Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 207, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 August 1913 — GOVERNMENT RAILROADS FOR ALASKA [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

GOVERNMENT RAILROADS FOR ALASKA

BEFORE the present congress ends it 1b possible that tbs United States government will be in the railroad-building business on a huge Beale with the construction of two great trunk-line roads for Alaska. It is an experiment that will be watched with keen interest throughout the country, for If successful the experiment will have profound effect upon the regulation of railroads in the states themselves. But the more immediate results of the building of railroads by the government in Alaska will be the development of a teritory of imperial richness, and it is expected that there will be a rush for Alaska land that will exceed in keenness anything in American history. When the railroads tap the enormous resources. of Alaska there will come another ringing challenge to American brain and brawn for the conquest of the new west Starved andmeglected as Alaska %as been by the federal government, it already has produced $450,000,000, but when railroad development comes this total can be added to easily by SIOO,000,000 a year. Alaska is coming into its own—not for soulless exploitation by greedy monopolists, but for the benefit of all its people and the people of the United States who own It. May Build Two Trunk Lines. The promise of hope for Alaska is held out most strongly at this time in the work and recommendations of the Alffika railroad commission which Uncle Sam sent to Alaska last fall to study the railroad needs of the country, and whose report to congress was made public this spring. In transmitting this admirable document the president made an outright recommendation for the construction by the United States of two trunk line roads at an estimated cost of $35,000,000, and the friends of Alaska are now presenting all the arguments they can think of to the senate committee which has the matter under consideration. Apparently we are about to embark in Alaska on governmental construction and ownership of railroads. The commission consisted of J. J. Morrow, major corps of engineers, United States army, chairman; A. H. Brooks, United States geological survey, vice-chairman; L. M. Cox, civil engineer. United States navy, and C. M. Ingersoll, consulting engineer, of New York. Three of the members are engineers and the vice-chairman is the head of the division of Alaska mineral resources of the geological survey. Proceeding immediately to Alaska, the commission visited the southern and central parts of the territory, including the valuable harbors and practically all of the railroads, and by an overland trip of 700 miles to Fairbanks gained a knowledge of the interior. The report made by the commission is not only favorable but optimistic, and it comprises just such a close analysis of the situation as might well be expected from a body of men so eminently qualified to consider the greatest needs of a new country—railroads. Not only is it entirely feasible to provide adequate railroad facilities for Alaska, but the commission points out the immense results which will follow. It calls attention to the vast undeveloped mineral resources, and also the large areas of fanning and grazing lands in Alaska. Theee are south of the Arctic circle and fully as capable of high development as Norway and Sweden lands and of as great an area as all the states lying east of the Mississippi and north of the Ohio and Mason and Dixon’s line. The climate of the Pacific coast region to comparatively mild, and while that of the interior is more severe it is not unfavorable to colonisation and agriculture. Two Great Problems. Alaska’s development, it is well recognized, centers around two great questions, opening of the coal fields and transportation. The former is dependent upon the latter. The fabulous (resources of this enormous territory are unquestioned, but without an adequate transportation system they will remain largely potential, undeveloped and unused; but with railroads Alaska (must respond to a degree which will jlnake even the great activity and the large production of the pest dozen 'years seem (as it has been in reality, mere pioneer work. At the present time all sorts of ! transportation methods are in use jin Alaska. Bome railroads, it is true, Are in operation, but the development \ -"j'--.'-*-•

of the country has been so retarded that few of them have been completed and none of them are believed to be paying. Most of those that are in operation at all run for only a part of the year. consequence 1b that the travel and freighting in Alaska today is in almost as primitive a state as it was during the Russian occupation. Men pack goods and supplies for days upon their backs to reach point after point which should be connecftd by busy railroads; pack trains of horses and dog sleds are used, boats of various kinds and sizes and even ox teams are employed to carry provisions throughout the great territory. The freight rates are of course tremendous, and the cost of even the necessities of life is so great as to appear fabulous to ?the people of the United States. The consequence is that the pricp of labor is terrific and only the richest mining properties can be worked. Deposits of gold, silver, copper and other minerals are plentiful, besides great areas underlain with fine coal. Many of these would be considered of great richness in the United States, but in Alaska, because of the enormous cost incident to their development, they lie idle; idle they will remain until transportation, the real key to the situation* is provided. All depends primarily oh the construction of railroads. Will the railroads be built? This is the question now before congress.