324 The American Geologist. ger 
PERSONAL AND SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 
Mount McKIN_ey, which is the highest mountain on the 
continent, lies in the heart of the Alaskan range, and no one 
has yet reached its base. A. H. Brooks. 
On Apr. 7, 1902, Dr. FRANK R. VAN Horn was made 
professor of geology and mineralogy at Case School of Applied 
Science, Cleveland, Ohio. 
Since 1898 THE UNITED STATES GEOLOGICAL SURVEY 
has been making systematic geologic and topographic surveys 
of Alaska. The annual appropriation by Congress for this 
work has been recently increased from twenty-five thousand to 
sixty thousand dollars in order to extend the investigation of 
Alaska’s mineral resources. This increase has not been ade- 
quate to the needs of the work. The mineral interests have 
developed so rapidly in the past few years, and surveys in this 
distant province are so expensive, that it has been impossible 
with only sixty thousand dollars yearly to satisfy many of the 
urgent demands for work in various parts of the territory. 
THe Lawsuit oF PEARSON vs. THE GREAT NORTHERN 
RAILROAD was referred, by agreement, to judge Kelly of St. 
Paul, before whom the case was tried and argued about a year 
ago. This suit was referred to in the GeEoLocist, vol. 28, 
p. 65, as it involved the science of geology in a pretended new 
“law” for the origin and distribution of coal. Mr. Pearson 
laid claim to 1,500,00 dollars as his share in certain coal de- 
posits in Montana. Judge Kelly has recently rendered his 
decision, awarding Mr. Pearson $500 on salary due him for 
services. from which it may be inferred that the new “law,” 
and the coal deposits claimed to have been discovered under 
its guidance by Mr. Pearson, were not considered, from a legal 
point of view, of any more value than they are from a geo- 
logical. 
Tue UNITED STATES GEOLOGICAL SuRvEy has just issued, 
in Bulletin No. 177, a catalogue and index of its publications. 
This compilation has been made necessary by the increase in 
the number of the publications, since the last catalogue was 
published in 1893, and by the need of a convenient classifi- 
cation. The first part of the compilation is composed of 
notices of all the Survey’s publications from its inception to 
date—the Annual Reports, Monographs, Bulletins, Water 
Supply and Irrigation Papers, the volumes of the old series 
of Mineral Resources, Geologic Atlas Folios, Topographic 
Atlas Sheets, special maps and miscellaneous publications. 
The second portion of the volume is an index alphabetical- 
ly arranged, comprising 742 pages. It is a broad classifica- 
tion of the subject matter of the publications, yet sufficiently 
detailed to be of value in economic, scientific, engineering 
and educational lines. 
