364 L. MARTIN — ^ALASKAN EARTHQUAKES OF 1899 



reports for 1899 and 1900.*^ Eev. Sheldon Jackson, the Commissioner 

 of Education for Alaska, also gathered information regarding the earth- 

 quakes, to which he refers briefly in his diary*^ and in a somewhat exag- 

 gerated account published by the Associated Press.*^ A newspaper and 

 magazine writer, W. J. Lampton, of the New York Sun, who also hap- 

 pened to be on the revenue cutter, interviewed the prospectors who had 

 experienced the earthquakes in Disenchantment Bay.*^ Some numbers 

 of the crew also described the earthquakes.*^ 



Pacific Ocean west of Yahutat. — A severe storm at the time of the 

 September 10 earthquake was felt by the revenue cutter McCulloch and 

 was ascribed in the press to this earthquake.^^ Mr. Andrew Brown also 

 experienced a very severe storm at sea between Kodiak and Sitka, on the 

 steamship Alliance. No earthquake phenomena are reported, however, 

 and these cases are cited merely to point out that the association by news- 

 papers of these storms with the earthquakes is probably wholly without 

 basis. 



Controller Bay. — At Katalla, on Controller Bay, 170 miles west of 

 Yakutat, Mr. T. G. White reports that the shaking was so strong on Sep- 

 tember 10 that one could not stand. Avalanches fell, trees waved on a 

 calm day, a water wave 4 feet high went up the Bering Eiver. An oil 

 spring is said to have started flowing and oil is reported to have been 

 seen in large amounts afterwards on the surfaces of streams and ponds 

 near Katalla. ^^ 



Cape Whitshed. — At the Coast and Geodetic Survey camp near the 

 Copper Eiver delta and 220 miles west of Yakutat, Mr. Eitter and Mr. 

 Latham observed the great earthquake at llh. 58m. 33s. true local time, 

 recorded by a good and well-rated chronometer. It lasted three minutes. 

 There was violent shaking all the time; part of the time one way, then 

 another. It seemed rotary. The top of a 40-foot flagstaff vibrated from 

 1 to 4 feet, and people had to stand with their heels at least 8 inches 

 apart to keep from falling. It was impossible to stand with the heels 

 together. 



*5 Department of the Interior, Misc. Repts,, House Document 5, 56th Congress, 1st ses- 

 sion, part li, p. 29 ; House Document 5, 56th Congress, 2d session, part ii, p. 25, 



*9 Ninth Annual Report on the introduction of domestic reindeer into Alaslca. Gov- 

 ernment Printing OflSce, Washington, 1900, p. 50. 



*7 Sitlja Alaslian, September 23, 1899 ; San Francisco Examiner, September 25, 1899 ; 

 London Times, September 26, 1899 ; Victoria Semi-Weelily Colonist, September 28, 1899 ; 

 Portland Weekly Oregonian, September 29, 1899 ; Japan Times, Tokio, October 31, 1899. 



*8New York Sun, October 1, 1899. 



*9 Seattle Daily Times, September 28, 189£». 



60 Seattle Daily Times, September 28, 1899. 



« G. C. Martin : Bull. no. 335, U. S. Geological Survey, 1908, p. 117. 



