The daily Alaska citizen., 1919-11-27
ALASKA THE DESERTED" IS TITLE
 OF MAGAZINE ARTICLE WRITTEN
 FORMER ALASKA MISSIONARY

Under inc caption of Alaska the Deserted" our former townsman, Rev. Hall Young. contributes a lengthy article to the New Era magazine, the official medium of the Presbyterian church. in which he joins with some others of the clergy in painting Ala .ka in ifs darkest colors but admits that the depression is only temper ary and the unlimited resources of the territory are eventually to be develop ed with the return of an era of pros perity. He writes in part as follows:
 It has been my misfortune good fortune. l esteem ito have been in ,mately acquainted with the young eiantess. Alaska for she has the spirit of perpetual youth-for more than forty-one years. She is generally depicted. in the imagination of her ad- mirers. as young woman of large but symmetrical proportions. seated upon the snowy peak of a sky piercing mountain. arrayed rather lightly for the Arctic climate that is supposed to environ her. attended on one hand h. & polar bear and on the other by giant moose; and her head crowned with a diadem composed of gold and icicles There is a look of benignity and happiness upon her beautiful countonance, and she is altogether adorable.
 Were I to depict Miss Alaska this year would present a forlorn and forsaken figure. with pick and sickle cast away, gold crown fallen of her head, weeping copious tears which congeaI into ice as they fall.
 For Alaska is at present decidedly in the dumps" When I went to her shore is 1878 she was despised and forsakon. There were 35,0OO heather natives on her shores and less than 200 whites. had the great and unde served good fortune of being able to persuade the only American young woman in the territory at that time to marr1 me. There were only two postoffces-S Fort Wrangell. And little steamer came once month from Portland, Ore.,-there was then no Seattle-to supply us with our mail Alaska had been taken by the United States government, garrisOned by sol diars and visited often by war vessels for ton years; then given up as bad investment There was not gold mine, coal mine, marble quarry or lumber mill in the territory, and only one salmon cannery started that year.
 need not recount here the steps of surprising progress made by this northwestern possession of ours, Ala ska has amazed the world and is re- cognized as one of the richest prov inccs in natural resources to be found anywhere on the globe. Its progress. tho it seemed very slow to us who were toiling and moiling there, ap- ueared surprisingly swift to those who knew Alaska as Stewards Folly" and now know it as "Uncle Sans Trea- sure House" The $7,0O0OO0 paid fol the territory was money thrown into tie Pacfc ocean," now we know that the territory has produced, principally in the last twenty-two years, over ,.a0 100000 in different kinds of trea' sure
 But this year the wave of progress seems to have receded It is decidedly low tide on the Alaska shore. Two years ago it's white population was es- timated at from 5O,0OO to 55,OOO The coming winter it is probable that not more than 25,O0O of the Caucasian race will be found in the territory The value of exports will be dropped to one-half the amount reported for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1918. The production of gold, copper, tin, lumber, farm products and even can ned salmon, all show a depressing de crease Towns that were booming two years ago are now almost deserted and the activity of the gold prospec- tof and the settler is slowed up to what would have appeared to those of us who know this immense wealth and inevitable greatness of Alaska in some of it's heydays, an unbelievable degree
 I shall briefly enumerate a few of the reasons for this slump in Alaskan values.
 First-The war, while it stimulated production along certain lines, ultt- rately retarded the development ot territory. A larger percentage of Ala ska's young men went to the wa than those of any other state or teri tory. From mining camp, from lumber rill and fishery, these typical young Americans rushed to take an eagel part in the war for world freedom Most of them have not returned, anc many of them will not return, having found other fields of activity.
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