®lj? (Efjttma Waiter
CHITINA, ALASKA.
Cordova Office: Daily Alaskan
Published every Saturday by
WTT.T. A. STEEL HARRY O. STEEL
Editors, Managers and Proprietors
O. E. BENNETT, City Editor
ADVERTISING RATES:
Made know n upon application. They
will be found reasonable for the ser
vice given.
Application has been made to the post
office department for the entry of this
newspaper as second-class matter at the
postoffice at Chitina, Alaska, under the
act of Congress of March 3, 1879.
SUBSCRIPTION PRICK:
One month.. ..$ .50
Six month8. *. 2.00
One year. 3.50
Office: Hotel Chitina Building.
CHITINA, SATURDAY, March 11.
LET US MINE
OUR OWN COAL
RAILROAD DEVELOPMENT.
_ >
There’s a legion that never was listed,
That bears no colors or crest,
But split in a thousand detachments,
Is breaking the road for the rest.
;—KIPLING.
So might the public sing of the
pioneer railroad builders of the past
decade.
The last “frontiers" are going, go
ing gradually—going before the ad
vance Of civilization or rather before
the advance of the pioneer railroads
that run ahead of modern civiliza
tion. Looking over the pioneer rail
road building of the past twenty
years, it is hard to find a country
that has not built, or is not build
ing, a railroad that was deemed im
possible to build fifty years ago.
South America, China, Africa As
ia and Alaska have all been invaded
by the hardy pioneer Soldiers of For
tune in the shape of the railroad civ
il engineers, that break through the
jungles and mountain passes, finding
a path for the “iron horse" to fol
low on. afterwards.
The ambition of every good Mo
hammedan is to betake himself from
the place he is living in and to make
one of the many million pigrims that
annually visit Mecca; to walk seven
times around the Kaaba, at the same
time reciting brisions; to kiss the
black stone from the sacred waters of
the Zemzen; also to make a num
ber of trips to Mount Ararat and pay
tribute to the tomb of the prophet at
Medina. For hundreds of years this
has been going on; some of the pil
grims went on foot, some on horses,
some On camels. But today it is all
changed. The engineer came, and
now the pilgrim travels on a rail
road that runs from Damascus to
Mecca, and thence by the way of
Medina to Jedda and. the Arabian
sea. This railroad is known as the
Hedjayz and was built by the Turkish
government with the sole aim to aid
the Mohammedans in their pilgrim
ages to Mecca. Freight trade is not
catered to at all.
Old Abdul Hamid was not a “shin
ing light” as the head of a govern
ment, but, to give the devil his due,
he gave generously from the civil
list towards the building of this road
and his subjects followed in their
ruler’s wake. For some time Abdul
Hamid tried to obtain infidel money
to build this road, but failing in that,
he turned the road over to the Turk
ish army. Officers and men threw
themselves into the task with a won
derful ezal.
From an engineering point of view
the road was not hard to construct,
as there were no great bridges to put
in, or any very heavy cuts, but all
the same, it is one of the pioneer
roads of the world and one can trav
el through that country drawn by
engines made in the United States
and on steel rails that came from
Pittsburg.
Wflien the Union and Central Paci
fic Joined the Pacific coast with the
Atlantic coast years ago, it was the
first link of a chain that has been
added to as years have gone on.
The progressive Latin-Americans
have always dreamed of having a
link or links like it, but until last
year their dream had never been
fulfilled. During last year an Eng
lish contracting company bored a
hole through the Andes mountains
connecting Chile with the Argentina,
this company cutting through a cou
ple of miles of rock and dirt, built
a tunnel that measures 10,300 feet
long, 16 feet five inches wide and is
18 feet and 3-4 inches in height above
the top of the rail, with two portals
measuring 400 feet long, and is at
an altitude of 10,350 feet above sea
level and forms the greatest engi
neering feat that has been done in
the last few years. This tunnel was
commenced at the Argentina end on
October, 1905, and at the Chilean
end a little earlier by a construction
company known as the Chilean Trans
Andine Construction Co., but was
turned over to the English construc
tion company in February, 1908.
This tunnel presented features that
has never been met with before in
tunnel building. The part of the
Andes through which the tunnel was
driven is composed of stratified rocks
tilted at high angles, and at this al
titude these rocks are subject to ex
treme weather conditions. To quote
the words of F. B. Warren in the
World Today of October issue, 1910:
“Owing to the constant percolation
of melting snow, decomposition con
tinues to great depths bfi'ow the sur
face. Engineers encountered this
condition 2,000 feet below the crest
of the range. It was, therefore, nec
essary to line the tunnel throughout,
for while many of the rocks may in
themselves stand the extremes of
heat and cold and the drip of wa
ter, no dependence can be placed up
on any of the cleavages planes.”
Last year was the centennial of
the Argentina Republic, and as a fit
ting center attraction of the celebra
tion was the opening of the first
South American trans-continental
railroad. This tunnel and the well
known Simplon tunnel that passes
through the Alps are perhaps the
two greatest feats in tunnel engineer
ing in the world. With the comple
tion of the trans Andine tunnel the
journey from Buenos Ayres to Val
aparaiso may now be taken in com
fort and safety all the year round.
In the old days the passenger had to
go mule-back from Las Cuevas to
Caracoles.
The present route not only saves
twelve days in time, but also ?65
in money. The number of men em
ployed on this tunnel was about
1,500 and working in eight-hour
shifts, with no stops for Sundays or
holidays, were steadily employed for
four years on this piece of work that
made neighbors of two nations, who
before were almost strangers and
who at many times in the past had
almost come to blows over a boun
dary dispute.
Cecil Rhodes, the greatest empire
builder or modern times, was wont
to gaze at a map of South Africa,
and say in a musing voice: "Red,
all red,” meaning one day he hoped
to see it all owned by the British,
also his scheme of a railroad from
Cape Town to Cairo was consider
ed visionary. He did not live to see
either part of his dream fulfilled, but
shortly after he died the British an
nexed the Transvaal and Orange Riv
er republics, and his dream of a rail
road from north to south is being
realized as surely as a great build
ing gradually climbs to the skies and
completion. Of the 5,700 miles of
surveyed line, 4,200 miles of track
age has been completed. For a dis
tance of some 2,200 miles from Cape
Town the road is in operation. It
has passed through the Transvaal
and has traveled deep into the Bel
gian Congo. By now it has estab
lished connections with the navigable
waters of the Congo River, thus es
tablishing connections with the At
lantic ocean and besides its connec
tion with the Indian ocean, by its
branch line to Beira. From the
north end the road is somewhere past
Khartoum, and although the distance
is great, it will soon disappear. When
the discovery of Victoria Falls was
announced to the world it was greet
ed with incredulity, for that section
of the country was almost at that
time uninvaded by white man’s foot
steps. Today there are trains run
ning to the falls that run on a regu
lar schedule.
The Pan-American railroad may
be compared to the Cape to Cairo
road regarding the engineering fea
tures of tne road, and the character
of the country it passes through.
The development of both countries
awaits the completion of these roads,
although for many years there will
not be a great deal of freight hauled
from end to end of the roads, but as
the country develops It will produce
the freight, and both roads will have
> to have branches or feeders, for the
future of both continents promises to
be enormous, and in time these roads
will be dividend producers.
One of the greatest waterways in
the world Is the Amazon River, with
its great feeders, the Mamore and
Madeira Rivers. These rivers form
a natural outlet for the central parts
of Brazil, Bolivia and Peru. The area
drained by these rivers is equal to
about the size of Texas. The draw
back to these rivers as waterways
has been the cataracts around the
Mamore River, where in the past
everything had to be portaged
around these cataracts. Civil Engi
neer George Earl Church was the
master mind in conceiving a railroad
around these cataracts away back
in 1868, and the Brazilian govern
ment granted the first concession,
but the project was abandoned.
Again in 1878 a second effort was
made but lowland fevers and theusu
al tropical diseases killed it. The
Belgian government, however, re
mained loyal to the idea and at the
present time there are over 2,500
workmen employed. Of course the
increased knowledge of sanitation
and tlie means of immunizing work
ers agaius* tropical maladies are the
only things that prevent these pres
ent workers from buffering the fates
of the past ones./ This road is about
200 miles lon^ &nd is nearly all grad
ed and reftrfly for steel. The construc
tion of t'his road will remove one of
the few remaining frontiers left.
This road also forms one of tbe feed
ers of the proposed Pan-American
railroad. There is no difference in
the tropical jungles of today and
those of three decades ago, only med
ical knowledge has enabled man to
combat against disease that 30 years
ago, where the mortality was 23 per
cent, today only four whites have
died in the course of two years.
Since the building of the White
Pass and Yukon railroad it has been
shown that railroads could be built
in the extreme northern countries.
When Major Abercrombie first qame
down the Copper River and made
known to the w'orld what a wonder
ful country lay in its vale, but what
a rugged and rough country it was,
little did people think that in the
course of a few years there would
be a railroad constructed there that
would overcome obstacles of nature
that seemed almost impossible, and
that gave an engineering feat to the
world that is almost unparalleled
in the previous history of railroad
building.
The story of the construction of
the Copper River & Northwestern
railroad has been written in nearly
all English speaking countries and
the engineering feats connected with
it. No where can one turn without
reading of a pioneer road that is be
ing built. Down where the river
Euphrates joins the Tigres, an Eng
lishman by the name of Sir William
Willeocks is building a railroad, just
about the spot where the Garden
of Eden was located and the traveler
in the future will be able to ride in
a Pullman car.
Canada is going to build a railroad
to Fort Churchill on the Hudson’s
bay that will traverse as bleak a
region as is possible to conceive, but
it will shorten the distance from her
western provinces by 1,000 miles to
Liverpool, and thereby bring the
great wheat market closer.
When the call goes forth for en
gineer pioneers to go “north of 53”
there will be no dearth of them.
There is no man that does more for
I civilization than the pioneer civil en
gineer, who goes forth into the wilds
to find a path for the railroad, and
there is no man that receives less
credit for it than he does.' But it
was ever thus.
RICHARD GALLAND.
When Governor Sanders df Louis
iana saw that the votes were going
against New Orleans for the Panama
Pacific exposition and that San Fran
cisco was going to get It, instead of
making a “holler” he withdrew
gracefully from the fight, and there
by showed that he was a good sports
man. There is nothing an earth ^9
commendable as a man who can eith
er take a victory or a .defeat grace
fully.
-XXX
■ ' ✓ '.
A New York heiress-rewarded a
policeman who saved her from death
in a runaway accident by marrying
him. Since this event wealthy young
women are afraid to drive faster than
an undertaker’s trot, so eager are
the officers to rescue them,'so says
one of our exchanges. But we would
like to have the “cops” views of dou
ble harness and if his brother oiti
cers only knew what he knows now.
We think that the laaies could drive
like the very devil.
-XXX-1
A New York society offered a prize
for the twenty-five most beautiful
words in the English language.
"Money” was a favorite word with
many of the contributors. We know
a whole lot of words that sound soft
er than money, but none better. If
we were to ask the newly engaged
man what was the most beautiful
word in the English language he
would probably probably answer
“darling” or "honey," but one year
after he was married ask him the
same question and its ten dollars to
a dead cow’s eye lash it would be
"money.”’ ;
Seattle, March 11.—The marine
inspectors are probing the accident
which recently occurred to the
steamer Victoria, east of Hinchin
brook Island.
John Hirst
Jesse Brown <
The Nevada
Restaurant
A Place you can get a
GOOD .MEAL
Cooked as you want it and
well served
AT POPULAR PRICES
t
Wine or beer served with .
meals <
Private suppers or banquets .
served at short notice
DR. A. GJEIMLIGH
. . PHYSICIAN and SVRGEON
MacCORMAC HOTEL, CORDOVA,
Telephone 29
ALASKA STEAflSHlP CO.
Fastest and most commodious s sailing between
Cordova and Seattle.
Sails from Seattle— Sails from Cordova—
March 8.Alameda..March 10
March 14.Northwestern.March 24
March 24.Alameda.March 31
April 1.Northwestern.. April 8
This company reserves the right to change schedule or
steamers without notice.
Tickets on sale at up-town office Alaska Steamship Bldg.
Baggage or freight will not be received at dock later than one
hour before sailing dme.
R. J. BARRY, THOMAS J. TALLENT
Ticket Agent
! W*
■ r
GEO. DOOLEY
General Commission Merchant
Agent: Agent:
Armour’s Hot Drink Supplies Fire Extinguishers
Kahn Bros. “Monogram” ' Royal Typewriter Co.
“What We Haven’t Got We Get”
New and Second Hand Goods Bought and Sold
■»♦♦♦♦»»■» |, > i MM 111 > >.|..y
Buy Your Clothing at the Home
Store and Save the Freight
We Will Sell You Everything
AT CORDOVA PRICES
. >
EINKELSTEIN & SAPIRO
CORDOVA MEN’S OUTFITTERS
Chitina, Alaska.
Just Op
Billiards - Pool
CIGARS
Confectionery
Soft Drinks and
Solo Tables
Bowling Alley
TIBBS BROS.
Send Your
Job Printing
To the
Chitina Leader
Chitina
News
Stand
All the Latest
MAGAZINES & PERODICALS
Cigars, Tobacco’s, Confection
ery and Soft Drinks
POOL AND SOLO TABLES
Barber Shop in Connection
You can play or read while
awaiting your turn
AL CHURCH & TOM BRADY,
Proprietors
FEED STABLE
HAY AND GRAIN
FOR SALE
First Class" Accommoda
tions for Stock, Steady or
Transient. : : : : :
H. CHAMBERLAIN, Prop.
Log
Cabin
Restaurant
GOOD COFFEE
Babbage
The Old Sour-Dough
Watchmaker and Jeweler
OP AMERICA,
l AA
In Chitina Pharmacy, Chitina,
ED. S. ORR SHOE CO.
Leaves Chitina
TUESDAYS,
FRIDAYS
and SUNDAYS
Carrying Passengers Express
and U. S. Mail
Office in Hotel Chitina
Chitina Bakery
& Coffee House
GESSNER & STANGNETH
Proprietors
FRESH BREAD
Cakes and Pastry
Always on Hand
Main Street, —— Chitina.