The Wrangell sentinel., 1944-04-07
(By Associated Press)
 Territory

In some caJdslA opulC SAHhtSA N the unWritten past a great contin- ent may have sunk into the Pacific leaving the hundreds of dots of land that are the Caroline islands.
 For scattered over these dots are traces of a vanished culture so ad- yanced that some archaeologlsts De- neye 1t could not have sprung from such insignificant chains and col- onies of small islands.
 The 1,4OO islands of the Caro- lines. Marianas and Marshalls em- brace but 860 square miles, an aver age of little more than half an acre to the island.
 In general, the larger islands are sf volcanic origin, the smaller ones are atolls built up by the countless carcasses of coral settling on the ocean floor.
 The Marshalls, for example, are characteristic atolls-- small, never rising more than few feet above sea level, and surrounded by coral reefs. -t-
 In the warm, moist, tropical eli mate there are IuXuriant jungles' and clear, fresh-water streams. La aloons that make safe anchorage are abundant.
 The larger islands, such as Guam in the Marianas, and Palau in the Carolines, are fertile and can sup port large populations. They pro- duce sugar, coffee, fruits, fish, veg etabIes, timber, phosphate d copra. l.-aslsAs.=
 To the north of these are the 27 Bonin islands, region of geograph- ical instability, where submarine volcanoes blow and small lava ls- lands rise and sink again into the depths of the Pacific.
 Long occupied by the Japanese the Bonins have an area of but 29 square miles, are high, rocky and probably of volcanic origin.
 History
 First of these islands to see the white man were the Marianas, found by the intrepid Ferdinand Magellan, driving his scurvy-ridden Spanish crew across the vast Pacific wastes in 1921.
 The Portuguese, racing their Spanish rivals, found the Carolines five years later and navigator All yaro de Saavedra came across the Alarshalls in 1929.
 Last group to lift above the oceans horizon ahead of the inquisitiVe brow of an explorers vessel were the Bonins, discovered by 0gasa- wara Sadayori, a Japanese, in l593
 Spain annexed all but the Bonins in 1886, dispersed or slaughtered the brown natives.
 Guam, probably the first island touched by Magellan, had a good port needed for the galleons plying between Central America and the Philippines.
 The Spaniards seemed little in- terested in the Carolines and Mar shalIs until after 1900, when their rich natural resources lured Span ish adventurers who exploited the natives ruthlessly.
 A dying Spanish empire, beaten by the United States, ceded the Car olines, Marshalls and all but Guam in the Marianas to Germany for S4O,OO pounds in 1899. Guam fell to the United States.
 Industrious Germans developed the islands economically, but were too busy in Europe to defend them in World War I and the Japanese invaded,
 Japan completed the enVelopment of this sprawlinE island empire with the capture of Guam shortly after Pearl HaTbor-
 The uninhabited Bonins first were claimed by the British, who sent a small colony from the Ha- waiian islands early in the last cen- tury. But Japan annexed them iR 1877.
 Peoples
 The brown-skinned natives whom the white man found in the Caro- lines, Marshalls and Marianas were intrepid explorers themselves.
 How else could their ancestors Malays from the west and Polyne-. sians from Hawaii to the east-have sailed away from home and landed on these lonely dots hundreds of miles away?
 When the Spaniards drove the Chamorros from Guam, these na- tives calmly took to their canoes and sailed to the distant Carolines.
 Natives in the Carolines and Mar shalls still navigate their outrigger canoes, hurried along by billowing sails far from land.
 All the natives belong to the brown race, but speak many dia- lects. The Chamorros have h e lightest skin, dark hair, fine phy- siques and keen intelligence. Not more than $500 of them are be- l{auod to c1IrUfUn