The Ketchikan miner., 1915-03-18

Between one hundred and twenty five and one hundred and fifty men attended the meeting called by the Chamber of Commerce at the Town Hall yesterday afternoon The meet ing was held for the purpose of talk ing over the conditions confronting Ketchikan on the hal'but question.
 Edw. Brown, president of the Com mercial Club called the meeting to order. and then asked Fremont King, i chairman of the committee recently appointed to investigate the matter, to take the chair. This MT. King did, and in short talk outlined the reasons for calling the meeting. Richard Bushell, Jr., was called on and told of the need of concerted ac- tion by the whole of the population of this region. By this time J. R. Beegle, one of the members of the committe had arrived. and being giv- thoroughly. He showed that if a thoroughly. Hhe showed that if a duty existed on fish, the Secretary of the Tereasury had the power to re- fuse the bonding privilege which has been allowed to fish going through Canada, but as the present tariff law had put fish on the free list. this means to prevent the landing of Al aska fish at foreign port was with out avail, and the only other remedy as he could see it pending g change in the law, was the securing of ter minal rates for Ketchikan from the transcontinental lines of the United States and the Grand Trunk Pacific so that the halibut fishermen could sell their catches in Ketehikan to the buyers representing the different fish concerns. By doing this, Mr. Beegle says. the fish can be handled by any of the transcontinentab roads, either those with tide water term. inals on Puget Sound or at Vancouver or Prince Rupert, it would make no difference to Ketchikan, provided the fish was sold here.
 Other speakers, D. w. Hunt, J. F. Riyard, w. A. Bryant, A. R. Larson, George Rounsefell Charles E. Inger. soil, Dr. B. l.. Myers, c. II. Field and NJ. J. Heneghan, all favored taking the matter up with the railroads at Seattle. E. c. Austin was not in favor of taking any action for the time being, believing that Seattle would get busy whether we did any. thing or not. Edw. Brown favored making connections with Prince Ru- pert in preference to Seattle. George Wilkes said that he believed compe. tition is the life of trade, and that if Ketchikan had spirit something along the same line as the Seattle Spirit of which we used to hear so much it would be better for all con. cerned. He further stated that the town should make every effort to get in closer andmore sympathetic touch with the fishermen, although he fail ed to state how this was to be effect cd. II. R. Thompson as fish shipper suggested that an association be form cd here for the purpose of so hand ling the fish business that the pro- ducers could be reasonably assured of good price of their catch, even it it should be necessary to curtail the production of halibut. E. C. How ard was of tho opinion that CO. operative company could be formed to handle the sale of fish. Two fisher men present gave their side of the matter, one saying that is was a matter of bread and butter with the producers ,who would most assuredly sell their catches where they could get the best price, and believes that great deal could be accomplished by cooperation. The other, apparently of the I. w. W. stamp, made the state- ment that there could not be any thing common between the fisher men and the storekeepers of the town, and the only way the fisher men could get all there was in the business was by them controlling both the production of fish and the sale of same.
 A motion was made that the matter he taken up with the railroad com panies running out of Puget Sound, and the meeting adjourned.