THE NOME NUGGET
Published Monday, Wednesday and Friday by the
NOME PUBLISHING CO.
NOME, ALASKA
Telephone 443 - 2381 $1.50 PER MONTH
P. O. Box 610 $16.00 A YEAR
E. P. BOUCHER . Managing Editor
CL.INTON GRAY . Production Manager
Entered as second class matter October 14. 1943, at the
post office at Nome. Alaska, under Act of March 3. 1879.
PITFALL BOULEVARD
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Boy Scouts Need Your Support
THE BERING SEA COUNCIL of the Boy Scouts of America
have announced their annual fund drive to start today and
will continue for one week.
Business houses will be solicited by a financial drive com
mittee headed by James Hart and assisted by Tom Martin, who
are members of the Council and Wallace Mclver who is chairman
of Troop 63.
Funds raised go into the Midnight Sun District fund from
which is derived the professional training for local Bov Scout
leaders as well as professional leaders for Boy Scout encampments
during the summer.
Members of the Bering Sea Council are Marc Beauchamp,
Jim Blanning, Tom Martin, Roald Amundsen, R. F. Wilson and
James Hart.
The Boy Scouts have been one of the outstanding youth
groups of the community for years and one which Nome has
supported whole-heartedly. If you are not contacted and wish to
contribute, a check may be given or mailed to any member of
the committee.
Gov. Egan Calls It
“Negative Sensational”
JUNEAU UP) — Gov. Wm. Egan
Tuesday termed a half-hour tele
vision show purporting to show
present conditions in Alaska “an
other example of a two-week ex
pert seeking the negative sensa
tional.”
Egan made the comment in con
nection with the “David Brinkley
Journal,” which was shown to
television viewers in the contiguous
48 states by the NBC Television
Network Monday night.
Egan said Brinkley had not even
visited Alaska, but apparently had
relied upon film and notes obtain
ed in Alaska last summer by David
Hardy, a member of Brinkley’s
program staff.
‘I talked to Hardy in my office
for about an hour,” Egan said. “He
seemed to be striving for something
sensational.”
The Brinkley show was shot
through with inaccuracies and - “it
would take a full book to correct
them,” Egan said after reading an
Associated Press story about the
program.
A member of Egan’s staff, who
declined to use his name, said the
script for the Brinkley show ap
parently was written before Hardy
came to Alaska.
“All they wanted to do was to
get some pictures and comment to j'
fit the script they already had in
hand,” he said. <
Commissioner of BIA,
Philleo Nash, Will Make
11-Day Visit to Alaska
JUNEAU UP> — U.S. Commis
sioner of Indian Affairs Philleo
Nash will make an 11-day visit to
Alaska starting Jan. 20, Robert L.
Bennett, Area Director for the Bu
reau of Indian Affairs, said yes
terday.
Nash will arrive in Anchorage
Jan. 20 to start his visit to the
nation’s largest state, according to
present plans, and will visit Nome
and Kotzebue the following day,
Jan. 21.
Bennett said Nash plans to fly to
Fairbanks for an overnight stop
on Jan. 22 and leave the following
day for Barrow. He will return to
Fairbanks Jan. 25.
On Jan. 26, Nash plans to fly
to Juneau to attend formal inau
guration ceremonies for Gov. Wm.
Egan and Secretary of State Hugh
Wade and to meet with state offi
cials and members of the BIA’s
regional staff.
Bennett described Nash’s visit
as the first of several the Com
missioner plans to make to Alaska
‘to become thoroughly familiar
with the situation of the native
people of Alaska and how the bu
reau can help them increase their
participation in the social, econ
omic and civic affairs of the state.”
”4-on” Duplicate Receipt Books
Available at The Nome Nugget
David Brinkley’s Journal Describes Alaska On TV As
“The Biggest, Coldest and Emptiest State Is the Union”
NEW YORK (iT> — Alaska was
described Monday night on a na
tionally televised program as “the
biggest, coldest, emptiest state in
the union and quite possibly the
happiest.”
Life in Alaska is hard, said com
mentator David Brinkley, “but the
people who like it really like it.”
The half-hour “David Brinkly
Journal” on NBC was devoted en
tirely to Alaska, stressing its econ
omic situation.
Opening the commenatory with
the remark about Alaskan con
trasts, Brinkley added:
“It has great natural resources
but they are too expensive to de
velop. For an Alaskan it is cheap
er to import oil from Saudi
Arabia than it is to pump it out
of the ground from under his feet.”
Although Alaska has been in the
union only four years, Brinkley
said, it is the only state to be
labeled in its entirety as a dis
tressed area.
Hcp<?d for Financial Boom
“When it came into the union,”
Brinkley said of Alaska, “it hoped
for a financial boom. It has never
come.”
Life in Alaska, he added, “has
its pleasures and rewards as well
as its plans for those who are cut
out for it.”
The state has had two booms,
Brinkley said — the f'rst in the
19th Century when it found gold
and 60,000 came in and “then in
1941 when the U S. military sent
in 100,000 people.”
“Now that one has died,” he
said of the military boom, “leav
ing most of Alaska out of work,
in debt and in the union.”
Films of Alaskan defense work,
mining, fishing, lumbering and
other activities were shown as
Brinkley gave a running com
mentary.
Chronologically, the account in
cluded:
Showing pictures of Kotzebue,
Brinkley said the most immediate
effect of a declining military boom
vas in such villages.
The DEW Line is still operating,
3rinkley noted “but construction
is over and now every Eskimo in
town (Kotzebue) is on relief.”
Kotzebue Mayor Robert Baker
appeared on the program, saying
“I’ve never been in favor of state
hood . . . when it went through
we had nothing to support it . . .
if the Department of Defense pull
ed out of Alaska, Alaska would
collapse.”
Gold Mine Operation
Showing films of what he de
scribed as the only gold mine still
operating, Brinkley said $730 mil
lion worth of gold has been mined
in Alaska and more than that much
is still left “but at the fixed price
of $35 an ounce it is too expensive
to get it out.”
“In Alaska, you can’t even make
money out of a gold mine,” he said.
A uranium mine (also shown) is
running, Brinkley said, “but there
is no money in that either. The
cost is so high the federal gov
ernment has to subsidize it.”
Letter To
The Editor
Jan. 3, 1963
It is with much appreciation that
I endeavor to express a sincere
“thank you,” to you, your paper
and your town, for the wonderful
hospitality shown to the All-Star
Basketball Team from Northeast
Cape during the New Year’s week
end.
Again, our deepest “thanks” for
a splendid display of hospitality.
Charles N. Curry,
S/Sgt., USAF
Someone has figured out that
Americans take 500 million baths
a week.
Showing fishing scenes, the com- I
mentator said this industry “used
to be the thing Alaska lived on
but for 25 years the government
allowed fish traps ... the yearly
'salmon* pack dropped from nine
million cases to two million.”
Alaska has “magnificent stands
of timber,” he reported, “but not
the money to get it out.”
He showed pictures of the Sitka
pulp milling operation and com
mented that “now timber operations
are financed not by Americans but
by Japanese.” The Japanese, he
said, have invested $55 million
and employ 200 persons.
Interviews Don Hoover
There was an interview with
Donald Hoover of Nome, recorded
in an airplane flying over spec
tacular mountains and glaciers.
Hoover said he was in favor of
statehood, but added his area’s
economy is based almost entriely
on government projects,” and j
added “employment is very sad,
really . . . we have only four
months of the year to employ our
people.”
There are a number of people,
Brinkley commented, “who serious
ly advocate return to territorial
status.”
George Rogers, economic adviser
for the Alaska government whom
Brinkley described as “Alaska’s
Bernard Baruch,” said on the pro
gram that “the Alaska we have
today cannot survive without con
tinued federal support.”
But, Rogers added, “a different
and better Alaska” can survive.
“It won’t be Fifth Avenue on
the tundra,” he remarked, but
“more like the native people . . .
identifying ourselves with the 1
land . . . building a new type of
society rather than trying to im
port superficialities from outside.”
Scenes at Anchorage
Showing scenes at Anchorage,
Brinkley remarked that a two
bedroom Rambler cbsts $60,000,
gasoline 60 cents a gallon and “al
though there are only 900 miles |
of paved highway in the state”
many families have two automo
biles.”
There was a scene at the An- I
chorage Elks Club with a girl in a
snowball costume competing for
the Miss Alaska contest. Brinkley
noted there were only six con- i
testants and said there weren't
more because of the heavy cost of
flying in from outlying areas.
Television viewers were taken
on a trip over the Alaska railroad i
with engineer Earl Simpson, and
Brinkley said that the railroad “is
more of a family railroad than
anything else . . . people climb
on and off as it it was a Tooner
ville trolley.”
Simpson said Alaska “has the
most beautiful scenery of anywhere
in the world,” but said he wouldn’t |
advise anyone to come up in the
winter. He recalled that it was
70 below zero at one point on the
line once last winter.
Interviews Homesteader
There was an interview with
Mrs. Larry (Rusty) Lancashire,
who homesteaded with her husband
on the Kenai.
“It has been a hard life but a
rewarding life,” she said. “. . . You
get to see something you did
with your hands.”
There was a scene in the Male
mute Saloon at Cripple Creek near
Fairbanks, as Brinkley said Alas
kans tried to recreate the romance
and legends of the old days.
“We’re here to stay . . .” said
bearded Don Pearson, owner of
the saloon. “Statehood was the
best thing that happened to Alaska
since Seward purchased it.”
At one point Brinkley said that
for every 16 cents Alaska pays in
federal taxes, “Alaska gets back
$1. In a sense, it is a ward of the
federal government and in its pre
sent state couldn’t survive with
out it.”
At the end, Brinkley summed up
his impressions:
“Alaska has resources that may
be developed when others are ex
hausted, but meantime it is the
poorest of the 50 states. life is
hard, but the people who like it
really like it.
“Seeing it is big and beautiful
and America’s last if not the
world’s last wild frontier.”
State Chamber Terms
It “Inaccurate Portrayal”
JUNEAU OP) — The Board of
Directors of the State Chamber of
Commerce Tuesday termed a con
troversial television show based on
Alaska as an “inaccurate portray
al” of the state.
The board urged Gov. Wm. Egan
to seek equal time for a presenta
tion of the film “Alaska! America’s
Brightest Star,” which the board
said “depicts an accurate image of
Alaska potential and development.”
The television program in ques
tion was the “David Brinkley
Journal,” shown over the NBC
nework in the contiguous 48 states
Tuesday night.
The Chamber Board said the pro
gram was “highly detrimental to
Alaska, contained distortions and
was generally an inaccurate por
trayal of the State of Alaska be
fore the American public.”
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