12 BECONNAISSANOK in NORTHERN ALASKA IN L901. 



Bennett, and Joe Edge, camp hands, all of whom rendered untiring and efficient 

 service and manifested genuine interest in the expedition. Section'- prepared by 

 Mr. Peters are credited to him in the proper places. 



A.s early as 1896 the Survey considered projects for reaching this unexplored 

 field in northern Alaska, hut owing to the remoteness of the region and the difficul- 

 ties of transportation, no plans could be devised which did not involve the wintering 

 of a party in this arctic country at great cost and much loss of valuable time. The 

 first plans submitted were by Mr. J. E. Spurr, who proposed a traverse from 

 the lower Koyukuk to Point Barrow, essentially along the route followed by 

 Howard. The probable existence of a passable route 200 miles east of the above, 

 between the upper Koyukuk and the Arctic slojDe, was not learned until 1899. The 

 transportation difficulty, however, became less formidable when the discovery of 

 gold on the Koyukuk, in the widespread search which attended the Klondike excite- 

 ment of 1S97 and 1898, led to the location of a trading post at Bergman, on Koyukuk 

 River, near the Arctic Circle, nearly 500 miles above its mouth, and subsequently to 

 annual visits to this post by the steamboats of a reliable company. 



In the light of this later information, gained by a visit to the upper Koyukuk in 

 1S99, the plans of the present expedition were formulated by the writer and sub- 

 mitted to the Director of the Survey, who approved them, and preparations were 

 accordingly begun in the spring of 1900. The writer being otherwise engaged, the 

 task of purchasing and assembling at San Francisco the necessary outfit, including 

 four months' provisions for eight men, fell to Mr. Alfred H. Brooks, who was aided 

 by Mr. R. B. Marshall. 



The outfit, including canoes and supplies, was shipped from San Francisco 

 through the Alaska Commercial Company early in the spring of 1900 and stored at 

 the Bergman post until called for by the Survey party in 1901. From this base it 

 was planned to carry the work northward across the Rocky Mountains of northern 

 Alaska to the Arctic coast, and to conduct a parallel return traverse, from some other 

 point on the coast than that at which it was reached, southward into the Koyukuk 

 Basin, if conditions should permit. In case the return trip to the Koyukuk should 

 be found impracticable the party was to proceed northwestward along the coast and 

 seek relief at Point Barrow, where it was hoped it might be picked up by a return- 

 ing revenue cutter or arctic whaler. In the event, however, that no such vessel 

 appeared (as proved to be the case), it was proposed to at once continue south- 

 westward along the coast in native skin boats or b} T dog sleds, as conditions might 

 permit, until some chance vessel along the coast or some mining camp in the Nome 

 region should be reached. 



As this northern region was practically unsurveyed and much of it was entirely 

 unexplored, it was planned to make an instrumental survey along the route of 

 travel, which was to traverse the Rocky Mountains stretching across northern 



