THE GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF ALASKA 45 



A geologic map can not be constructed without an adequate base 

 map. As in the west there were practically no adequate and systematic 

 topographic surveys of the interior before the organization of state and 

 federal geologic bureaus, it naturally fell to these organizations to con- 

 struct base maps for their work. The same holds true of Alaska, where 

 the conditions have been even less favorable because of the many large 

 areas which have been practically unexplored. It is no exaggeration 

 to state that, at the inception of this work, there was not a single area, 

 large or small, except at the actual coast line, of which there was a map 

 of even approximate accuracy. A few explorations had, to be sure, 

 been made; but the resulting maps were absolutely worthless for geo- 

 logic mapping and of little use for anything else. Thus the survey of 

 one of the largest rivers of the territory proved to be thirty to forty 

 miles out in location, near-by mountains, whose altitude had been indi- 

 cated at seventeen to nineteen thousand feet, proved to be less than 

 fifteen thousand feet in altitude. It is evident, then, that an investi- 

 gation of the mineral wealth had to be preceded or accompanied by 

 accurate geographic surveys. Maps were needed not only by the geolo- 

 gist, but also by the prospector and miner. The mining interests de- 

 manded that watercourses should be surveyed and passes and water- 

 sheds explored. During the Klondike excitement of 1898 there were 

 at least 10,000 people in Alaska who were attempting to follow unex- 

 plored routes and to navigate unmapped rivers. It is no exaggeration 

 to state that the cost of these fruitless efforts aggregated several million 

 dollars, many times the cost of a survey of the entire territory. In view 

 of these conditions, much of the money, therefore, appropriated for the 

 investigation of Alaska's mineral wealth was necessarily used for ex- 

 plorations and for topographic surveys. 



Older Explorations and Surveys. 



It will be well to review briefly the progress of Alaskan explorations 

 previous to the time when the Geological Survey entered this field. 

 When, in 1867, Russia ceded all her North American possessions to the 

 United States, so little was known of this province that it is hard to 

 understand what was the basis for the purchase price of $7,200,000. 

 To Eussia Alaska had been a field for private speculation rather than 

 an integral part of the empire. First, ravaged by the itinerant and 

 half savage fur trader, and then, for two thirds of a century, in the 

 complete control of an incorporated company, the territory was prob- 

 ably not regarded as a valuable asset by the Czar and his advisers. 

 To be sure, during the last two decades of the Eussian dominion, naval 

 officers had been been sent from St. Petersburg to govern the colony, 

 and a semblance of imperial authority was thereby kept up; but this 

 control was limited to but a fraction of the coast line and to the lower 



