JOURNAL 



OF THE 



WASHINGTON ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 



Vol. IV FEBRUARY 4, 1914 No. 3 



GEODESY. — Our Northern Boundaries.^ O. H. Tittmann. 

 Coast and Geodetic Survey. 



In accordance with the custom of this Academy, which prescribes 

 a theme in which the retiring President is especially interested, I 

 have chosen ''Our Northern Boundaries." 



It happens that your speaker has been engaged for the last ten 

 years as Commissioner on the part of the United States, in co- 

 operation with Dr. W. F. King, the British Commissioner, in the 

 formidable task of delimiting the Alaska boundary and re-marking 

 and establishing in precise manner the boundary from the Pacific 

 Ocean to Lake Superior and from the St. Lawrence River to Grand 

 Manan Channel. 



It would lead too far afield in an address of this kind to enter 

 into a detailed account of the complications and controversies 

 which had to be settled by 1>arious commissions before the treaties 

 negotiated by Secretaries of State John Hay and Elihu Root 

 afforded the means and prescribed the method for finally fixing 

 our northern boundaries. My purpose is to confine myself to 

 a few illustrative references of their origin and in this connection 

 I recall an incident which may serve to suggest the cause of many 

 difficulties in boundary questions. While serving on the staff 

 of General Foster, the American agent before the Alaskan Boun- 

 dary Tribunal which convened in London in 1903, a banquet was 

 given at which I was placed at a narrow table immediately oppo- 



' Address of the retiring President of the Washington Academy of Sciences. 

 Delivered before the Academy on Thursday evening, January 14, 1914, at the 

 Cosmos Club. 



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