NEW LAND: ALASKA 233 



in Alaska. A number of new play areas have been made accessible recently 

 by roads and trails. The Forest Service has sought help from organized, 

 unlimited-membership groups, such as ski clubs, hiking clubs, Scout organi- 

 zations, and rifle associations to supervise orderly use. 



Juneau has the largest gold mines in Alaska and an excellent library 

 and museum of local history. Here woods trails for hiking lead out of town 

 and facilities for quiet boating on fresh or salt water are available. Thirty 

 minutes distant by highway is the Mendenhall Glacier. This ice mass 

 descends a steep valley 2% miles wide. About 125 years ago, it is evident 

 by the vegetation, the face of the glacier extended to tidewater. Wild goats 

 can be seen at times on the grassy upper slopes of ridges flanking this 

 glacial valley. 



Twenty miles south of Juneau by launch is a very active glacier 

 Taku, fronting on the sea. Great blocks of ice drop from its mile-wide, 

 250-foot vertical face at frequent intervals during the day, and in the 

 form of deep-blue, fantastic-shaped bergs, are carried down the fiord 

 by the tides. This glacier is steadily advancing its front into the sea 

 channel; a rare phenomenon, for most tidewater glaciers in Alaska are 

 now receding. 



Tracy Arm, situated 50 miles south of Juneau by launch, is an out- 

 standing fiord a clean-cut chasm extending for some 20 miles into an ice- 

 capped mountain range. In the same locality is Port Snettisham with 

 three beautiful hanging lakes, all lying 1,000 feet or over above sea level. 

 Their waters pour into the bay over high waterfalls and multiple 

 cascades. 



Sitka is 50 minutes by airplane from Juneau. For 68 years prior to the 

 purchase of Alaska by the United States, it was the capital of Russian 

 America. From Sitka the Russians carried on their extensive sea otter- and 

 seal-hunting operations, and their attempts to colonize the New World. 

 Among the interesting relics of their occupation is a cathedral where services 

 are still conducted for v/hites and Indians holding to old Russian creeds. 



FOREST PLANNING ... Of the total national-forest area of approximately 

 21 million acres only about 7 million acres have timber cover. The remain- 



