Seward daily gateway., 1931-09-15
SENATOR HOWELL AND HIS REPORT ON
 THE ALASKA RAILROAD


 The Gateway does not join in the extreme charges of unintentlonal untruth that some newspapers and many people in Alaska have hurled against Senator Howell of Nebraska because of some of the inaccurate statements contained in the official report he submitted to the United States Senate in January, 193O embod by his Senatorial Committee the operations of the Alaska Railroad in Seward and other towns of the rail- road belt, during 12 days of August 1929.
 Instead The Gateway is disposed to credit Senator fcials in Washington which would place the Alaska Railroad basis of financial sefsupport and of serv ice to Alaska and the rest of the United States.
 Senator Howells committee devoted IF days to their investigations along the Alaska Railroad Naturally an investigation made in short time must be incom- pete and not be accurate in all of its findings and statements.
 The wsest men in America, actuated by the most honorable motives could do better in short time than give superficial opinions of them based on misconcepton of facts. That is undeniaby the case with Senator Howells report It does contain some statements about resources in the Alaska Railroad belt which inaccurate, far from the facts that they regarded in Alaska with amazemen to express 1t mildly.
 little timber in this region that is suitable for export and markets too far away to encourage the production and the exporation of wood pulp However
 is claimed that far to the northwest of Anchorage there is large tract of birch for which it is hoped market can be found for the manufacture of furniture It is proposed to raft this birch down to the vicinity of Anchorage but under such cOndlClOS, the falfOau at best would have only 114mile haul and It IS more than likely that if demand develops for this birch It would ultimately be loaded vessels in Cook lnet and the railroad get no haul whatever"
 Unfortunately for Senator Howeps report, and very much to it's discredit report issued by the United States Department of Agriculture in February l93l known as Technical Bulletin Mo- 226 The D1strbll. ton and the Mechanical Properties of Alaska Woods The author was L. J. Markwardt, Senior Engineer For est Products Laboratory Branch of Research ot the Forest Service It gives most careful survey of tne timber resources in Central Alaska all tributary to the Alaska Railroad result of 12 years of intensive IT. vestigation followed by shipping and samplng ot logs of all the different varieties of timber under sclentl1c laboratory tests.
 That exhaustive and accurate report by the Agrl- cultural Department states that the amount ot spruce and hemock in the Chugach Forest Reserve surround ing Seward is estimated at 626OO0OOOO board fee st able for pulp It states that the total or lnteI1or ests all tributary the Alaska Railroad IS not less than 5OO00O000 cords' cord the report says con tains $50 board feet. That would make stupendous total of the forests in Central Alaska outside tne Cn cach Forest Reserve amounting to poaru feet It is enough produce 40O tons of pulp per day indefinitely without depicting the supply
 The most valuable of those Interior forests, 1ne co., tonwoods and basam poplars, not mentioned at all bv Senator Howes report but they are mentioned 1uy and in detail by Bulletin 226 of the Agricultural Report
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 cuENr NrnNnav VISITED BY