mining development on the British side than on the American. On the contrary, aside from a few rich claims in the Klondike which can be easily matched on the Seward Peninsula, the attractions for the miner on the American side in such districts as Fairbanks, Forty-Mile, the Upper Koyukuk, the American Creek, Nome and Council City districts, and probably others, are just as great as on the British side. In fact, outside the Klondike region itself the British Yukon has nothing as yet to offer equal to any of the districts named on the American side.
As is generally understood, the ocean front of Alaska from Portland Channel to Cook's Inlet, west of Valdez, is mountainous. The coast range throughout that entire distance of 1,200 or 1,500 miles, is high and rugged and
Solomon Rapids, near Valdez
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difficult of penetration. The White Pass road, however, has surmounted the difficulties of railroad passage through the mountain barrier and government surveys and private explorations have found a route on American territory through Keystone Canyon and over what is known as Thompson's Pass, northeast of Valdez, over which it is said to be entirely practicable to build and operate a rail- road. The testimony is practically unanimous on this point, including that of Senator Nelson, who while our party halted at Valdez, in company with Lieutenant Barker and Assistant Engineer McMillan, of the Mc- Culloch, rode on horseback twenty-five miles up the Gov- ernment trail to Thompson's Pass. Once over the range no serious difficulties present themselves in crossing the Copper River valley or the valley of the Tanana, and the entire feasibility of building a railroad from Valdez to Eagle, so far as the engineering problems are concerned, is not seriously disputed. The route seems to present no greater difficulties than have been overcome by many of the engineering achievements on American and Canadian roads. Indeed, the engineering difficulties are pronounced by Lieutenant Abercrombie, who laid out the military trail from Valdez to Eagle, to be comparatively trifling. The elevation of Thompson's Pass is about 1,000 feet less than White Pass crossed by the White Pass & Yukon Railway. The only question is one of financial feasibility. Capital cannot be easily induced to engage in enterprises of this kind without reasonable expectation of profitable return. However, a company has been organised to build
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over this route, encouraged, no doubt, by the fact that the White Pass & Yukon Railway, operated in connection with its steamboat line to Dawson, has been a great financial success, the original investment having been cleared up, it is stated, from the earnings of the first three years. This projected road, known as the Valdez & Yukon Railway, has been incorporated under the laws of Virginia with a capital of $10,000,000. When it will be built depends upon peculiar conditions. While there is considerable gold in the Copper River country, more in the Tanana valley, and still more in the Forty-Mile coun- try toward Eagle, the greatest known mineral wealth along that route is believed to be the copper deposits of the Cop- per River country. During the summer of 1903 three or four prospecting parties, each representing different im- portant copper interests in this country and Mexico, visited the valley of the Copper River and its tributaries to as- certain the truth of the reports of great copper deposits there. These explorers were very reticent as to the value of the copper deposits supposed to exist in that region. One of them, however, stated to a reliable citizen of Valdez, known personally to the writer, that when the copper deposits of the Copper River country began to be developed and put upon the market the mines of Butte and the Calumet and Hecla would have to go out of business; that copper could be produced from the Alaska ores at a third or a fourth of the expense incurred in either of the localities named. No copper interest, however, seems prepared to commence operations, influenced possibly by
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the fact that to do so would be to lessen if not destroy the value of the properties already in operation in the States, where large sums are already invested. These copper kings appear to be watching each other, however, each to see that the others do not get the start of him. This country has been protected more or less, and the best known deposits have been filed upon and are claimed by individuals who have set a high price upon their hold- ings. Some day, however, these rich deposits of copper will fall into the hands of men of capital and will be developed; but until they do pass into the hands of men of large means capable of developing them, the construction of the Valdez and Eagle railroad through that copper region is likely to be deferred. Whoever builds the road, and it will doubtless be built some day, will first have to obtain control of the best copper deposits, in the develop- ment of which such a railroad would be almost indis- pensable .*
Among the inducements to build such a railroad, I have referred only to the mineral wealth of the region to be traversed. All the testimony obtainable from residents, prospectors, military explorers, builders of the Govern- ment telegraph lines, mail-carriers, agents of the agricul- tural department and others best acquainted with the coun-
* The recent discoveries on the Tanana and the marvellous growth of the great gold camp at Fairbanks constitute another reason why this projected road should be built, for, while Fairbanks is considerably west of the point where the Eagle City trail crosses the Tanana, it would doubtless become the objective of a branch if not of the main line. If Fairbanks proves to be a permanent camp, it ought to add considerably to the inducements to build the Valdez and Eagle City railroad.
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try, is to the effect that there are large areas in the Tanana and Copper River valleys adapted to successful agriculture and stock-raising and that when transportation facilities have been provided hundreds of thousands of acres of rich soil will come into use, and furnish large traffic to a rail- road.
Ex-Governor Leedy, of Kansas, who had just returned from the Copper River valley, said to the senatorial com- mittee at Valdez, that he had been obliged to pay thirty- five cents a pound for oats for his horse right on ground that would produce that article as well as Illinois or Ohio. The Government tests seem to show that beyond question this portion of Alaska will produce forage for ani- mals in great abundance. But the agricultural possibilities of Alaska is another story.
The Government is not likely to subsidise any railroad in Alaska. Land grants in countries whose chief known resources are minerals are not very practicable and a cash or bond subsidy is not now a popular idea.
What the Government is more likely to do and ought to undertake without unnecessary delay is the building of a wagon road over the route proposed for the rail- road, with branches leading to adjacent mining camps. Such a road would greatly stimulate the development of the country and in that way hasten the building of a rail- road.
The history of things at White Pass illustrates this point. Mr. George A. Brackett, of Minneapolis, demon- strated the feasibility of putting a wagon road over the
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White Pass and showed so conclusively that the obstacles to cheaper transportation than the pack trail afforded might be removed and the way opened for the easy en- trance of thousands of prospectors into the Klondike, that capital was willing to follow and build a railroad. The same result may be worked out in substantially the same way at Valdez, while as a regulator of railroad rates it would probably pay to maintain the wagon road per- manently.
The next question, of course, is, where is the money to come from? Will the federal Government make the neces- sary appropriations? I do not know that any reliable estimates of the cost have been made, but the million dol- lars expended by Canada in five years for 875 miles of roads and trails has provided 230 miles of good wagon road which probably absorbed half of the total outlay. Across the coast range and among the inland mountains greater difficulties are to be encountered on this Valdez to Eagle route than on any part of the Klondike system, but for the greater part of the distance the construction of a wagon road would be neither difficult nor expensive. A bulletin of the United States Geological Survey estimates that wagon roads can be built in the interior of Alaska at an average cost of $1,000 to $1,500 a mile. Many a min- ing camp has already spent on excessive charges for the freightage of its supplies several times the cost of a wagon road. Nor would it be necessary for the United States to draw upon its own revenues alone to provide the money necessary. Alaska is already paying into the treasury of
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the United States, and has been for years, a great many thousands of dollars annually more than the Government returns to the district of Alaska in the form of public service of any kind. This surplus above what is expended on the administration of the laws made for the district goes into the treasury of the United States and is appro- priated to the general expenses of the Government. But whether the surplus revenues of Alaska are sufficient to aid materially in wagon-road construction or not, the Gov- ernment at Washington owes it to the people who are enduring the privations and hardships of pioneering in Alaska to give them the transportation facilities * neces- sary to the development of that great country, as Canada has done for the British Yukon. We have a better country to develop, and the principle upon which public money is expended upon river and harbour improvements, upon the Weather Bureau, upon the coast survey, upon the
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