Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1902-05-17
COAL IN THE ARCTIC
Alaska Could Furnish the
World With Fuel.
HAS WIDEST OF SEAMS
EVEN BEACHES ARE COVERED
WITH BLACK DIAMONDS.
The Eskimo's Superstition of the Use
the White Man Has
for It.
Written for The Evening Star.

Nrltten Tor Inc Evening star.
1t was a wild and fur-clad Eskimo that
ran whooping up the arctic sea beach of
northern Alaska. Above him frowned bare.
black cliffs of shale and sandstone, cutting
off the low. midday sun. The arctic foes
blinked the sky to nOrthward and on the
slopes and lodges lay ice masses of COM
pacted snow. The elder ducks, frightened,
shrieked and fled away before him. while
fast as he ran. yet faster down the cliff
plunged and whirled a dancing boyle, which
seemed bent capturing the clumsy ma
tive of the arctic wastes, yet which was
nothing more or less than a big meal sack
full of coal
We gathering coal from the vast
deposits of the far north, and Hoodlum
that was as near we could get to his
Eskimo name). was man Friday. 1t
was singular what a desire, what a yearn-
ing, those sacks of coal seemed to have for
Hoodlum There were many other Eski-
mos in the party at work for us, but none
of the coal sacks had any malignant yearn-
ing toward them Some of them worked
with us or the vein at the cliff top, some
piled the coal into sacks, and some were
at the cliff base with Hoodlum, helping
load the sacks aboard the whale boat.
thence TO transferred to the ship, but
none Of the sacks chased them. The sack
was sure to follow HoOdlum, however,
whether he ran up the beach or down, and
it only made him more certain that there
was some witchcraft about the whole bust
ness. and that malevolent- spirit having
designs on his life dwelt in the coal. The
black stones he familiar with. But
that any man should be so 'kuka willow"
as he termed it. as to load these stones
aboard the big canoe, the umiakpuk and
carry them away, savored obviously of
evil spirits. and the more coal came down
the harder he ran from it.
The Magic in the Coal.
There was magic in 1t. too. The magic of
money: for these same black stones sold in
Nome that year for $50 the ton and not
enough of them We're to be had at any
price. But how was Hoodlum to know
that?
Almost the entire northern coast of Alas
ka from Boring strait to Point Barrow is
striped with seams of semi-bituminous coal
and these veins extend inland no man
knows how far Upon the beach live the
year round few Eskimo families with two
wolves ever at the igoo door famine and
cold Yet in the very ground under their
lsloos. in the cliffs which they preca-
riouSly snare fowl for a scant refuge
from starvation. lies wealth which cannot
be estimated, and fuel enough to heat the
whole world for untold generations. Enor-
nous supplies of coal lie almost on the
surface-no man has yet estimated the
quantity. AS you sail from Cape LiSburne
to Cape Beaufort you may see miles of cliff
in which the dark bands of it slant ribbon
like from beach to summit When the brief
summer thawS the ice the coal falls ont of
these veins in masses that lie in the lev
surf, blocks containing tons of fuel each
Ihere are places where ships crew can
actually pick up a cargo of good coal from
the beach and the surf at the base of the
cliffs. \ blast set in these veins sends
many tons OF il rumbling down to the wa
ter. and from the summit of the headland
You may see the surface Groupings stretch
ing miles inward in the form of parallel
ridges In them the brown ground souir-
res which the Eskimos trap for fur and
Iood. Dig their burrows and throw up black
AedpS OF crumblinS coal at the doors.
A Wonderful Coal Vein.
Probably the widest single vein of coal
known In the world is found there. Such
d VEN Is considered good one when it is
eight feet wide; this one is eight times that
width. If you paddle along the beach a lit
Tie north of Cape Beaufort in a kyack you
may look over the side In shallow water
and see the dark band running in from the
sea fully sixty feet in width How far in
iahu II extends no man may know; certain
II is that far back in the hills a stream
cuts 1t and runs through black coal cliffs
over a pebbiy bed of coal. Its depth too
IS unknown. but 1t and similar smaller ones
are supposed to dip with the sandstone
ana conSIomerate far beneath the inland
nlhs' they certainly reappear several hum
bred miles to the south on the shores of
kotzebue sound. The fey Eskimos who
nave explored the inland rivers in tncir
hunting expeditions tell of cliffs through
which the water breaks that are similarly
scanned with "adloha,' the black stones
which the white men covet
Whaiers. too, who have wintered at
Herschel Island and taken winter trips in
land with the natives, tell us that at a
hundred or so miles back from the Arctic
sea are river branches whose water is
warmed by heat from underground and
that FOR certain portion of their course
they DO not freeze over, even in the sever
est weather the natives resorting thither
for winter fishing. Whence comes the heat
for the warming of this water? 1t Is not a
volcanic region. All about for ten months
OF the year the snow lies fathoms j, ep
drifted under the perpetual night by tie
Icy gales in whose touch lies death for
every living thing long exposed to them