The Concordia sentinel. (Vidalia, Concordia Parish, La.) 1882-current, 1921-01-22

who had some wonderful spruce timber He
framed up the wing for us, built ribs and spars
for the SabiliZer and the ailerOn. OF course each
one of us had a piece of linen for patching; we
pooled supply and covered the wing. The
dope Lieutenant Kirkpatrick, the only chemist we
had in the party. was able to cOncOct from cellu-
lose nitrate, unrefined banana oil, and several
quarts of amyl acetate, proved not very eff
cacious as the linen was about tabby when it
dried as it had been before wetting I3ut We took
a chance on the new wing anyhow. Still another
delay held us at Prince George however for al
most ten days in all, and got our first
quaintance of real frontier town. We got ac-
quainted with hard-boiled miners of the old type.
with iumberjacks-great tall ScOtchmen and little
French Canadians, who came in about twice a
week for the fun of spending their money.
Our next stop was to be at HazeltOn, at the
head of navigation the Skina river, and at one
time the main point of distribution for the region
beyond. Hazelton is right IN the mountains and
these are covered with high timber Due to the
frost, when the timber is removed and the
land pOwed level and cultivated during the sum-
mer, when it thaws out again next spring. it is
rolling and rough the waves of the sea.
Knowing of these conditions, we went on by train
to inspect the landing field before making the
jumprin planes Finding its dimensions In
adequate, Captain Street arranged to have the
grain cut from a field adjoining to make room
for TO aght with safety.
"Our next jump was to land us in United States
territory again, but to reach WrangeI we had to
jump over the Coast Range mountains, at least,
that is what we thought had to do from our
maps, which showed the trend of a river or of a
mountain system and depicted everything else as
perfectly smooth, level country. In point of fact
the region has never been explored or surveyed.
Fortunately, we had clear day for our takeOff
When began to ascend for our hop over the
Y1Ot fol afTRdfb aff
and higher than we had Instead of being 5000
and 1000 feet shown on our map. when we
reached a height of 1000, we found we needed
5000 more to get the top, and when we tried
to skirt the range, found it wasn't really a
range at all with valley the other side but
just close packed mountain peaks filed with snow
and ice between These glaciers looked like level
seas of dark green water. At Wrangell the only
landing field available was on a little island in
the Stickine river, which, at high tide wasn't an
island at ALL We landed in about six inches of
water which had grown to foot before we took
off.
"from Wrangell we went by way of Chkoot
Pass and Skagway to Whitehorse. This is the re-
giOn made so famous in the early days of the
gold discovery. Formerly it took about three
months TO make the trip; in winter travel was
by dog-sleds; in summer. foot or by pack-train
Tho once famous mines of this region are now in
active. Their surface veins have been stripped
ana hlgh-grade mining In this country is too ex-
pensiye because of inadequate transportation fa-
cili;ies.
"FrOm WhitehOrse to Dawson we flew over the
rou:e patrOlled by the Canadian mounted police
The trail runs in almost an a6line that shows I'D
practically all of the way, dotted with the neat
litte road houses at intervals of 40 to. 80 miles
APART. The police. in full regalia-bright-red
jackets and blue trousers-are snappy looking
fellows we'll disciplined and giving wonderful
service to the country They were of tremendous
assistance to us wherever we encountered them
We crossed Lake La Barge so well known to read
ers of Services poems which breathe the very
soul and spirit of this far northern region This
Lake is at once the basin of the White river and
the source of the Yukon, unless indeed it be
and the same river with different names in
different localities.
'Crumrlne had blown out a tire at WhitehOrse
but filling his casing with rope packed tightly he
wrapped the outside with rope, taking off with
us to Dawson, and landing safely despite the hard
jolt from his mendhd tire We arrived at Daw-
son, by chance, on August II, the gala day of the
country. discovery Day" it Is called for Just
% years before, the first Alaskan gold was dis
covered on Bonanza creek. The people made us