THE MALASPINA GLACIER REGION OF ALASKA 
LAWRENCE MARTIN 
Assistant Professor of Geology, University of Wisconsin 
The Malaspina Glacier region of Alaska may be of especial interest 
to geologists at the present time for two reasons. The great earth- 
quakes in Yakutat Bay, just to the east in 1899, involved faulting and 
changes of level of the land. The eastern portion of the Malaspina 
Glacier itself, with adjacent valley glaciers, is engaged in one of the 
greatest ice-advances of modern times, due indirectly to these earth- 
quakes.’ 
Different parts of this region have been described in some detail 
by the late Professor I. C. Russell, of the University of Michigan, 
Dr. G. K. Gilbert, of the U. S. Geological Survey and the Harriman 
Expedition, Professor R. S. Tarr, of Cornell University, and the writer, 
as well as others listed below. 
The model or relief map here described (Fig. 1) includes the 
Malaspina Glacier, and the adjacent region near Mount St. Elias and 
Yakutat Bay, about 7,350 square miles in Alaska and Canada, near 
60° N. Latitude, and 140° W. Longitude. On this model whose 
vertical and horizontal scales are the same (1:80,000), about one 
mile and one-quarter equals one inch. ‘The model is about seven 
feet by four and two-thirds feet. Its cost of construction was pro- 
vided by the Geological Department of the University of Wisconsin. 
It is based upon a brief general view of the whole region by the writer 
in 1904, upon several months’ field-work in the eastern half of the 
area in 1905, both years in U. S. Geological Survey parties, but 
chiefly upon maps, photographs, and descriptions by I. C. Russell, 
and the Alaska Boundary Commissions, as well as the work of Lieu- 
tenant Schwatka’s New York Times Expedition, H. W. Seton-Karr, 
William Libbey, the Topham Expedition, George Broke, the Cana- 
dian Boundary Commission, H. C. Brabazon, the Duke of the Abruzzi, 
« This region was revisited in 1909 by the National Geographic Society’s Alaskan 
expedition for the study of glaciers under the direction of R. S. Tarr and the writer. 
Important observations on the additional advance and recession of glaciers were made. 
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