The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-09-21
STRANGE WHITE ESKIMOS
From the New York Sun.

From the New York Sun.
 TYR. vILHJALMAR Stefansson, eth II noloslst, anthropoiostst and ex- 0 plorer who found new race Of men in blond Eskimos, some of whom were red bearded, in what maps declare to be ''uninhabited territory in the coro- nation gulf region of Victoria Island, British Columbia, came back to town yes terday on the Twentieth Century Limited He spent the greater part of the afternoon at the American Museum of Natural His tory telling about his trip
 pr. Stefansson was possibly more in- terested in the curious blond people whom he lived with and studied for several months than almost any other or ms ilnds' but the museum heads believe that his most valuable discoveries dealt with the pottery art in the Arctic regions. In the past it was believed that only the Eskl7 mos in Alaska knew anything about the use of pottery for cooking and other pur- poses, but Dr. Stefansson found specl- mems throughout the extensive section over which he travelled, even in the land of the strange blond people, although they were not given to the use of it. Some or the weird looking pots and things that he dug up are very old and may have seen service long before the days of the old est of the Eskimos' forefathers. There arc now on the way to the mus cum aboard the whaler Belvidere, due to reach San Francisco in November, be- tween 40,oo0 and b0ooo ethnological speci- mems, including pottery, clothing, weap- ons. furniture etc., which Stefansson gathered with the assistance of pr. R. N. Anderson, one of the museums scien- tists Dr. Anderson started on the expe- dition with Dr. Stefansson in 1908, but left him before he made his jaunt into the land of the blond people He Is aboard the whaler with the treasures.
 As pr. Stefansson said in his account in last Sundays Sun, of the finding or fair haired Eskimos, 'the purpose of the expedition was to find Esllimos uncontam- mated by contact with white men, and in this he succeeded beyond his fondest expectations.
 In accomplishing this he takes pride in the fact that his plan of exploration dir- fered essentially from other expeditions of A similar character for his living, talk ing with him simply rifles and ammuni- ton. The usual plan is to carry large quantities of 'pemmican" and other sup plies on dog sleds.
 .I depended altogether on game" he said. My plan can be successfully car ried out in any country where caribou are found During the 1S1a months that I was away I went without breakfast only once. I had with me six dogs and one sled. I took 96o rounds of ammunition and used but 500 rounds"
 1 Asked concerning his impressions as to the ancestry of the white Eskimos, pr. Stefansson said:
 q believe they are descended from an ancestry approximately half European and
 half Eskimo, and the number is so large
 that one must suppose large number of
 white men a long time ago mixed with Eskimo. The only place 1 can think of 1 from which these white men could have
 come is, the west coast of Greenland. It I is well known that this west coast was in-
 habited from before the year 1000 until about 145O by a comparatively prosperous
 colony of Norsemen or Scandinavians.
 one of the evidences of a bygone civil
 zation that interested him greatly was a
 conical stone hut at Superior bay, on the
 south coast of Victoria Land There
 were lots of stones in the vicinity from which the hut was built but there was
 no sign that the structure had been occu-
 pied for many, many moons The stone
 building was a treat to see in a land
 where the people live in snow huts. 1 Dr. Stefansson speaks the Mackenzie River Eskimo dialect. The blond EsSimos
 had dialect of their own. The doctor
 was able however. to make his wants 1 known and the white Eslimos were the
 most hospitable of hosts. The doctor fig
 ured that the population of the strange
 people was in the neighborhood of 2ooO
 and he got around to see about 1000 of
 them before he said goodby.