Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1914-06-26

katchewan, those provinces in Canada
| to which so many good American
farmers have been immigrating and
making fortunes in the cultivation Of
wheat
In this region temperatures have
been recorded as low as IS degrees be-
low zero and as high as 80 above. This
means a short, hot, luXuriant summer,
with long, severe winter, but neither
of these is materially different from
regions in Canada that are furnishing
homes and prosperity for hundreds of
thousands of settlers.
All this region is full Of a multitude
of resources that has been but indicat-
ed by the accomplishments Of the last
decade and a half. Already gold aside
| from that which has been washed out
Of the sands has been regularly mined
| in Alaska sufficient to furnish
wealth of $57,OO0,0OO. OF this nearly
81, 900 900 was produced last year. Yet
this hardly compares with the placer
| gold that has been washed out Of the
sands at Nome and Fairbanks and
over on the Yukon and down the Sus-
tina rivers OF this powdered gold
$145, 100000 has been sent out Of
Alaska, and last years production was
s12 2OO0, 900.
Though the Alaskan miner has been
interested in little else than gold, he
last year extracted 90,0OO,OOO pounds
of copper from the ores of this region.
Here also is to be found coal in prac-
tically unlimited quantities, and so
placed as to make it particularly easy
to get out To be tapped by the pro-
posed railroads are the Bering river
region and the Matanuska fields,
| which compare with the best regions
of Pennsylvania. There are gold bear
ing gravels and copper deposits and
wide stretching forests to the interior,
the possibilities of which are as yet
merely a matter Of speculation.
Last year 100000 worth of potatoes
alone were raised in this part of Alas
ka. Oats and barley and rye are grown
and ripened in abundance. Thrifty
farms are springing up around Fair
banks in the far interior The depart
ment Of agriculture reports that there
are great numbers Of crops that may
| be produced abundantly during the
short, warm summers and that there
| are possibilities of developing certain
varieties of grains that will be peculi-
arly adapted to Alaska conditions and
that may open up undreamed possibil-
tiles. 1t is even hinted that these broad
acres might be made to yield of their
| abundance in the short summer sea-
son and that their owners might spend
| half the year in California.
Most unique of all the known latent
! resources Of Alaska is that which lies
| in its reindeer herds. For thirty years
the federal government has been build
ing up reindeer herds in Alaska with
the idea of substituting reindeer rails
| ing for cattle raising and in grating
| it as a mammoth industry upon this
region. The government herds are now
many and large, and their numbers are
multiplying so rapidly that it is prom
ised that soon the ranges Of Alaska
may be stocked with reindeer as were
our western plains with cattle three
| decades ago.
But, according to Secretary Lane
and the Alaska railway commission
and Other authorities upon the devel
| opment Of new regions, the possibil
ties of such a country can in no way
be gauged by it's known resources
When a railroad penetrates a region
and great numbers of people follow
that road they everywhere turn up
new ideas that lead to wealth. When
the Southern Pacific railroad, for in
stance, pushed through New Mexico
and Arizona and southern California,
no human being dreamed that this
country, then called the Great Amer
lean desert" was to become the great
est copper producing region in the