Los Angeles daily herald., 1875-05-01
THE SeMI-ARCTIC REGIONS.
Blasting Ice in Minnesota - People
Freezing to Death = The Rivers
Still Ice B0und-PrOspect OF n Hegl.
ra TO CalifOrnia--Slanders In CIR.
culatt0n Against our Climate.

We have received a letter from q
resident Of the polar region known as
the State of Minnesota, which, though
it raises pine lumber, wheat and ice, is
not fit for civilized man to inhabit,
being too cold in Winter and too hot
in Summer. The letter speaks for
itself:
EDITOR HERALD: / notice that a
portion of a letter written to Mrs. B. F.
Mathews of San Bernardino, by her
uncle, giving an account of the cold in
Minnesota, is going the rounds of the
papers. Well, sir, Robin Railroad did
write that letter and it was truthful,
only did not tell all of it. Last Win
ter was . cold Winter. 1t is cold yet.
The wind from the North and snow
falling to-day. We were going down
street yesterday, and saw men taking
up pipe that was frozen so hard that
it bursted last Winter, and it was down
eight feet deep. On the 9th of this
month the Surveyor-General of logs
for this district, who has been blasting
the ice, told us that in places in the
Mississippi river where the current was
not very strong the ice was fve feet
thick. For fear the ice might do DAM
age to the mill property, his hands
took whip-saws and cut two lines
about two miles long and about thirty
feet apart, and then commenced at the
lower end and blasted into splinters
and chips with dynamite twenty or
twenty-five feet at time of the ice
lying between those lines, and so let it
foat out and down the river by Titles;
and yet, with all this care, when the
ice broke up it went out with crash,
doing good deal of damage, and but
for this precaution would, i'm all prob
ability, have taken out some of our
bridges with it. AS it is, the bridges
escaped with thousand or SO dollars
damage and about the same amount
Of damages to mill dams. Not SO
many people died by freezing this
Winter as in others, for the reason
that this last has been less stormy than
Others. But it has been real frosty
and no discount as to length. Old peo-
pie who have passed the meridian of
life have suffered terribly. For most
folks, especially those who are full of
life and vigOr, there Is no place North
Of Mason and Dixon's line ahead of
Minneapolis as regards good health,
but old people lacking in vitality had
better find warm climate. Being
one of the number hurt pretty badly
by the cold of last Winter, Sallie and
,Ue sat down one evening and talked
the matter over very deliberately, and
we came to the conclusion that if we
had the California fever we had it bad,
and that is what ails us.
In what part of California we shall
drop our anchor and furl our sail, is
more than we can tell just yet. We
thought the HERALD might help us to
decide this matter; so you may send
it to us at this place until we locate
and build our shanty, then we will tell
you where to send it. We are favor
ably impressed with what our friends
tell us of Los Angeles and San Ber-
nardino, but not being. particularly
burdened with this worlds goods, we
wish to put what little we have where
it will do the most good. We were
talking with an attorney (our City
Attorney, Mr.. A. N. Merrick, for
naerly citizen of your place, said he,
'eyOu will not like Los Angeles. The
water. is not good to drink and they
have no ice too cool it with" A lum-
herman who has been in the mines
says, "you wont like Southern Cali
fornia, it is the dryest place you ever
saw, and the dust is siIteen feet deep.n
Said ], "that sounds Mark Twainish.
/ don't take much stock in dust sixteen
feet Deep" "Well," said he, ''its the
dustiest country under the sun. 1t
gets into your eyes, mouth and nose,
it gets into your hair and onto your
clothes. 1t gets onto your flowers and
into your house, oi4 your bed and all
over any thing in the house and out
of the house," OF course we take such
stuff with an ample allowance of salt
with which to season it. But really
does the wind blow the dust and sand
about ones ears and eyes in such a