14 



T H l^ C U B A R E V I E W 



GENERAL NOTES 



CUBAN BITUMEN INDUSTRY 



Tlie opinion is growing that great activ- 

 itv is likely to develop in the oil group, 

 ^lany important new enterprises are about 

 to come before the public, and it is believed 

 that Cuba is coming in for a very large 

 share of attention on the part of English 

 capitalists. American capitaHsts have al- 

 ready placed a vast amount of money into 

 the Cuban oil industry, but up to the present 

 few English companies have taken much in- 

 terest in the Cuban oil-helds. During the 

 past few weeks, however, a considerable 

 change has taken place in the situation, and 

 several strong influential groups in Eng- 

 land are now negotiating for the acquisition 

 of Cuban oil properties. The mineral wealth 

 of Cuba is important, and the completion 

 of the Panama Canal would no doubt 

 greatly benefit the island. Influential en- 

 terprises brought out under good auspices 

 have splendid prospects. One of the first 

 in the field will be the Anglo-Cuban Oil, 

 Bitumen and Asphalt Company. From the 

 company's prospectus it appears that the 

 properties which have been acquired com- 

 prise no less than six bitumen and petroli- 

 ferous estates of a total area of approxi- 

 mately 1,400 acres, and are located about 

 twenty miles east of the port of Cardenas, 

 on the northeast coast of the island. 

 Throughout the whole area experts state 

 that the surface indications of petroleum 

 are apparent on every hand. In one por- 

 tion of the property a shallow excavation 

 was made, and into this heavy, crude oil 

 oozed in large quantities, it being eventually 

 drawn out in buckets and sold to the sugar 

 mills for fuel purposes, and also for the 

 manufacture of illuminating gas. The sur- 

 face indications point to large quantities of 

 oil, while in some places are springs of pe- 

 troleum. 



Inasmuch as the Cardenas and Jucaro 

 Railroad passes through the property, it is 

 anticipated that the area will lend itself 

 to speedy development, but while drilling 

 machinery, etc., is being erected the various 

 bitumen deposits — which in places extend 

 for a mile over the properties — are being- 

 worked ; considerable quantities of this ar- 

 ticle are already at hand for shipment. 



As is known, the bitumen industry of 

 Cuba has been established upon a commer- 

 cial scale for many years, and some of the 

 producing shafts have been working in the 

 district for over twenty years. They are 

 still producing large quantities of bitumen, 

 indicating that the supply is apparently al- 

 most inexhaustible. It is proposed to sink 

 seven more shafts for bitumen, and a.'con7 

 servative estimate is that these will yield 

 about SO tons per day. 



The ciiiiipany has a very strong direc- 

 torate. — from Luudou {Eiiijlaud) Ot^liiion. 



INDIANS OF CUBA 



Professor Eewkes recently sent to the 

 Isle of Pines by the Smithsonian Institute, 

 has been making a study of the al:)originees 

 of the island. While he has discovered 

 much concerning them and their ways, and 

 has been making a study of the aborigines 

 of these people he is not greatly impressed 

 with his find. He had hoped to find a 

 higher type of civilization than what they 

 represent, something more on the order 

 of what we found in Mexico, Porto Rico 

 and Haiti, but has been disappointed, says 

 the Isle of Pines News. At a dinner given 

 Prof. Fewkes at Xueva Gerona previous to 

 his departure for the United States, he re- 

 ferred to his investigation as follows : 



The caves which were inhabited by the 

 Indians in western Cuba and the Isle of 

 Pines so far as known, are natural and not 

 excavated by human means. They were 

 sought out for shelter and when they were 

 deserted, vvere used in some cases for 

 cemeteries for the burial of the dead. In 

 the Santa Clara Province Dr. Montane and 

 other Cuban students have found the 

 skeletons and skulls of Indians which have 

 been considered among the most ancient 

 of human remains in America. In other 

 caves, in Cuba, bones supposed to belong 

 to animals which are now extinct, have 

 been found to be associated with human 

 bones, which evidence has been adduced to 

 show that man lived in very ancient times 

 in Cuba, and that at that time the island 

 was connected with North and South 

 America. If these conclusions are sup- 

 ported by additional and decisive facts, it 

 will open a most interesting chapter in the 

 story of the antiquity of man on the Amer- 

 ican continent. 



The lands which will be acquired by the 

 United States' naval station at Guantanamo 

 comprise an area of 31,070 acres or about 

 941 caballerias, bounded on the north by 

 20 degrees latitudinal north, on the east by 

 the Yateras River, on the south by the sea, 

 and on the west by the present grounds of 

 the naval state. 



More lands may be asked for, in order 

 to obtain a good water supply, for borings 

 to a depth of 500 feet on the new lands have 

 failed to yield potable water. 



Some speculative individuals made haste 

 to take possession of some of the outlying 

 keys around the new extension, but the keys 

 along the coast of Cuba are government 

 property, and no private individual has a 

 right to inscribe them as his property. 



