Martinsburg journal. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1920-1977, 1921-06-16

V
shifting of world interest to the
Pacific, and the rapid growth of its
commerce, the western rim OF the
United States where it touches the
yastest of the worlds oceans is be-
coming one of the country's most
important boundaries says a bull
letin issued by the washington, d.
G., headquarters of the National
Geographic Society.
This ripping line of Pacific
surf marks the end of the great
Aryan migration, which began ages
ago in some mysterious, unknown
land of central Asia, surged
through the deep valleys of the
Himalayas, and has since poured
ever westward, making the greater
part of the worlds history as it
went. Across this boundary Of
white colonization the yellow peo-
pie of the East have shown them
selves ready to flow in a counter
current, making complicated racial
problems and giving the western
boundary an ethnic importanc which
none of the other three boundar-
les possesses.
The Paclfic's Hidden Harbors.
For centuries after the discov-
cry Of the Atlantic caost of Amer
lea, even for centuries after Balboa
first looked upon the Pacific at
Panama and after his compatriots
sailed ships across its vast ex-
panse. the Pacific coast Of what is
now the United States, remained
practically unknown. Cabrillo,
Spanish navigator, it Is true, enter
ed San Diego Bay near the present
Mexican border in 1912 and his ex-
petition later sailed north as far
as the big bulge in the coast line.
But the two priceless features OF
the Pacific coast were missed: San
Francisco Bay, one OF the greatest
safest, and best of the harbors Of
Puget Sound, where land-locked
Seattle and a group of ether fine
! harbors now handle a large part Of
i the commerce between America and
i the Orient.
This failure of early navigators
to find San Francisco Bay. though
many Of them passed up and down
the coast and the Spanish even
made a special effort to discover
a satisfactory harbor. constitutes
one of th1 mysteries of the Pacific
seaboard. Francis Drake is suppos-
ed to have anchored in BCdega
Bay, about 40 miles northwest of
i san Francisco, and numerous other
/ explorers visited the tiny brakes
Bay only thirty miles northwest of
the Golden Gate, and the Far-....
islands, an equal distance due west
of the entrance to the great bay,
/ but none of these soiourners ap-
pears to have obtained the slight
est inkling Of the existence so
close by OF the matchless barber
The bay was first sighted from the
land in 1869, more than two hun
bred years after the Spaniards be
gan their search for Pacific coast
harbor, and it was six years later
when the first ship sailed through
the Golden Gate
Where Mountains Meet the Sea.
The Pacific coast of the United
States is markedly different from
the Atlantic coast, especilly that
part OF the latter south of Massa-
chusetts. with its relatively low
sandy shores and its outlying bull
wark of sand islands and sand
spits. San Diego Bay, only ten
miles north Of the Mexican border
is the only bay of major import
ance on the Pacific coast of the
/ United States land-locked by Il
sand spit Point Iona. forming
the northern boundary of San Die
go Bay, however. is a ridge several
hundred feet high, and from there
northward to Canada with only a
few miles of narrow lowlands be
tween the sea and the hills or