The Wrangell sentinel., 1938-03-04

lFoilowing is a copy of the add ress by Anthony J. Dmond, Dele gate from Alaska, over the Columbia Broadeastfng System. Friday, Feb ruary IS at 6:35 ?. n. Eastern Standard Time His topic was, "Japs anese Invasion of Our Fisheries. ]" Delegate Dimond spoke from the studios of WJSV. CoIumbia,s station for the nations capital.)
 The salmon fishery of Alaska is by far the most important industry in the Territory. Most people think of Alaska in connection with the production of gold, but gold mining is definitely of secondary conse- quence as a source of wealth in Al aska. The Bureau of Customs of the Treasury Department informs us that during the year 1897 the value of the output of the salmon fishery of Alaska amounted to more than 43 millions of dollars.
 Alaska produces each year ap- proximately five-eighths of all of the salmon caught in the world. The industry furnished seasonally direct employment to upwards of 25,00O people, and furnishes employment I indirectly to many thousand more Over a period of years prior to 1897 the salmon industry of Alaska pro- vided approximately 70 percent of all of the revenues of the Territory.
 And yet this fishery, vital as it is to the welfare of the people of AL aska, and momentous as it is to the economy of our nation is threatened with extinction by the invasion of the Japanese.
 All of the Alaska salmon are spawned and matched in the inland lakes and streams of the Territory. A few months or years after being matched, dependent upon species, the young salmon proceed down the riv- CTS to the ocean, and remain in the ocean one or more years; and then inevitably and invariably return to the rivers and lakes where they were matched, there to spawn and after spawning, to die. The life cycle of the salmon is definitely known. The salmon of Alaska have been protected by our rigid govern mental laws and regulations, en- forced over the years at the cost of millions of dollars and calling for the abstention and self-sacrifice of the American operators and fish ermen. Without such coordinated conservation, the salmon would soon be exhausted.
 From the earliest inception of the salmon packing industry up until the present moment that industry has been 100 percent American. No foreign nationals have openly en- 1 gagged in it, and no foreign nation als have even surreptiously in- vaded the industry except for the clandestine entry therein by the Japanese, to a slight extent in 1886, and to a much larger extent in 1887. But it is to be noted that up until the present moment the Japanese have denied, and they continue to deny. that they have ever packed salmon commercially in the waters adjacent to the coast of Alaska.
 However, we know by conclusive proof that in 1886 on a small scale. and in 1897 on a much larger scale, the Japanese operated floating sal- mon canneries with a considerable number of attendant smaller vessels, in the shallow waters of Bristol Bay and Boring Sea a few miles off the coast of Alaska; and we know that they seriously interfered with the run of salmon back into the rivers and lakes of Alaska to spawn; we know that these Japanese operations took place on the continental shelf of Alaska, where the water is less than 100 fathoms deep, and that over this continental shelf, as across submarine bridge, the Alaska sal mon must pass on their way back to the rivers and lakes of Alaska to spawn. We know, as surely as the sun rises, that if the Japanese con- tinue, and are permitted to continue their salmon fishing operations in the waters off the coast of Alaska, they will inevitably and within a few years totally exhaust that fish :, cry, and thus a source of annually renewable wealth, given us by na- ture will be entirely destroyed; and that, as consequence, many thous- ands of our people will be unem- ployed, the public school system of Alaska and it's Social Security re- lief work will suffer through inn pairment of territorial revenues. and the nation will permanently lose a source of food supply and a source of wealth that may otherwise last forever