Seward daily gateway., 1932-09-17
ALASKA INTERESTS AT THE NATIONAL
 CAPITAL, WASH.
(By w. A. s.

(By w. A. s.
 The Bureau of Fisheries is in formed that on August 19 ship ment of 49,334 seal skins, taken from the Pribiloff Islands this sea- son, arrived in Seattle aboard the U. s. S. Sirius, and were later ship ped to St. Louis There the skins will be tanned and dyed before they are sold at auction for the account of the United States Government. This shipment is about 19O skins smaller than last seasons kill. The decrease was caused, it is said, by unfavorable weather at the Pribi- lof Islands, which prevented as many young male seals coming ashore as anticipated The seal skins from the Pribilof Island herd represent about 80 per cent of the worlds supply, and the demand for these skins determines the price of seal skin coats and wraps which Will be worn next season. The Prlbilof Island seal herd is consid- cred the most valuable in the world, and has been under the management of the Bureau of Fisheries since 1910. When the government first took charge of this herd it numbered about 125,O0O animals, and since that time it has been rebuilt to approximately I,2CC,OOo animals, an increase of more than million in g years. In the same period the bureaus workers have taken about 5OO.oOO skins from the surplus three-year- old males.
 pr, Gustax Egloff, ess-August 9. reported to the American Chemical Society that as a result of his work in the laboratory of the Universal Oil Products Company, Chicago, 50 per cent of the oil of a Pribilof fur bearing seal is anti-knock gasoline. He further says that the same seal also yields: 12 per cent of "as- phalt, suitable for road making." { per cent of oil which can operate diesel engines, 16 per cent of it. Illuminating gas, per cent of pure water. As there is not any demand Tor anti-knock gas among the Es- klmos, the research has two indi- rect values. For one thing it is part of a series reported by Dr. Egloff showing many available na- tural products can be converted quite unexpectedly into gasoline if and when the world needs them. wood from plain trees is one. of these sources, he has previously i reported. Cottonseed oil is an- other.
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 Almost entirely owned bv the Feoeral government the Territory or Alaska is vitally interested in the consideration extended it by the Congress of the United States For that reason there is naturally much apprehension as to, just what may be taken by the ma- ]orlty leadership in the House when congress convenes at the coming snort session in December. That there will be further economies in the appropriation and expenditure IS evident from an expression that mas Just been given by Rep. Joseph W. Byrnes of Tennessee, chairman '1 the House committee on appro- prlatlons, who says: we are go- ng to start cutting appropriations Io the very bone from the begin hing of the session. The country de- nands further retrenchment in Federal expenditures and the con- mlttee will comply" Delegate has many friends among both political parties and 1aS hlgh hopes that he may be able 70 prevail upon Congress to extend [alr treatment to Alaska, and not 'o Sacrl1ce the best interests of a 'atlent people and deserving territory by recklessly curtailing needed expenditures that are ma ;erial to the development of land 'ich in natural resources.
 GOV Franklin D Roosevelt and