Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 19, Number 4, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 September 1897 — IN GENERAL. [ARTICLE]

IN GENERAL.

At Toronto, Ont., Ware defeated Lefoy 6—2 and 6—4 in the tennis tournament. The American Society of Professors of Dancing has declared that waltzing is romping and not to be permitted longer in well-conducted ballrooms. Carrier pigeons have again been used successfully in transmitting messages from the North Atlantic squadron, fifty miles from Norfolk, to the navy yard at that place. A company is being organized in San Francisco and will be incorporated under the laws of Arizona which has for its object the construction of a narrow-gauge railroad from tidewater on Prince William Sound up the valley of the much-talked-of Copper river, and thence across the divide to a point on the Yukon River near the boundary line. The name of the company will be the Alaska Central Railway Company, and its capital stock $5,000,000. The promoter of the enterprise is Col. John Underwood, a former extensive railroad contractor. Associated with him, he says, are Elijah Smith of New York, the controlling spirit of the Oregon Improvement Company, and John W. Cudahy and P. D. Armour, the Chicago packers, and one or two local capitalists. The proposed road will be about 322 miles long. Senator Perkins and Capt. Goodall are mentioned as possible members of the Board of Directors. The news by the steamer National City from St. Michael’s corroborates all thathas been said of the prospects of short rations in the Alaska gold diggings of the upper river during the winter. The steamer, which connected with the river steamer J. J. Healy-at the mouth of the river, brought three passengers into Eureka, Cal. One of these is J. A. Ralston, of 214 McCallister street, San Francisco. He says there is gold and lots of it in the Klondike, but it is mostly still in the ground. It is believed that the claims now located could turn out fifty tons this winter if the scarcity of food did not prevent full operations. He gives a rough guess that the Klondike is good for $250,000,000 before petering out. Six thousand men in the mines about Dawson City is the estimate of Ralston. The supply of the necessaries of life to feed these men, he says, is totally insufficient. In fact, he estimates that the stores will be exhausted before the winter is half over, when the famine will be on in earnest, -and especially as the number of men in the country will be greatly augmented by the later arrivals over the passes, There is whisky, beer and all kinds of liquor in profusion, he says. It is not that the men in the country have not money to buy supplies, but that the stocks of the stores are inadequate. Ralston says that one of the best claims on El Dorado is the property of James Hallack, of Missouri. It will turn out at least $1,000,000. Claim No. 12 on El Dorado is also very rich. It is no uncommon thing to take out two ounces to the pan from any part of the claim.