The Newtown bee., 1900-09-28
Town Topics.
NEWTOWN BOYS AT CAPE NOME.
HARRY F. ORGELMAN WRITES INTEREST
INGLY TO THE BEE.
Cape Nome, August AZ, 1900.

promised to write, but 50 far my tim'
has been fully occupied In one way o.
another, then too didn't wish to attempt
to describe the country and existing con
ditions without being somewhat familiar
with them, so now will try to do go.
will not try to describe the trip across
the continent a. that has been done many
times by abler pens than mine and az
my sister writes that you have published
the letter describing the voyage from
Seattle to Nome will not touch upon
that, but will begin with our putting foot
on terra f1rma here, which was on June
16, 2S days from Seattle. We found on
landing a great crowd of people all along
the shore for some two miles, ,one and all
rushing around looking for baggage or
freight, lighters discharRing cargos Of
the forty or more ships lying off the city,
everything in confusion, horse teams,
dog teams and man teams crowding the
beach, making it almost impossible to
move along and acres and acres Of freight
consisting of everything under the sun
in the shape Of supplies, provisions and
/ q
picture such as the world never saw and
perhaps never will see again. Add to this
\ a background Of a few wooden buildings
surrounded by multitude of tents, in
pls ces 80 thick that it was feat to walk
in and out among the tent ropes and not
was hard work for while to locate our
own tent after having left it, these tents
extending along the beach in white
line as far as the eyes could see, which
was about Is miles in either direction.
During our voyage we made the &C.
with young man by the name of Mus
sen, whom I shall hereafter write of as
Jack, and his tent having been shipped
as baggage was used by us till our
freight was all ashore, which wasn't till
June 81. We took turns watching for it
and in the intervals explored the city
and then the beach for q suitable place
for our permanent camp, finally locating
a good six miles west of the city and we
are still keeping headquarters here, as it
isn't too near the city and we have good
water and plenty of firewood to be had
for the trouble Of picking it up. The
city at the time of our arrival and for
some weeks afterwards was crowded
with people and the stores and restau-
rants did big business while the ganb- |
ling houses, saloons and dance halls were
crowded to the doors day and night, not
excepting Sundays.
The main street (strictly speaking there
was but ono street at that time) was in |
passable condition just In the centre of |
the city but all the others were in fear
ful shape as the frost was just beginning
to come out and when one attempted to
Cross, the ground you'd shake for yards
some of these streets are or were two
weeks ago simply impossible, as found
while trying to traverse as came in
from Anvil creek. had on hip boots
and started to walk alor 6 what was once
called the sidewalk () and kept going
down deeper and deeper till the mud
reached the top Of the boots, and in try.
ing to get out pulled my feet out of
them and was commencing to think of
calling for help, but finally succeeded il
extricating myself and then had to make
wide detour to reach my destination,
which was the postc flee. This (the
Office observes description. 1t is q one
story building about 12x15 with twoI
doors in front for general delivery and a
side door for box holders. Going in atl
the front you.flnd five small holes cut in
wooden partition, the frst on the left
for names with initials A to G, next Dl
to q, 1 to McC, Med to S, T to 2 and
whenever it is known that q mail has
come in there is long line At each door
waiting for the Office to open and vouI
step In at the rear of the line your initial
is on and wait according to the length of
the line ahead of you and on July it
took me little over four hours to get to
the head of the line, but I had the salts
faction of getting several letters from
home, also copy of The BEE. 1 should
have stated that the newspapers and
packs ges have tent just behind the
postt flee and as a rule don't have to ,
wait 80 long there. There is now in
course of construction a good sized two !
story post. flee 80 in short time the &C. ,
will be improved. At the ,
time of our arrival, water tor drinking
or cooking purposes was hard to get and &
was csrted around the city in tin cans. G
five gallons, ard 1t was a queer sight to | 9
see the water cart drawn by dogs com. I
ing along the street. There are thousands :
Of dogs used for carting all sorts of stuff I
and it is surprising to see what an im-I
mense load team Of SIX good dogs will /
ull. They are also used to carry a pack q
on their back and will run along quite r
with heavy weight and in | q
the winter IL of the hauling is done by {
Them, they being hitohed to sleds. Inl q
starting them the Indian word s'mush" q
Is used in place of get up and this is also q
said when one is On trip to the noun. q
tain or creek that he is ''mushing. :" j
When our Iur is all gone 1t Is ''peluck, ;" a
another Indian word ie the term for new-I &
conner, for be is called a "chee-chs wker. I" q
[ don't know how it is spelled but that ia Z
the way it sounds. When a person is q
sick of the country and wants to getI G
away he is said to have "cold feet' and t
going to the states is spoken of as "go-I '
ing on the outside.' And now for de- :
scription of the tundra of which you
ave heard 80 much. ALI along the I
beach, which is not very wide, varyingI
from about 200 to 500 feet is bank Wirb5