The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1909-09-08
YHAT is WHAT POINT BARROW
ALASKA, IMPLORES OF
UNCLE SAM.
UNCLE SAM.
Three Deliveries of Reading Mat
ter From ''HOme" Every Twelve
Months Would Make Four
teen Men Happy.


teen Men Happy.
Suppose, instead of two or three
mails a day-to say nothing of ter
or dozen-you had to content your
self with two or three week. Sup
pose instead of two or three a week
even, your chance of getting letter
or of sending one, were cut down to
two a year Suppose you had to wait
six long, weary months for the as
surance that she-the particular
"she" for whose sake, perhaps, you
were seeking your fortune so far
from civilization-still loved you,
and then had to be content with the
assurance that she did-several
months ago. Wouldn't the arrival
of the mail mean a lot to you?
Wouldn't the announcement of one
more mail week, the possibility
of one more mail year, be thing
to lie awake nights thinking about?
We'll, Alaska has been having the
one more mail a week this last win
Rorth" of the postal service of the
entire world, has been dreaming of
one more mail a year-and the
dream may come true. For last Fall
Uncle Sam announced three instead
of two mails for Alaska for the win
ter of l908-'09, and last spring
Point Barrow asked for three in
stead of two mails a year, and the
postoff1ce department is considering
the matter, and may see it's way to
granting the request.
THE Alaska mail service!" The
words are no more imposing than
well, than the New England mail
service" But they mean lot more
and lot less; a lot more in en-
deavor, in difficulties met and con-
quered; in impOssibilities performed;
a lot less in mail delivered. The
Alaskan mail service is one of the
governments practical philanthro-
pies. 1t doesn't pay, of course, in
dollars and cents. 1t pays 80 cents
the pound, and costs something like
SIS, but in what it contributes to-
ward making life under peculiarly
desOlate circumstances approximately
worth living it pays a hundredfold.
Alaskan Rural Free Delivery
The Alaskan mail service is the
limit of the rural free delivery idea.
1t is rural free delivery carried to
its logical-or rather it's heroically
logical-cOnclusion It's routes are
from $50 to $50 miles long. They
are traversed, as already indicated,
from twice a week to twice a year
Most frequently the mail wagons are
sleds, drawn by dogs, though grad
ually, as the country opens up, the
trails of five years ago are the roads
of today, buried though they be un-
der many feet of snow, and horses
are supplanting huskies. Thus
heavier mails are carried, and with
greater frequency, between the
larger settlements.
On the 65C-mile route from Kotze-
bue to Point Barrow reindeer are
supposed to be used. 1t is frequently
spoken of as ''the only reindeer route
in the world" But in practice it is
doubtful whether reindeer are very
much used. The postoffice depart
ment entertains a strong suspicion
that reindeer have been discarded,
and that the Point Barrow mail is
most frequently delivered by half
breed runners, mere men having al
ways proven superior to the entire
brute creation in the matter of
logged unbeatable endurance.
The postoffice department has fig
ured out what it costs in dollars and
cents to deliver Alaskan mails, but
what it costs in exposure and suffer
ing, in Misunderstanding endeavor, in
dangers faced, in difficulties over
come, no man, not even the man who
does it, can realize.
They are not talkative, these men
who manage the delivery of mails in
Alaska, but the stories they tell
when once fellow gets on the right
side of them! Like all quiet men
naen who have learned the meaning
Of NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS. they do
take notion to talk they have some
thing to say. Modestly they tell
their tales of the great frozen PENN
sula where there are more square
miles than square meals or the bunk
houses, or the native igloos, where
they are glad to spend the night
when on the trail-igloos, which
they entered Santa Claus fashion, by
dropping through the chimney into
the vestibule, which got all the air
for a long succession of rooms from
this same chimney; igloos which
were not to be despised, since they
offered shelter and warmth, and
above all smell-a smell of I'M
washed humanity and caninty
crowded into a small unventilated