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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



to 300 miles from tidewater ; the Bering 

 Hiver coal-field, 25 miles from the coast 

 at Controller Bay and 100 miles from a 

 good harbor on Prince William Sound; 

 the Matanuska coal-field, 150 miles from 

 an ice-free port on the Pacific, and the 

 Yukon placers, from 400 to 600 miles by 

 feasible railway routes from the Pacific. 

 This inland region is separated from the 

 Pacific tidewater by high, snow-covered 

 ranges, broken, however, by several river 

 valleys. 



The full development of the mineral 

 wealth of inland Alaska must await im- 

 provements in means of communication, 

 which will need to be of a very radical 

 <:haracter. The expensive and uncertain 

 mode of reaching the Yukon placer dis- 

 tricts by ocean and river boats or long 

 winter sled journeys places so heavy a 

 tax on the gold-mining industry as to 

 make it in most places impossible to ex- 

 ploit anything but the richest placers. 

 The copper deposits of Copper River and 

 the coal-fields of Controller Bay and the 

 .Matanuska basin must remain unproduc- 



tive until a transportation system has 

 been developed. 



Thanks to the Alaska road commis- 

 sion, and in a lesser degree to local enter- 

 prise, much has been accomplished in the 

 way of road and trail building. Much, 

 however, remains to be done, for in 

 this Territory, embracing nearly 600,000 

 square miles, there are only 452 miles of 

 wagon road, 397 of sled road, and 255 

 of trail. The coastal service of ocean 

 vessels and the river transportation sys- 

 tems of the Yukon and its tributaries are 

 being much improved. In addition to 

 this, steamboats have been placed on 

 Copper and Sushitna rivers. Local trans- 

 portation facilities have also been greatly 

 bettered by short lines of railway, such 

 as those at the White Pass, at Fairbanks, 

 in Seward Peninsula, and the Copper 

 River Railway, which now extends from 

 Cordova for about 70 miles inland. 



All these improvements in means of 

 communication, together with the mili- 

 tary telegraph lines, wireless stations, and 

 long-distance telephone systems, have 



commande;r jens^n 



OBSERVATOR PE;cHur.E; 



Two members of the committee appointed by the University of Copenhagen to pass on 

 Cook's claims of having reached the North Pole 



