Alaskan Telegraph System 



361 



laid communication was kept up over it 

 with the Signal Corps buzzer. By the 

 last of April the wire had been run for 

 the entire distance from Kelchemstock 

 to the mouth of the Goodpasture. At 

 this point we had expected to meet the 

 party working up the Tanana, but due 

 to unsurmountable obstacles it had not 

 been able to get within 65 miles of that 

 point. As I had kept in touch with the 

 party down the Tanana, sufficient mate- 

 rial had been put on the Goodpasture in 

 the event that they did not reach the 

 point of junction. Boats were accord- 

 ingly built of whip-sawed lumber at 

 Central, and as soon as the Goodpasture 

 broke we loaded our outfit and went to 

 the Tanana, also sending a pack train 

 over the hills to cooperate with us on 

 that stream, the aparajos and packing 

 outfits having been previously sent to 

 the Goodpasture on sleds. Meanwhile, 

 parties with their pack trains were work- 

 ing between the various stations, putting 

 in poles and elevating the wire. All sta- 

 tions had been chosen and caches of ra- 

 tions for the working parties, forage for 

 the animals, and a year's supply for 

 three men and one dog team, which was 

 to form the detachment at each telegraph 

 station, had been carried to each cache. 

 The final run down the Tanana started 

 on May 31, it being necessary to reach 

 Salcha before June 30, as the appropria- 

 tion for the work ran out at that time. 

 This was a distance of 65 miles from the 

 end of our line to where the other party 

 was working at that time. The work 

 went forward rapidly, every man doing 

 his utmost in spite of the obstacles 

 which presented themselves. Our meat 

 ran out, but we obtained caribou and 

 bear meat. The mosquitoes in the 

 Tanana swamps were nearly intolerable 

 for both the men and the animals, it 

 being necessary to build long smoky 

 fires to keep them away. The animals, 

 especially the horses, would have to 

 be driven away from these fires to make 

 them feed. Great care had to be taken 

 to get the boats safely through Bates 



Rapids on the Tanana, because if the 

 boats were capsized and the rations and 

 equipment lost the completion of the 

 line would have been delayed for a 

 year. I accordingly took the boats 

 through the difficult places personally, 

 and nothing was lost. One boat had 

 been previously capsized on the Good- 

 pasture and over a ton of rations sunk, 

 which was a serious thing, as no more 

 could be obtained until winter again set 

 in, due to the impossibility of packing 

 for such a distance from Fort Egbert 

 during the summer. We worked stead- 

 ily on, however, gradually overcoming 

 the obstacles in our way. When one- 

 half the distance between Goodpasture 

 and Salcha was completed, a forest fire 

 caused by Indians and prospectors be- 

 gan to creep up the Tanana, and by 

 June 10 was over 250 miles long, fol- 

 lowing the north bank of the river, and 

 directly in our path. From that time 

 until the completion of the line the men 

 worked directly through the fire, in 

 some places the wire being taken 

 through the smoking embers by a man 

 riding at a gallop on a mule. 



On June 27, 1903, we made the final 

 connection, and the Alaskan telegraph 

 system was completed, comprising, with 

 all the lines in the territory, nearly 2,000 

 miles of wire. 



As General Greely, the Chief Signal 

 Officer of the Army, has said : " Never 

 have enlisted men shown greater apti- 

 tude and attention to duty than in the 

 construction of these lines through the 

 extreme cold and snow of the winters 

 and the bogs, morasses, woods, and mos- 

 quitoes of the summer time, and with 

 these conditions prevailing in an ex- 

 tremely rough and little-known country, 

 which many people believed to be im- 

 possible for a telegraph line to be put 

 in. " As it was, the work could not have 

 been accomplished had not the Chief 

 Signal Officer, General Greely, directing 

 and knowing each detail of the work, 

 given the men engaged in it the support 

 and encouragement which he did. 



