The daily Alaskan., 1914-05-06
ONLY A HALF TRUTH

:he caption of Alaska; Land Of Opportunity" gives a lengthy writo- up, profuseIy illustrated. of this northern country. 1Ir Welliyer's article, as far as it goes, is all right, but the immensi,y of the task he undertook evidently over sbadowed his powers of observation, description and illustration, for lit deals almost exclusively with the Southwestern and 1 IMiddIewesteru portion of the territory, and hardly mIaes men ton of the Southeastern part, which lis, in-reality, the most promising in many ways of the whole vast area of which he treats. Now, do not misunderstood us, f.r while We are in no way trying to de,racJ from any portion of Alaska in com parison with the Southeastern part We believe we are safe i0 the at- firmauon that in no other portion of the territory, in an alea equal ta extent to the long narrow strip which is embraced in what is known at Southeastern Alaska, is there the possibility of as great returns from certain industries as there is here.
 h this connection We refer more particularly to the exploitation and development of the immense ore l bodies which have already been dis covered and are of proven richness, and which will be pouring out their golden treasures long after the placer fields have been worked out and practically forgotten.
 lIr. WelHyer, also 1ss several illustrations of interior Alaska horticultural and agricultural scenes. l His information along these lines seems to have been furnished by Prof c. T. Georgeson, :n charge 0l the experimental station at sitka, ] whose time since his appointment Ito that position, appears to have been mostly taken up in finding enough soil around Sitka to give l his experimental farm small sembIauce of what it is intended to be; and as that very learned gentle man has during his tenure oL office seen fit to almost totally
 overlook the most fertile, and pro Ilific spots in the territOry--i. e. the sections around Skaway, Dyea and Haines-it is hardly to be wonder
 ed at that a person who was simply
 making a tour of the country, as
 was Mr. Welliyer, should laiI to be
 more explicit.
 MT. WeIliyer says: "Cne private gardener (presuma3ly of Fairbanks)
 is credited with producing half
 ton of cabbage on a half acre of ground in the seaso2 of 1910."
 In 1913 Roy Gault vt Skagway, produced 25OO pounds Os potatoes
 on less than one-fourtreuth of an 1 acre Of ground, or approximately I17Is tons to the acre.
 In 1913 H. D. Clark of Skagway | produced and shipped out over six
 tons of as fine celery as was eyer 1 grown anywhere.
 J In 1913, in Haines, one man grew coco quarts of strawberries for shipment. besides all those he sold 1 for home consumption; others rais-
 ed and shipped 1000 sacks of rut-
 abagas, 150 sacks of potatoes and
 about one ton of cabbage.
 In addition to the above, in Skag-
 way especially, almost every family
 has its own garden patch in sum
 mer in which is grown all the veg l etables used.
 In concluding his article Mr.. 1 IWelliYer says:
 No presentation of the facts | concerning this new Alaskan era
 would be either complete or just if it omitted acknowledgement of the | great services rendered to his con- Istituents and to the nation by James | Wickersham, delegate in Congress from the Territory. It has been the peculiar good fortune of Alaska that
 iu it's pioneering epoch it was able 10 command the services of a man
 who can combine all tho elements of practical statesmanship in the