The Daily Alaska empire., 1943-06-18


 Command There is distinct parallel between the accomplish ments of this Command and those attempted by the Western Union Telegraph Company a task which they placed squarely on the shoulders of Colonel Bulkley. | as the building of the Alaska High way was given to the able direc- tion of General James O'Connor.
 At the time of Bulkley's expe- dition, nearly eighty years ago, AL aska was still a Russian possession, it's real worth unknown even to the Russians. Colonel Bulkley, as En- gineer- -in- Chief of this expedition surrounded himself with such able men as Kennicott, Dall, Bush, Whymper and Elliott, all of whom published such excellent reports that Alaska's potential worth first became known to the American public It was largely through the work of these men that sentiment was created which resulted in the Purchase of Alaska.
 "Bulkley's Expedition did not accomplish what it set out to do, for the successful laying of the Atlantic Cable made the overland telegraph no longer necessary. But it did accomplish a much greater end-that of paving the way for the establishment of American sovereignty over that outpost which means so much to our national safety today.
 General OConnor, who in his feat of building the Alaska Mill tary Highway in such record time, has earned the plaudits of the world, is, in a sense. stepping into and filling Colonel Bulkley's we'll wofn shoes. AS a result of his highway system now expanding, new resources will become known and utilized and Alaska will enjoy re-birth such as Alaskans have never seen in their widest dreams. And where Colonel Bulkley's expe- dition had as its chief result, the Purchase of Alaska, General o. Connors mission will no doubt carry it on to statehood.
 Tn accepting this journal for the Alaska Historical Library, .I l wish to express my personal thanks as well as the thanks of the Library and Museum staff and the Board of Directors, We shall place it along with the books and papers of Colonel Bulkley's associates and contemporaries so that Alaskans for all time may read in their own Ar chives of the great achievements of Alaska's founding fathers"
 s The Governor also made brief response, saying in part:
 Colonel Bush, on behalf of the Territory of Alaska permit me to express my profound appreciation for the gift of the Bulkley Tele- graph Trail Journal to the Alaska Territorial Museum. Please convey to the Commander of the North west Service Command, Brigadier General James A. O'Connor, whom you so ably represent, the Terri tory's gratitude for this valuable document.
 Tt is highly fitting that the Northwest Service Command, which is making history throughout the Northwest should be the agency to bring to light and make available | for future historians the no less stirring record of an earlier govern mental attempt to blaze a north western trail. Today, nearly three generations later, you of the North west Service Command have con- verted that earlier effort at trail blazing into an artery of supply and communication, invaluable mil itarily, economically and politically It is because of this dramatic link ing of past and present, and because of the now successful completion of what in an earlier day brave pio- neering did not fully achieve, that this occasion is important and the