The Ketchikan miner., 1909-01-30
Causes of
 the Earthquake

The following article ''The Cause of Earthquakes" first appeared in the Philadelphia Ledger and. has since been copied extensively by the news papers of the country.
 From the primitive ages when men sought to account for earthquakes by peoplng the deeps with mighty mons ters, whose wrath at mankind or whose struggles to escape tba enveloping rocks made the earth fo tremble, " until this age of exact science man. kind has made little real progress toward a solution of the problem. Up to the beginning "f the present gen. eration about all that was accom- plished by the physicists and geolog- i,ts who gave their attention to the subject was the cataloguing of external ob ervations as to the damage and suff- ering caused hy earthquakes, and while it cannot bs said that the mod ern science of seismology- dating practically from the invention of the recording instruments and the system- atic multiplication of recording stations-has yet done much for the protection of the dwe lers on the earth surface, it is beginning to throw some light on what is going on below it.
 At the same tune the conclusion of seislnologists have not yet been so crystalized as to permit of dogmatism. and there are several theories. each of which has it's earnest advocates and supporters. All are agreed that the primary cause is distur bance of the rocky structures of the earth's crust displacement, settlement or upheav- al-but there the agreem ent ends. the exact cause of that disturbance hay ing yet to be ascertained. Some mod ern theories even retain as part of their explanations the belief of some of the earlier Greek philosophers in the breakingdown of vast caverns with in the earth, and the Aristotelian theories are still to be traced in the hypothesis maintained until very re- centiy that the shocks proceed from single point.
 It was the multiplication Of minute observations and the increase of sta tions which led to the discovery that earthquakes occur most frequently along certain lines of the earths sur face, and hat these lines mark the location of breaks or folds iaults-in the crust. Hense the belief now gen. eral that the regions of greatest earth quake frequency are those where the crust of the earth is weakest and sub ject to the greates. strain. On the edges of great ocean ''deeps land of lofty mountain elevations. and in cer- tain other known localities. are the region of greatest instability. but the explanations of the nature of the movo- ments hat are taking place are varied.
 Some geopl yscists hold that the contraction of the crust from cooling is suffcienr for the worlds growing 
 pains and coptortions. Others find in the gradual shiftingin weights and pressures, from the denudat ion of the co ,tneuts anl tne gel ll al elevations and Impressions that arr going on. an adequate explanation oi volcanic and seismic act ion; while si i'll others hold that the stupendouS pressure Of the elastic masses within the eaiih are the cause of the slips and breaks along the fault lines. To still annth"r theory Professor See of the l'nited States navy has given the weight Of his authority. He tint. in he proximity of sea water 10 the sr neS uf greatest volcanic and earthquake, nativity the key to the mystery, tis ih nry in be- liet b. ing that vulcauic rihrealS and earthquakes are caused by vast steam explosions deep within the eartn's stony framework by the inliltrasion of water to the regions where intense pressure heats it to the explosive pOtI,t