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THE TRUTH

ABOUT

ALASKA

THE

GOLDEN LAND OF THE
MIDNIGHT SUN

BY

EUGENE MCELWAINE

ILLUSTRATED

PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR

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PREFACE

ALASKA has within the last half-decade awakened the interest, if she has not received the recognition, properly attaching to the GREAT COUNTRY which her aborigines, more wisely than they knew, shadowed forth in the name. She has become at last an object of interest alike to the explorer, the economist and the adventurer; to all who have the instinct of the pioneer, to the capitalist, the miner and the wageearner, and now, even to the legislator and the politician, and, not to mention the naturalist and the antiquarian, she deserves to be such to the agriculturist and the manufacturer. She has, however, had no recent chronicler. What little reliable information concerning her has been written, since general attention was attracted thither, has been filed away in tomes of government reports, while the misinformation has been more widely disseminated through the medium of newspapers and other channels under the more or less immediate influence of interested and often unscrupulous transportation and speculative agencies.

Under these conditions, it occurred to the writer of this volume that an account, plainly and unpretentiously told, of the experiences and observations and even the inferences of one who for the last three years has been actually on the ground, and been required by the very exigencies of the situation to keep awake to what was going on about him, would be accepted by readers with appreciation of the spirit in which it was written-the desire to tell the truth about a region which has not hitherto

been favored in this regard, and, for the benefit of such as may be interested in this part of our country, to supply, however imperfectly, the information which he felt greviously the need of when such interest was first aroused in him.

The result is the volume which is now submitted. In its preparation the author has made use of no model, and has resorted to no art or artifices. He desires the book to be taken for what it purports to be, as nearly as may be a reflex of the things and objects described and subjects treated, from the point of view of a business man, and without any pretentions to literary merit.

In PART FIRST, and as a sort of introduction, is given an account of the author's trip from Pennsylvania to Kotzebue Sound, with descriptions of incidents and observations in the long journey of over 6,000 miles.

PART SECOND treats of Arctic Alaska, and gives an account of what he learned and observed during his sojourn in this practically unknown region.

PART THIRD concerns subjects of more immediate and absorbing interest. It treats of Alaska as a whole, of her resources, of her hidden and patent wealth, of the aids and hindrances to development, of her people, their situation, environments, facilities and means of progress, as well as of their needs and their aspirations. The discovery in 1897 of gold in rich deposits on the headwaters of the Yukon at and near the present location of Dawson City, and later at Nome and in many other parts of Alaska, has attracted world-wide attention. This work has been prepared with special reference to the gold industry and it aims to give an exhaustive treatment of the subject. It is thought that the reader will find in the pages of Part Third prac

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