The Wrangell sentinel. (Wrangell, Alaska) 1909-current, 1939-12-08
Progress Made
Toward Airport
Development

Definite progress toward possible
development of an airport at WranI
gel WAS made here last week end
with the visit of MARSHALL Hoppin,
superintendent of Always in AL
aska for the Civil Aeronauties Auth
GRITTY. Benton ". Davis. Senior Air
ways Inspector. Flight, and J. M.
Beardslee. cAA Civil Engineer.
Arriving in their seaplane last
Friday, the airways officials stayed
over here until Tuesday afternoon
and had opportunity TO look over
proposed sites ana confer with of
ficiaIs and citizens here as to their
feasibility.
Meeting with civic leaders at an
informal gathering in the Elks club,
Mr.. Hoppin pointed out that while
GAA at this thine has no money for
the construction of airports It Isl
authorized to construct what the
Authority terms intermediate fields,
commonly known as emergency land.
ing fields Several of these inter
mediate fields are already outlined
for the Interior and 1t is the plan
to establish at least five in South
east Alaska, he said. These inter-
mediate fields will be established in
conjunction with communication
stations for providing weather data
and are tentatively outlined for
Yakutat, Juneau, Sitka, Ketchikan
and somewhere in the Wrangell-Pe-
tersburg district.
At the forthcoming session of
Congress in January the CAA plans
to present a bill asking for $14,-
100000 fer airport construction in
the Territory. In the meantime, the
last Territorial Legislature set aside
$4,000 for the construction of an
airport at Wrangell No part of the
money thus far has been used for
this purpose due to the lack of prop
er data ON such a project
It was explained to the Wrangell |
group by Mr.. Hoppin that the first
thing necessary toward the estab- |
lishment of an airport here was a
report, prepared bg a qualified en-
gineer. setting forth the dimensions
of the proposed site, what runways |
could be established, the nature of |
the ground and how it could be put
in shape, and other such engineer
ing data as would be natural with |
such a report.
While Dr. Ernest Gruening, the
new Governor. was here this week, |
the picture was presented to him
by Mayor Van H. Fisk with Mr..
Hoppin present ard the Chief Ex-
ecutive showed a warm interest He
said that on his arrival in Juneau
he would take up the matter of pos
sibly borrowing an engineer from
some of the other government de-
partments to prepare such a detail
ed report. He stressed that in this
way it might be possible to conserve
the entire $4,000 in territorial
money for actual construction pur-
poses if the engineers report reveal
ed the project feasible.
superintendent Hoppin declined to
comment on the possibility of Wran-
CELL getting an intermediate field
and communications station under
the CAA program, but he did give
assurance that Wrangell would be
given full consideration, comment
ing, 81 never have seen such a SOL
idified public spirit anywhere as
have seen right here in Wrangell.
After seeing what you men did Sun
day toward building skating pond
for your children l am convinced
that you will go out and build an
airport yourselves If it doesn't come
in some other way"
The three airways officials have
headquarters in Anchorage. They ar
rived in the Territory last July and
expect to be in the north at least
two years in carrying out the CAA
program. They flew from here to-
Ketchikan.
INDICTED FOR MURDER