Iditarod pioneer., 1915-05-01
McKINZIE BUTTERFIELD
 GIVES HIS IMPRESSIONS
(Valdez Commoner)


 zie Butterfeld, elected to the lower house of the territorial legislature from Too Much Gold creek wrote to his partner Gum boot" Bill Chase:
 Juneau, Alaska, March :, 1915
 ''Pardner Bill 'Cording to my disvowal when you dumped my official carcass out of the sled at salt waiter and headed the dogs back over the trail, 1 take my pencil this dark and rainy morning from the desk which bears my name to tell you and the boys on Too Much Gold creek about how the legislature team IS pulling
 "Well, Collins is at the gee-pole in our room. He is speaker. Which means that he is supposed to do the talking, but he don't do it. He lets anybuddy talk, which is pretty good for a WickerSham son-of a gun.
 Dan Sutherland, the old scoundrel, is mushin the sennet along To see him in the pulpit, Bill, you would never recognize him for the man that staggered into our camp on No Wood creek that day with no outfit but blood-staned club with which he had been killing rabbets for too weeks. He jest seems to fit any kind of hole.
 Had some bad feelings getting organized. Hard shell Democrats wanted an office or too but the Wickershams didn't even give them a piece of the core. 'Corse being elected on non-c -commlttel ticket 1 didn't worry.
 However that is the hard-shells say on the a. t. that they arr going to block legis- lashun in the sonnet Three of them can do it before that Nome man gets into camp. But believe me. Gumboot Bill Chase, if they try 1t the Hon. McKinzie Butterfeld of Tco Much Gold creek is goin' down in history. Dan Is a friend of mine. Didn't we sWare it over his buddy rabbet club on No Wood creek that day when the wolves was howlin' on lis unprotected tracks and the halo of political glory had encircled our respective brows?
 ''Irom the lop-sided door of the cabin on Too Much Geld l hear voice say "Yes"
 "Then 1, Mckinzie Butterfeld, eschewing parliamentary tictacs, do here and now declare that l shall overtake one of those three traiters some dark night when he is going home and remove this obstacul to legiSlashun to the hospital
 T confess being little previous in these foremost remarks
 "Organizashun we've ben organizing for a weak Somebody gets appointed to do something and before be dares to move a man gets on each side of him and steadies him along. Then somebuddy else gets ap- pointed and they do the same thing. It is called escorting them to the chair, and it takes up lot of time. After some more of these 'nonkeyshines a committee is ap- pointed to intervue a committee that was ol j bnfNro +O ,r1-ac+irn+a other committee and then we all adjourn and retire to rest our overtaXed minds
 T guess 1 desecrated the rules of the houses and made a kind of fool of myself the other day.
 "I was named with some other fellers by Collins to notify the seHnet that the house was rediy for business The committee poked around the 1Com for about an hour riting resolutions. had the stennografers working like scared rabbcts returned the docyments to the stennografer and had her rite it all over again because she had made an e in rlace of a in one word, and got tired of it and dinn't see any use of it any way So 1 oreDed the door and says pretty loud for was mad at the committee max ing the stennografer work when they wasn't any use of it:
 Say Dan I says the more numerous branch Of the Alaska do nothings assem- bled this day on the third floor of the StengoId building, has broken camp and is reddy for the trail. Have you got your dogs harressed yet"
 'Dan looked kind of funny, but he smiled. He's sport, Dan is and he knows me.
 q slammed the door shut and said
 "'The higher order of things will have their sleds lasned in a few minutes. I move that we go ahead and break trail
 There was unnatural silence in the legis- lative hall for minute and quarter, dur ing which they all looked at me as if l was Old Charlotte Jump-in-the-fre and had got hold of bottel of red ink whisky. Then they began to whisper and smla-all but one of the stennografers.
 Say Bill, there is a person behind a typewriter here. She iS-if all the beauty of the flowers was mixed together and the sunlight on the mountain peaks and the transp2rrency of the iceburgs added to it
 "Well, I grabbed my hat and went down to the Louvre, where nigger man beats a pesnno in the corner and the smell of human nature is like green grass in the spring.
 Rite a letter and tell me how far down you and the Bisket Kid have got in the new shaft on 4 below, also if Jake's front paw is well yet, and if you caught the wolverine that has been robbing our trap line
 More to come. McKINZIE"