Evening capital news. (Boise, Idaho) 1901-1927, 1916-09-17

the Pacific and Arctic
oceans, and half way down the Yukon on its
course from the international bundary at
Eagle to its mouth, where it flows out into
Boring sea not far from St. Michael.
have come 800 miles down the river from
Canada on my way to this point, and have
300 miles more to 60 before | can get the
little steamer that will take me over Boring
sea to Nome Just opposite where my
steamboat is anchored is the mouth of the
,Tanana river 1t is WIDE sluggish stream,
having a course OF so netting like 600 miles
from the Wrangell mountains to where it
flows into the Yukon 1t will take me two
DAYS of steaming to 70 up it to Fairbanks,
where the terminus of Uncle Sam S new rail
road is to be.
The people here think that the railroad
should be extended to Ianana. They claim
that the Tanana river is not deep enough
for large steamers, and that its sand bars and
islands affect navigation They say that if
the road were so constructed as to cross the
Yukon at the rapids about 35 miles above
here the cost OF Birding would be extremely
low and the road could then be run down
the north bank OF the river to Tanana open
ing up a vast region lying to the west and
north of the Yukon. This region has some
of the richest placer deposits of Alaska, in
Guiding those of the Koyukuk river, where
on several occasions as much as $4,000
worth Of quartz gold has been found at the
foot of shaft eight or ten feet in depth.
They assert that such road would also
open up the great farming possibilities Of
interior Alaska and would give direct access
Ito the Yukon and its enormous tributary
system.
There is no doubt that Tanana can offer
room for all the population she may have in
1.-THE future. The corporate limits at present
are large enough to give an acre to every
imam, woman and child and leave some to
spare. The town has 400 population, and II
lis scattered along the water front for more
than a mile At the lower end of it begins
the army post OF Fort Gibbon, which eX-
tends three miles father, and which has Il
government reservation of 90 square miles.
The town consists of the post and the civil
community. The latter has two churches,
three hotels. six saloons and several large
Ine1Cdntlle cSIdDHSHlnenlS. 1t Has also Il
public school and movie show. The build
ings are of logs and boards, and the place on
the whole is the largest and most prosperous
of all on the Yukon river proper.
The people OF Tanana are enthusiastic
fAlaskans They have a chamber of COM
imerce, consisting Of boomers. They have Il
camp of the Arctic Brotherhood and a local
organization known as the Loyal Order OF
the Moose Talk to them about their village
and they will make you think it paradise,
as beautiful as the Vale of Kashmir and as
salubrious as Los Angeles | asked Judge
Dehn, the United States commissioner, who
has been here Il years, what he thought of
the climate. He replied:
81 like it and | keep healthy and happy
summer and winter Our summers, which
last from May until the middle of Septem-
Der, are more delightful than those of any
part of the states The thermometer ranges
from As to 90 degrees above zero, and for
the most OF the time there is scarcely an
hour that you cannot read within doors
From June | 5 to the 10th of July there is no
real darkness, even at midnight"
allow about your winters?" | asked.
''fhe man who went away from here and
said that we have nine months of hard win
ter and after that three months of bad
sleighing is a liar. Our winter starts in
about October |, when the thermometer
drops to Is degrees above zero. AT that time
the ground freezes and remains solid all
winter. The frost goes down to the bed of
glacial ice that lies under great part Of
Alaska, and, as far as we know, we live on a