He almost gets onto the right
track when he says; "During the
short summer in the Matanuska Val
ley, nine weeks at the most, two
and three crops can be grown."
Two crops of clover and alfalfa
can be grown. Hay of the latter '
variety was cut twice this summer
from a ten-year-old stand ahd each
cutting was Ha feet tall.
V.'ith government observers re
cording an average of 130 consec
utive frost-free days over a per
iod of yea.rs it looks like Mr,
Frown had just about cut our sum
mer in half. Ve have as many hour:
of growing sunlight here as there
are along the northern boundary of
the united States.
CUT OF STEP AGAIN
A DELIBERATE LIAR OR --
(Continued from page 1)
have harvested their first crop,'1
Part of the first crop has al
ready been harvested and all re
maining Colonists eager to stay
and make good. Eighteen hundred
people hero being fed peas, car
rots, lettuce, cauliflower, rut
agagas, turnips, potatoes, cab-,
bage, rhubarb, low- and high-bush
cranberries and raspberries out
of community gardens planted by
themselves, and from wild fruit
bushes growing around their homes.
''The sending of farmers from
"‘'iohigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota
to Alaska to farm is one of the
most foolish moves this adminis
tration has done to date, ' says
Mr. Brown, and continues* ''First
of all there is no top soil any
where in Alaska."
Vg'H pass over whatever "fool
is moves the administration has
done,1' and ask Mr. Brown to talk
~i"t’H any man who has seen the base
ment. excavations around here. The
top soil is from four to seven feet
thick.
"There is an annual rainfall in
southeastern Alaska of lo4 inches,
thereby making the soil unfit for
farming and the melting of winter
snows in Matanuska valley, where
the "pioneers" are now located,
with no drainage makes the country
unfit for crop raising," Mr. Brown
tells us.
Granted they have rain at Ketch
ican, hut we are over a thousand
miles from there, and the Matanuska
Valley can boast of only a 14-1- inch
average annual precipitation over
a continuous TT. S. leather Bureau
observation for twelve years.
:,fhe potatoes and strawberries
are perhaps the largest grown in
the world," admits our informant,
but adds; "V.hen the potatoes are
cut open they are soggy and unfit
for human consumption and the straw
berries are tasteless and stringy.
':hent, barley and oats are mouldy
by harvest time.1'
he have wheat here that mills
into the finest kind of flour, and
mouldy barley doesn't thresh and
prove by test to be 97% as fatten
ing as corn. Oats fully mature
and have been a staple crop in the
valley for years. The potatoes wo
are eating here are splendidly
firm, smooth and shallow eyed, They
are not soggy and Colonists have
been heard to say they were better
than what they raised back home.
Brown says that the crops are
bum "...because of too rich a low
er soil."
Our lower soil here happens to
he gravel, which, by the way is
fine for drainage, and that answers
the question of our spring snow
melting -- 43 inches average annual
foil.
Brown gots worse as he goes
along. Mr. Ghaely's report will
:noro thoroughly rover the crop,
soil and climatic angles, but like
all other Alaskans he can only
laugh at the rest of our tin-snip
ping historian's aberrational rav
ings .
"One of the complaints of the
"pioneers" is the lack of medical
service.-. They have one doctor and
a trained nurse to the 1800 odd
•souls in the valley. The Matanus
ku Valley is 17b miles northeast oi
Seward and on the government rail
road. if one is seriously ill, he
must be removed to the hospital by
either train or plane,"
We might inform Mr. Brown that
we have a corps of two doctors and
six nurses running two temporary
hospitals, with a big and perma
nent building nearing completion.
And the inference is that we have
to go to Seward l'or treatment in
cases involving the use of modern
appliances, 'ghat's the matter wit.
Anchorage, only forty-four miles
away, and equipped with the best
hospital along the line?
"Not only will the "pioneers" b
disappointed in their crops, they
will have to face life in the raw.
They will have no modern facilitie
of any kind such as even the poor
est of farms "down below" have.
They will have oil lumps and wood
and coke fires."
If warm bouses, plenty of fuel
last minute gasoline lights and
radios •, living a ithin ten miles of
a well-stocked library and a sound
projection movie show.; having u bu
service for their children to at
tend school — if that is seeing
life in the raw, then surely the
Colonists will experience it this
winter.
WHO'S AFRAID OF THL BIG BAD WOLF?
Trappers Attention! Mr. Brown
is about to let you in on somethin..
"During the long winter months
the new "pioneera" will have to
•,-w*t.«