OBSERVERS OF THE EARTHQUAKES 345 



Yakutat foreland from the foothills. Along each of these three older 

 faults and several others, there was renewed movement during the 1899 

 earthquakes. 



OBSERVERS OF THE EARTHQUAKES 



The observers of the earthquakes include eight prospectors who were 

 at the junction of Disenchantment Bay and Eussell Fiord, tributaries to 

 Yakutat Bay, during the most severe shocks; a few whites at Yakutat 

 village, at the entrance of the bay; natives at Yakutat and at Dry Bay, 

 near the mouth of Alsek River, to the east; the captain of a vessel at 

 Yakataga, 100 miles to the west; prospectors at Controller Bay; a Coast 

 and Geodetic Survey party at Cape Whitshed, at the mouth of Copper 

 River; army officers in the Chugach and Wrangell Mountains; cannery 

 employees in Glacier Bay; telegraph operators along the Klondike trail; 

 people living at Skagway, Juneau, Sitka, Valdez, etcetera, and pros- 

 pectors, missionaries. United States and Canadian government officials, 

 and others in various parts of the 216,000 square miles of wilderness 

 within which the shocks are known to have been felt. 



These persons have been corresponded with through a series of 600 

 earthquake circulars, which were sent in 1907-1908 to the region dis- 

 turbed, and their observations have been carefully studied. 



OBSERVATIONS BY GEOLOGISTS 



The only geologists who are known to have observed these earthquakes 

 are Mr. Oscar Eohn, the geologist accompanying Captain Abercrombie^s 

 U. S. Army Expedition, who was in the Wrangell Mountains, 170 miles 

 northwest of Yakutat Bay; Mr. A. H. Brooks, of the U. S. Geological 

 Survey, who was near the Tanana River, 250 miles northwest of Yakutat 

 Bay; Prof. J. C. Gwillem, of the Geological Survey of Canada, who was 

 near Atlin Lake, 215 miles southeast of Yakutat Bay, and Mr. F. C. 

 Schrader, of the U. S. Geological Survey, who was on the Koyukuk River, 

 670 miles northwest of Yakutat Bay. The Harriman Expedition had 

 left Yakutat Bay on the return trip about three weeks before the earth- 

 quakes. 



CONTEMPORARY DESCRIPTIONS 



Descriptions of these earthquakes first appeared in the newspapers. 

 Over fifty such accounts have come to the writer^s attention, including 

 items in daily and weekly papers in Alaska, in the United States and 

 Canada, and in Europe. Magazines also . referred to the earthquakes 

 briefly; for example, the National Geographic Magazine,^ the Scientific 



Vol. 10, October, 1899, p. 421. 



XXV — Bull. Geol. Soc. Am., Vol. 21, 1909 



