THE MATANUSKA VALLEY
PIONEER
Published Weekly at Palmer, Alaska.
♦
JACK ALLMAN
Editor-Publisher.
♦
Application made for entry as second class matter
at the post office at Palmer, Alaska.
Subscription Rate
One year by mail ...$3.50
APOLOGIES
Our apologies for the delay in getting switch
ed over from a mimeographed sheet to a press
printed paper. Seemsas though trouble has been
on our trail since we first got our equipment in.
If some of the news in this first issue seems a
little stale, please realize that part of this paper
was printed some time ago, before hard luck over
took us. In fact, so much was already printed
that there isn’t room for such regular features aa
Hospital News, Social Calendar, Church News,
etc.; items that will be taken care of weekly.
And, as to the advertisers, our apologies to
them also. The response was so great that we
were snowed under. We have taken them in the
order which their bids for space was rec eived, and
we hope that no one feels slighted.
Thank you all for your patience. Regular sub
scribers will receive additional issues to make up
for the period of suspension from publication.
WORKING FOR THE RAILROAD
Illustrations of the manner in which the Alaska
Railroad is NOT being used to develop the country
come to us every day.
Not long ago a mine operator from Peters
Creek told us that he can charter a special car to
bring friends from Seward to Talkeetna for a
fishing or hunting trip for less money than he can
have a carload of diesel oil delivered. Yet there
are casualty risks in hauling people, and there is
supposed to be a special rate for everything used
in mining development.
The Standard Oil Company produces diesel oil,
transports it a couple of thousand miles to Seward,
and sells it for less than it costs the Willow Creek
mines to have it hauled from Seward to Wasilla
a distance of 159 miles. It costs $40 a ton to
transport powder the 46 miles from Anchorage
to Wasilla.
The mine operators have been suffering this
pain for years, but how about the farmers, now
that agriculture in this section of the country is
in the throes of savage birth?
Mining is, of course, a gamble. There is al
ways that chance of running into exceptionally
rich ore. Not so with farmers. Their security
lies not in the hope of sudden riches, but in a
steady income from products of the soil. Will
they be willing to see all their profits go toward
the absolutely insane idea of forcing the five
thousand inhabitants of the rail belt put a seventy
million dollar investment on a paying basis? We
have it directly from the present management
that the rates will not come down until the road
is making money. Seventy million dollars worth
of railroad in the States will run through many
large cities, any one of which will equal the
whole population of Alaska-something like sixty
thousand.
When we said ALL the farmer’s profits, we
meant just that. A. A. Shonbeck last year sold
hay to a Seward dairyman. He paid $27.20 a
ton to ship it from Matanuska, and this, together
with the freight he had paid on the oil burned in
his dryer curing the hay, took just about all he got
for it, leaving him nothing to pay for the cost of
production. His profits plus part of the expense
of raising the hay went into railroad pockets.
An illustration of the difference in landed costs
lies in the fact that private merchants here can sell
some commodities for less than the corporation,
yet the corporation buys more cheaply by their
competitive bid system, and marks up only the
actual cost of handling. They ship over Alaska
Steamship and Alaska Railroad. Private mer
chants use Heinie Berger’s boat to Anchorage and
haul over the new road by truck, landing their
grocery stocks here for as low as $26.00 a ton
from Seattle. For boxed printing equipment from
Ketchikan we paid $76.20 a ton, and this freight
did not require special handling, such as storage
away from boilers and under cover from rain.
Matanuska And Economics
Ernest Jessen, capable editor of the “Seward
Gateway,” gives us a good thought in an editorial
which appeared recently in his paper. Mr.
Jessen says:
! “To the average individual the Matanuska
colony means an expensive federal adventure
| wherein outsiders are receiving aids which are the
heritage of oldtime resident Alaskans.
“To the student of economics it includes little oi
the above myopic view. It means the opening
'wedge of an industrial era.
“Here again the shortsighted shout: ‘What are
the colonists going to do with their products?’
“The same shout went up back some hundred
years ago when the first manufacturing plant
was proposed to emancipate the Colonial United
States from dependence upon England. It was
shouted when far-sighted men sought to lay the
foundation for the present industrial west.
“This attitude has been in evidence throughout
American history. The man who would have
predicted that we would cease relying upon
Europe for our manufacturer and outstrip her in
this respect and that within a century, would
have been put into the stocks, or a straight
jacket.”
MEET SOURDOUGH
SAM ... AGAIN
Popular demand for a reprint
of Sourdough Sam has been so
strong that we have decided to in
troduce him again. Sam has had
and will continue to have, a lot
to say in the columns of the PIO
NEER.
You see, Sam has a pretty good
slant on all this activity in the
Matanuska Valley. He has lived
here for years, but last spring a
year ago, just about a month be
fore there was anything said about
colonizing this district, Sam head
ed back into the hills at the head
of Chickaloon to do a little pros
pecting on a creek he and Tex
Cobb knew about. He went alone
except for his old dog, Bum; and
he never saw a soul till he re
turned last September. Can you
imagine his surprise? You should
get him to tell you about it. You’ll
recognize Sam if you see him
around camp. He’s tall and
straight as a birch sapling, and as
tough as a piece of Nigaluk
whalebone in spite of his seventy
yeai’s.
His hair is white and curls a
little over the collar of his shirt.
He has a somewhat scraggly
white moustache that is a bit to
bacco stained in the middle. His
eyes have the clearness of gla
cier ice, but they are not hard.
If you see him go right up and
talk to him. Sam’s sociable. Get
him to tell you about his ieturn
to the Matanuska Valley after only
six months’ absence.
When Sam left for the hills
there were a few scattered fam
ilies and only two miles of grav
elled road. When he came hiking
back he expected to find things
just the same.
| He was coming down an old In
! dian trail near Cottonwood Lake,
} right near Swanson’s place, wrhen
he suddenly stumbled on a fine
gravelled road that shouldn’t have
been there at all.
Just then a big staff sedan—
Colonel Hunt’s—bore down on him
with the hom wide open. Sam
jumped about twenty feet.
“Wa’n’t nothin’ like that ’round
(Continued on page 14)
VALLEY PRODUCTS
PROVEN ECONOMY
V:.
T. S. MacDougal, who operates
the Fern Mine above Wasilla, says
he has been buying locally raised
vegetables and beef this summer
and finds that he saves just about
the cost of freight from Anchorage.
“And this is no small amount,” he
adds, “Considering that there are23
of us to feed up there. Once I
bought a sack of cabbage from Mrs.
“Hardworking” Smith. I paid her
75 cents for it in Matanuska, then
paid 80 cents to have it hauled nine
miles on the railroad to Wasilla.”
Mr. MacDougal went on to say
that the vegetables he bought from
old settlers and colonists couldn’t
be beaten, and that some of the
beef he has had was the very finest
that can be raised anywhere.
NOTICE
Will the person who borrowed
eight drawers from the school house
tables and desks please return them
as soon as convenient? They are
badly needed.
Halloween
MASQUERADE BALL
Sponsored By
C.V.F.D.
Saturday, October 31st.
Chamber Of Horrors - - Floor Show 4 Acts
ADMISSION Gents $1.00 Ladies Free
FOUR COSTUME PRIZES
Bus Transportation Furnished
m