Iditarod pioneer., 1915-12-25
DUDE" THOMPSON GETS
 SUUCn7-FUR PUBLICITY

Wien ". r, Thompson Of the Fairbanks News Miner left Fairbanks last fall he ap- nounced that ne would let tue Outside worl know all about Fairbanks, and the infer cnce was ccnl eyed that it you'd also learn about Thompson. The man of unique ideas in newspaper editing and past master in the art Cf getting up publicity programs lost no time ;n breaking into the news, as the foI lowing dispatch from Montreal to the New York World would indicate It is noticeable thai in the relation of the incident which is t!.e sub ect of the news dispatch Y Iea contriHes to keep himself well in the fore ground, which is typical y Thomp,cnjan:
 "I4ntregl Oct 9.-Ihe arrival of at Alaska newspaper man here, on his way tc visit his sick father i'll the United States has uncovered story of exceeding rich ness invoking .he railway development cf hI4,ka and the personality of Franklin K Lane. secretary Cf the interior The tray eler is N.l.&m r, Thompson, publisher cf the News Miner at Eairbals5s MT Ttorup >on tsIl. his s.sr" jh!s way:
 We have dinkly little narrow gauge F; lryau there financially in bankruptcy in thousand ways ineficiently equipped, and S cant pay the interest on the bonds, and l. therefore getting worse al the time. Some body made the supreme court conclude that the railways of Alaska came under the interstate commerce commission, and the clerks of tEe commission began to hand out orders by mail.
 Every railroad in Alaska had to qui; except the Guggenhcim road the White Pass & lullcn and our little forty hye-m.la road Our road could not quit; so long as they kept running they were on earth and had Q chance-when they quit they were dead,
 "Finaly. after the interstate commerce commission had piled up about SI0O0Uo fine and 263 years in jail for the president tue managers very good carpenter, by thc way-came crying to me, asking what he should do It was so funny l told him to forget it and leave it to me.
 "Three weeks later Franklin K Lane president of the interstate commerce com mission, received letter from me which read:
 '''Deor Frank: When you and l used to work together cn the old Tacoma News . generaticn and mere ego, you used to be a gcod fellow, but today you are not, and if you don't change your system something bad is apt to happen to you. For instance. ycu threaten to put CUT little line of railroad out of business unless it hauls dynamite in ten car lengths from the engine. In the first lace, the blamed railway hasn't got ten cars, and in the second place 1t hasn't an engine that could haul ten cars if it had them The only way they can comply with +n of cnto the engine with a ten-car lengths rope Do you care to be responsible for what hap pens to the engine and crew thereof when the train starts down hill?"
 "T continued in the letter with the actual story of the road, and three weeks later both the railroad and myself received letters from Lane assuring us that the interstate com merce commission would make no more trouble for the road-and they have kept their word
 For six months afterwards, after Lane became secretary of the interior l kept get ring letters from different members of the interstate commerce commission explaining why they had mixed it" with our rail road, and apclogizing.
 "'Three months ago the commission formally remitted the immense fines against President Joslin, told him he needn't go to jail for more than 300 years, to which pull ishment he fell heir under the interstate rules-congress had passed a new law re mittng the tax of $l00 mile on all Alaska railways for all the time it had not been paid and for all time to come-just because Lane and I used to work together more than twenty years ago on a little hand-set daily paper in the state of Washington and be cause he is human man when you can eet him to forget his official position.'" ;"