Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1942-12-13
COLOMBIA: A Two-Ocean Land

This is the ninth of series of
10 articles and maps OF the re-
publtcs OF South America, the
great continent NTH ,Dhich ue
share the Western Hemisphere.
At the request OF The SUNDAY
Star, the National Geographic
Society, as a part OF its many
educational activities, has pre-
pared the basic data and accom-
pdrytng maps from its rich re-
sources OF geographic knowledge
and surveys. By clipping this
series from tDeek to week, adults
and school pupils may acquire an
Hp-to-ddte collection OF maps and
notes on our 1eighbor continent
to the south.
Colombia, nearest South American
country to the United States, has
the geographic advantage of a two
ocean coastline. Stretching on both
sides of the slim Isthmus of Panama,
it is the only South American nation,
with the exception OF Chile at the
southern tip of the continent, which
"opens on Atlantic and Pacific waters.
sAt its nearest point, Colombia Is
4only about 100 airline miles from the
western Hemisphere's most strate-
gic waterway, the Panama Canal.
The Colombian Republic (Which
indicated its friendship with the
United States by breaking off rela-
stions with Japan the day after the
Pearl Harbor attack and with Ger
many and Italy II days later is
larger than Texas and California
together. It has population of
between 8 and 10 million.
, Within its roughly 100000 square
miles OF territory, Colombia has an
astonishing variety of regional di-
visions, even for highly diversified
South America. There are arid and
rain drenched tropics: mountains
above $4,000 feet and fiat tablelands.
spopulous cultivated areas and re-
mote jungles alive with monkeys,
epumas deer, alligators, deadly snakes
and bright, noisy birds.
i Lowlands Differ.
ii Colombias hot coastal Iowlands
facing the Pacific on one side and
The Caribbean on the other, are
.sAtrikingly different in appearance
and production, and both vary con-
ssherably from the vast and still
eundeveloped tropical hinterland of
1.-the east. Still another and even
more dramatic scene shift is found
IN the mountainous western half of
the country, which is itself broken
up into innumerable subdivisions of
plateaus and river valleys, spaced at
many levels.
u Under the direct sun rays of the
.stroplc zone, and encouraged by gen.
orally ample sometimes and in
some places surplus rainfall, the
fertile Colombian soil yields a wide
range Of the worlds commodities.
In the valleys of the Magdalena and
Cauca Rivers, important arteries of
trade and travel, grow rich crops of
coffee, sugar, cotton and tobacco.
Colombian forests contain uncata-
<logued resources in mahogany, balso
wood, oak, dyewoods; in cinchona
bark, for quinine, and rubber trees,
whose development now is being
pushed to help meet Unsuitable war
demands. There are medicinal and
2insecticide plants and countless
species of orchids and ferns. Among
the numerous palms is the tagua
palm, whose nuts provide vegetable |
ivory for buttons and similar manu.
featured articles.
Scenery Changes Swiftly.
Climbing, by river and rail, from
the torrid Caribbean coast to the
mountain capital, Bogota, is an
@"Alice in Wonderland" experience
of quick-changing scenery. At the
slower levels you pass plantations of
bananas, cacao, sugar cane, cotton
and rice, rising gradually into
landscapes marked by coffee farms,
temperate-zone fruit orchards, corn
and wheat fields; by green pastures,
where sleek cows Craze. Still higher
you find the small subsistence farms
where Indians make a scant living
by raising hardy crops of potatoes
and beans, barley and other grains.
Coffee is Colombias leading ex-
port crop, and the most important !