30 HUNTING IN THE ARCTIC 



fades away, unless on some logical highway of conunerce. 

 Dawson might continue to be a stopping place on the 

 Yukon long after its gold had been cleaned up, but there 

 would be no geographical excuse for a railway touching 

 Fairbanks. 



"But you ought to see the wonderful fruit and vege- 

 tables raised here by So-and-so," someone, interested in 

 agricultm-e, told us. We hunted him up at his greenhouse, 

 in which a profusion of tomatoes, melons, cucumbers 

 and other plants were thriving. Fresh tomatoes sold at 

 seventy-five cents a pound. ''I can't keep anything 

 over the winter," he said, "except one or two flowers. 

 Everything must be planted from seed and the summer 

 is so short that they hardly have time to ripen, except by 

 forcing imder glass. I have made a hving, but no amount 

 of money." 



Inquiries about the game of the neighborhood all led 

 back to Harry Karstens. When one tried to locate a 

 person in this, as in other towns, the answer frequently 

 was, "You'll find him at the Northern, or the Palace," 

 or one of the other bars. But not so with Karstens: 

 "You'll probably find him at Hall's bookstore." Finally 

 we tracked him down; a tall, strong, clear-eyed young 

 man. He had been a partner of Hudson Stuck, the 

 missionary, in their successful attempt to climb Mt. 

 McKinley, and he told us that he had shared the expenses 

 of the expedition. 



Stuck seemed to have gotten all the credit in the news- 

 papers for the achievement, but when we met him a few 

 days later at St. Michael, Stuck said that he could not 

 have made the ascent if Karstens had not pulled him 

 through, and repeated this in his own published story. 

 People in Fairbanks told us that Karstens was the man 

 who brought the party back ahve. 



