The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1933-06-02
On This
Occasion
Just q few thoughts by the Editor
ON things Material and Immatertal.

Governor Olson says he will
ask the national administration
for $5,000,000 with which to
build dams and develop water
power on the picturesque trout
streams emptying into Lake
Superior along the north shore,
according to a program devel-
oped at meeting on Saturday
between the governor and E. V.
Willard, acting commissioner
of conservation. While only
$5,000,000 will be required, it
Is estimated, to develop 100000
to $4,000 horsepower along the
north shore for manufacturing
and for serving municipal and
domestic needs, $10,000,000
will be asked of the public
works program of the admins
tration for unemployment relief
and for the completion of i'm
portant public works that will
be of permanent value to the
state.
1t sounds good but how is it
to be done? A short time back
the Shipstead-Nolan bill was
passed in the legislature which
withdraws from entry all state
lands for public purposes with
out an act of the legislature.
This bill as passed in Minnesota
was supposed to take on where
the S-N bill as passed by Con-
gress several years ago left off,
fnasmuch as it now exempts all
federal and state lands, except
by congressional or legislative
action. At the time this bill
was before the legislature great
stress was laid on the fact that
the Minnesota Power & Light
company asked for authority
to build a dam to control water
flow and furnish the company
with a regular stage of water to
develop electric power at the
Winton plant, and that this
move would flood about 400
acres of land for the state out
of several hundred square miles
of wilderness country in the
Gabro-Bald Eagle section.
At that time the power COM
pany promised to spend about a
quarter of a million dollars,
more of its own money in that
country and clean up the shore
lines of the lands to be inun-
dated besides rebuilding the
unsightly dam at Birch Lake
and to otherwise revamp and
improve the section. At the
hearing before the legislature
several self-constituted guard
ians of the wilderness area who
live in the cities, appeared and
objected most strenuously. The
opposition to the measure was
not so much concerned with the
good accomplished or the DAM
ages that might accrue by the
move but it looked very much
as if the opposition was based
on the fact that the company
was a corporation. Corpora
ton" was the stickler respons-
ible for the defeat of the meas
ure, it was concluded.
This latest move sounds fine
and if the $5,000,000 are spent
in the north shore country it
will be a fine stroke of business
in aid of unemployment. We
sure need it in northern Mime
sofa. How it is to be done re-
mains for the governor to work
out. The Shipstead-Nolan bill
is very explicit in its makeup
and says in substance that no
water levels can be raised, low
cred or otherwise interfered
with without first getting the
consent of Congress. We also
Judge that this applies to the
state as we'll as to corporations
or individuals. 1t is also a
mystery as to how water power
is to be developed without con-
troll of the flow and without
flooding interior lakes and
wilderness country, more or
less.