The Cordova daily times., 1916-09-15
WORK BULL DINC JINGLE ShM'S
 RAILROAD

SEWARD, Sept I4.-A government railroad gang driving line across a wild bit of Alaska and breaking the age-old silence Of the almost primevaI section with the prosaic locomotive toots and crashes of falling timbe~. is meeting unusual situations and mix ups heretofore unknown to construc- ton workers The road is the Ameri- can governments first venture in that branch Of the transportation business and when completed. will connect Fairbanks. the metropolis Of the fer tile Panama valley, and the coal fields of Matanuska with the selport of Seward. which is never closed with ice.
 Often gangs away out on the out posts of the line are foreotten or overlooked by the headquarters com missary department and have hard times getting their supplies Rival engineers compete for construction material at the supply station in order that they may go ahead.
 Advance guards of the road have already penetrated far into the Ta1- keena country. some 15o miles in land from Seward Lieutenant Fred erick Mears. of the Alaska Railroad Commission. has charge of the work.
 The railroad is already using coal from the fields it is tapping The Happy Valley" Coal Company is sell ing the coal, and has disposed of sev- eraI thousand tons in the construc- ton town
 When headquarters were built at Anchorage the gang faced the prob lem of unloading ships by barges in an eight knot tide Every Alaskan sourdough in the section had his own ideas about the problem. and none were backward in adyi-ine Lieutenant Mears. The question was solved by the erection of a "eridiron" at the mouth of a creek al Anchorage The barees are loaded from the ships an chored off the town. and then are hauled onto this gridiron at high tide. When the tide goes out they are left high and dry and are unloaded at lei sure into the ears or warehouses.
 When the longshoremen were strik- ing up and down the coast, there was trouble in getting supplies to Anchor age. And after they did arrive there was competition between representa- tives of the cooks .of the different camps as to who was to get the most Sometimes it was a Survival of the fittest." and the camp with the strong est representative often had more to eat than their fellow workers who sent little man to town Often those not represented got nothing. And even after the supplies were on the trains on route to camps far out along the line they were not always safe, for intermediate camps would stall the trains sometimes and help themselves
 Advance gangs change their posi- tious suddenly and carry but few sup plies, depending upon the commissary department to keep them supplied. Sometimes they are forgotten. or over looked. and then send in hurry calls. In response to one hurry call. one camp once received ten barrels of sauer kraut On the next call 1t was sent a whole beef. several eases of tomato catsup and nine kegs of pick les For two days the men lived on beef and pickles, and then moved depositing the remainder in the brush along the track. and sending one of their number to Anchorage to hold conference with the steward
 There is considerable rivalry to ob- tain construction material among the division engineers. With war orders on hand. the factories sometimes de lay their shipments, Each engineer wants to make a good showing, and were it not for the building hand of the Alaska Railroad Commission. which has charge Of the work, the most aggressive division head would take his choice and inc others would take what they could get But tine work is progressing regularly as the commission is handling the supplies.