TANANA LEADER
Published Every Thursday at Xanana, Alaska.
Vil 2 SAM J. CALLAHAN. EDITOR He. 2
0»3. It. Arbaeklt. Manager
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The Northwest Mounted Police force of Canada con
sists of about 700 men. We often hear this body spoken of
as the most superb body of semi-military men in existence;
and the praise is not ill bestowed. The strength of the
organization lies in its sympathetic connection with the
people and in its extraordinary powers of a judicial and
discretional nature. It is patterned to a great extent after
the Texas Rangers, which have been in existence with but
little change except as to decrease in number since 1836.
The Rangers have not the judicial powers of the Police, yet
they exercise slightly larger discretionary powers in some
respects, while not being hampered quite so much by mili
tary rules. Thus, when the Galveston disaster took place,
the Rangers when they arrived there unceremoniously shot
persons caught robbing the dead and committing other acts
of vandalism. The Rangers wear no uniform, and are sent
on their duties, collectively and individually, with the
briefest possible instructions. It is somewhat remarkable
that there has never been a scandal of any note connected
with the service, and that the Rangers have always held
the respect of all classes of people in Texas.—It has often
been suggested that a system formed somewhat after the
fashion of the Rangers and the Mounted Police be provided
for Alaska. It is needless to say that under the present
status of the territory such a body of men would owe its
responsibility to a head too far removed from the soil to
permit of its unbiased and most effective action.
One Year ...
Six Months.
William T. Stead, the noted English journalist, not
long ago, when the question of the budget was agitating
the British public and threatening to put an end to the
house of lords, interviewed his congenial spirit Julia, and
through her mediumship conversed with the late Hon.
William Ewart Gladstone on the political situation. It is
worthy of remark that the Grand Old Man entertained
about the same views he would reasonably be expected to
hold if he were still in the flesh. Could some occult-gifted
newspaper man acquaint Alaskans with the opinions held
by departed statesmen regarding the political aspects of
this territory, it would, of course, make interesting reading;
but it would, doubtless, leave debatable ground on either
side of the River Styx. Platt of Connecticut would proba
bly turn up his ghostly nose at Delegate Wickersham and
ask, in an audible aside, where in the blazes he came from,
any how. Poor old Mark Hanna, who died before his time,
might ask time to investigate the strength of the Socialist
vote. If Washington, or even Lincoln, should be ap
pealed to, there would be need of outlining the later les
sons of geography.--All in all, it is just as well to let the
dead past bury its dead, and to fight out the issue on pres
ent and future exigencies.
The national inland waterways commission will send a
tub-commission to Alaska in the spring to report on the
water facilities, particularly regarding the Yukon river.
One of the things to be investigated is the desirability of
placing ice breakers on the Yukon as an aid to winter
navigation. There is all kinds of room here for experi
ments in aid of winter navigation, and if winter navigation
would not be helped it would not be perceptibly hindered
by them. The only steamboat that has passed Tanana this
winter was on runners on top of the ice. It was drawn by
horses. It is our candid opinion that the best way to nav
igate these waters in winter is to adhere somewhat tena
ciously to the general rule of keeping a safe and sane thick
ness of good solid ice between the craft and the chilly wa
ters beneath. But if the waterways commission desires to
•experiment with ice breakers they will find the ice always
ready in the proper season, and there will be nothing to it
but to trot out their breaker and go to work.
A late philanthropic idea which has possessed John D.
Rockefeller is the proposed donation of a million dollars
to be expended in the eradication of the hook worm of the
Southern States. Strangely enough some of the people
down South have intimated that they do not want anything
to do with Mr. Rockefeller and his vermifuge. If the old
gentleman is set on making war on worms and the South
persists in thwarting his campaign down there, he might
send his million plunks to Alaska to be used in suppressing
the ice worms, which are even more numerous and more
deadly than their Southern cousins. Alaska can overlook
a reasonable amount of taint, even in her vermifuge.
Some of the old grayheads will remember Woodhull &
Claflin’s Weekly, a publication of New York which was
issued in the interest of free love and women’s rights along
in the early ’70’s. During the progress of the Beecher
Tilton scandal the paper became so salacious that it was
denied the privilege of the mails, and it finally succumbed
to the vigorous opposition to the circulation of indecent
literature. Its publishers, Miss Tennie C. Claflin and Mrs.
Victoria Woodhull, sisters, went to England, where they
married men of title and fortune. Now Tennie C. is the
Lady Cook who is in the front rank of the suffragettes.
She declares she is prepared to spend a million dollars for
the good of the cause.
WILL TAFT AND ROOSEVELT QUARREL?
Col- H nry Wattersorv, of the Louisville Courier-Journal, lias
flung ti e following challenge at the New York World:
Nor let us be too cocksure of anything; and yet,
albeit opposed on principle to games of chance, we have
a wager to offer the World, not of money but of wittles,
with maybe a drop or two onbeknownst to the W. C. T. U.
to wash ’em down—to wit, a dinner for twenty four, to be
given in Washington City, District of Columbia, on or be
fore the first Monday of December, 1911. the World to
invite twelve, the Chief Justice of the United States, the
Vice President and the Speaker of the House of Repre
sentatives to serve as judges and referees and to sit at
table as additional, ex officio guests—or words to that
effect—the proposition to be that Taft and Roosevelt are
at daggers’ points, by the Courier Journal in the affirma
tive, the World in the negative.
The WTorld accepted the wager, with a few strings attached as
life lines. There is plenty of time to figure on who has the best
chance to win.
THE POLE
I’m glad I didn't find the pole, up there wdiere the Arctic bil
lows rolls. When first I heard the pole was lost, for one brief di.
mv wires were crossed; I said: “Methinks I’d better go ac»oss the
weary wastes of snow, along the white bear’s lonely track. an<l find
the pole, and bring it back. Thus shall I s^ale the heights of fame
and grow sidewhiskers on ray name. I'll be a bigger man than
Taft, I'll work the soft Chautauqua gtaft. and earn a package of
long green by writing for a magazine; I’ll have some medals in my
trunk, and silver cups. and other junk; and kings and queens will
cry with pride, that I’m all wool and thiee yards wide. So let me
hire some Eskimos, and hit the nice cool Arctic snows." But here
my granny intervened, and said: "Those stovepipes must he
cleaned; you haven’t mowed the la.vn this week, and it’s a sight to
make one shriek; there’s'-something clogging up the flue—yon
ought to wash the buggy, too, and there are forty thousand chores,
and here you stand around outdoors, and mumble like a heathen
Turk"—and then, mv friends, I get to work. —Walt Mason.
CO VERNMENT
BY COMMISSION
Valdez Prospector, Dec. 12: “Alaska is going to he run hy a com
mission if the Taft administration is able to jam it through,'’ says W.
F. Thompson, editor of the Fairbanks News Miner, who has just re
turned from Washington. “The President has settled to his 1 wu sat
isfaction that a commission is the real thing for a far-away colony, ano
lie wants to put the system in force in Alaska."
Mr. Thompson talk eel with various officials of the departnien* < f
ju-tice and of other departments, as well as mernb. is of congress, iilit.tr
Alaska affairs, and trom many of them he gained the impres ion tluo
the Alaska commission is one ot the pet ideas of the President, and a
few other persons outside of Alaska care whether Alaska is governed
as a penal colony or left to itself without any government at all, the
President will be able to get support for bis fad trom congressmen who
do not care, but who do wairt favors from the administration, and the\
will be wi ling to tiade. •
This impression which Mr. Thompson tilings fiom the capital i
not biased by any fondness of his own fo the commission idea, becan-i
he is opposed to it, but he comes hack with the philosophical view tha’
it is going to be inflicted on Alaska anyway, and theie is no use sweat
ing blood over if
GRANT GREEK MINERS
“LINING UP" THE PAY
Willi all the knocks that Grant criek gets she is still in the ring
[t seems that the people in the near vicinity are the worst knockers.
It appears that people who would be benefited by a camp here aie some
of the first ones to condemn the creek, instead cf trying to assist it in
development. I will say one tiling for the laymen on the creek—with
one exception they are troubled with a disease known as cold feet
There are some of them who if they stuck their feet into a tub ol
boiling hot alcohol they would freeze it solid, and it would not have to
be wood atcobol either. There is one man who got a lay on the creek
and got frosty feet and has since leaving the creek been telling people
that he put the creek on the bum. He told one man who was going to
visit the creek what he had done; but the man happened to know him,
took the story for what he thought it was worth, made trip and iva>
pleased with the outlook of the creek.
I think by next July thirds will show for themselves. There
will be three or font outfits sluicing when the water runs and they will
be taking out some gold. Thdre is pay lined up on three claims up to
date, and I think It will soon show up on more—before spring, any way.
Sam McDill had one ol bis fbet severely frostbitten, but will not
lose any of it. The heavy snow retards work, as it is about four feet
on the level, and getting into the woods for fuel is an uphill job. Wood
is a little scarce, but I guess we will make it stick any way.
Cy Noble has been with u,s for some time. He is representing the
Monday association, and I will say that he is doing legitimate work.
MacDonald & Stoneman are busy on their lay on 4 above. They
are in very good pay, and are blocking out for summer work.
Christmas and New Year's were celebrated to the best of our
ability, but owing to the tact that the man who took the order tor a
turkey and a few other luxuries failed to make good, the turkey we
look for failed to light on Grant creek. J. P. Farley.
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CAfc'P 6IGBGN f,0. 25, Arctic Brother
hood. meets every Monday night
in A. B. Hall, corner Second st.
and t'ampliell ave. at 8::kl o'clock.
Visiting Arctics cifrdiallv invited to at
tend llie meetings of the Camp.
Phil Gallaher, Arctic Chief.
J. Russell \\ alle, Arctic Rec.
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