THE NOME NUGGET
Published Monday, Wednesday and Friday by the
NOME PUBLISHING CO.
NOME, ALASKA
E. P. BOUCHER .'. Managing Editor
CLINTON GRAY .Production Manager
Telephone: Main 125 P O. Box 618
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Entered as second class matter October 14, 1943, at the
postoffice at Nome, Alaska, under the Act of March 3, 1879.
Uncle Sam and The Skin Game
(Anchorage Daily Times)
Alaska’s fur seals are in the news again as the
Interior Department announces that 66,378 pelts were
taken this year at the Pribilof Islands.
The skins were shipped to St. Louis where a pri
vate firm will process them under contract with the
Interior Department. Then they will be sold at auction.
Twenty percent of the money will go to Canada under
a treaty arrangement. Eighty percent will, go into
the federal treasury.
Last year the sale of 48,582 skins yielded $3,265,868
to the federal government. This year’s larger crop
should bring more, depending upon market conditions.
All this is a joyous report for the Interior Depart
ment. It proves that the conservation program is suo
cessful. The seal herd has been built up from almost
nothing to a level of abundance. The operation is high
ly profitable.
But the joy is not for Alaskans. The story brings
to mind conditions which are undesirable and even
obnoxious.
Alaskans have complained for many years against
the practice of the federal government in stripping the
territory of its seal crop for processing in St. Louis.
They contend that the federal government, under
this procedure, is guilty of the type of absentee ex
ploitation that has deterred Alaska’s development in
many fields.
The Pribilof program takes the precious furs out
of Alaska and leaves nothing for Alaska. The entire
operation, including profits, are beyond taxation.
Efforts have been made to have the Interior De
partment insist that the skins be processed in Alaska.
The requirement could be made a part of the contract.
If this were to be enforced, Alaska would stand
to gain a new industry employing some 500 workers
on a year-around basis. This industry is now main
tained in St. Louis.
Such an industry would bolster the economy of
any Alaskan city in which it were located. It could
lift a little community out of economic doldrums and
make it a thriving center with a substantial population.
It could be the basis for creating a new city.
Besides furnishing employment, the enterprise
would become a taxable unit of the territory’s indus
trial establishment.
Pleasant words are emanating from high places
in the federal administration about the encouragement
of private industry in Alaska. This industry could
be established by writing a new clause into a gov
ernment contract.
If the administration is really interested in doing
what it says it is, why is no effort being made to
create this industry with the stroke of a pen in a
contract?
The announcement of the banner crop of fur seals
for 1953 also reminds Alaskans that under statehood
legislation now pending in Congress, their state would
. get half the profits.
The operations would remain a responsibility of
the federal government because they are conducted
under an international treaty with Canada. But instead
of looting this natural resource of Alaska and leaving
nothing behind, the government would return half of
the profits to the state from which the wealth came.
This proposal has won the endorsement of the
Interior Department, the Bureau of the Budget, and
various Congressional committees during the years
statehood has been pending. But it never becomes a
reality.
The benefits for Alaska from the' fur seals are lost
New Organization
For Development
Of Western Alaska
ANCHORAGE, UFi — Business
men from a number of western
Alaska communities ended meet
ings here this week by forming a
new arm of the all-Alaska Cham
ber of Commerce called the Econ
omic Development Committee for
Western Alaska.
Paul Dupler, Kodiak attorney
elected chairman of the new
group said tire non-partisan or
ganization will push for political
action in promotion and develop
ment of mining, aviation, trans
poration and the tourist trade.
Bruce Kendall, Cordova hotel
operator, elected secretary of the
group, said it was formed when
the “collapse of the Alaska De
velopment Board became appar
ent.”
He added the need was evident
to impress the territorial govern
ment with the wishes and needs
of the people of western Alaska.
The organization rapped the lo
cation of the Alaska General De
pot at Anchorage as expensive for
the Army and detrimental to the
development of other more suited
areas.
Kendall said a goodwill tour to
Japan is in the offing to interest
Japanese interests in Bering River
coal resources.
Other members of committees
set up for the new organization
include: Walter Hickel, Hugh
Dougherty, A1 Swelling, Ed Coffey
and Larry Moore of Anchorage;
John Brennan and Cash Cole of
Fairbanks; Jack Roth, Seward;
and George Gibson and Bob Kel
sey of Valdez.
Reds Return 50 More
Prisoners Than Promised
PANMUNJOM, GP> — Seventy
five more Americans streamed
back to- freedom Tuesday as the
great Korean war prisoner ex
change entered its third week.
Besides the Americans, .the
Reds turned back 75 British and
300 South Koreans—50 more than
the 400 daily the Reds originally
promised.
Tuesday’s liberated Americans
and British came back smiling,
but their gaunt bodies showed the
effects of many months in North
Korean stockades.
One repatriate, a prisoner for
more than 25 months, wryly de
scribed the food.
“We ate like pigs,” said Pfc.
Earl C. Barnard, of Martinez,
Calif. “I cringe when I think of
it.”
“They brought the food in
wooden troughs. It was soupy sor
ghum and rice. Of course you had
meat in your sorghum — worms,
that is.
“At times there was enough for
all of us. At times there wasn’t.”
Harvey Aluminum Corp.
Ask Permit Survey Hydro
Plant on Copper River
WASHINGTON, UP)—'The Alas
ka Division of the Office of Ter
ritories in the Interior Depart
ment said Monday that to its
knowledge Harvey Aluminum,
Inc., has not officially approached
the department about a huge pro
posed hydroelectric project in
Alaska.
Harvey Monday asked the Pow
er Commission for a preliminary
permit for a 7 million kilowatt
hours output on a Copper River
project 65 miles northeast of Val
dez.
Harvey said the project would
include a concrete dam about 560
feet high, located in Wood Canyon
about 4 miles below the conflu
ence of the Chitina and Copper
Rivers.
Ths dam would form a reservoir
extending about 51 miles up the
Copper River and about 55 miles
up the Chitina. Total capacity of
the reservoir would be about
18,500,000 acre-feet of which 14
million acre-feet would be active
storage. The power house would
have an ultimate installed capa
city of 1,475,000 horsepower.
A preliminary permit, if issued,
is for the sole purpose of giving
•the holder priority while conduct
ing studies to prepare an applica
tion for a FPC license.
Gunmen Force Cashier To
Open Vault, Escape With
$160,00 From N. Y. Bank
FLORAL PARK, N. Y., UP) —
Daring gunmen grabbed an assist
ant cashier on the lawn of his
home Tuesday morning, forced
him to open his bank’s vault and
escaped with $160,000.
They took the cashier with them
but dumped him out a few miles
away.
Eric Gronewall, 44, told police
that as he was leaving his Belle
more home to go to a branch of
the Franklin National Bank, a
man stepped out of the bushes. •
He had a gun, and a canvas
bag. Jamming the gun into Grone
wall’s side, he warned him not to
cry out, adding, “we know all
about you and the bank.”
They got into Gronewall’s car
and drove to the bank. Gronewall
became aware another car was
following, but the gunman said
sternly, “Don’t dare turn around.”
The gunman, about 30, dark
haired and medium height, chat
ted as they drove along, said he
had been in the Army and be
fore that had worked in a bank,
but didn’t say where.
He had planned while he was
in the Army to rob another bahk,
he said, but when he got out
found it had closed.
Men did not climb Mt. Ojympus,
traditional home of the ancient
Greeks’ gods, until the current
century.
year after year, along with all the other benefits that
would accrue under statehood, because Congress fails
to enact the legislation.
The Interior Department no doubt swells with
pride each year as it announces bumper crops of fur
seals have been taken. The department has good
reason to be proud of its successful venture in the fur
business.
But Alaskans don’t swell with any such pride.
They are left standing here with their pockets empty
and employment scarce while 500 men and women
in St.. Louis prosper on the industry that belongs here.
And the federal government takes the profits for
its own.
And some Senators have the crust to delay_ state
hood on the ground that more industry is peeded here.
Statehood Backers Blame
Condition of Alaska’s
Resources on Washington
<Continued from Page One)
canneries and the Ketchikan Pulp
Company.
The attorney said he helped
bring the pulp mill to Ketchikan
and feels that four or five more
such mills are needed before state
hood.
The attorney cited figures
given by Allan Shattuck of Ju
neau at House hearings in
Washington earlier this year
claiming that statehood would
cost $200 a year extra per in
dividual.
Mrs. Diane Olson, who followed
Gore to the stand, said no fisher
man would object to $200 if the
present depletion of fisheries is
stopped and stable runs like those
in British Columbia, could be at
tained through local control. Mrs.
Olson is a housewife who trolls
for salmon with her husband.
Thor Hofstad, Wrangell - bom
tugboat operator, said that at
many places in the world, Am
erica has fought for the right of
the people to self determination.
Alaskans, he said, were among
those who fought for that cause
for others but came home to
find the determination of their
civil rights in the hands of a
distant Congress unwilling to
act on statehood legislation.
This has left the American de
fense bastion as a mockery in
which conscription and taxa
tion continue without represent
ation, Hofstad said.
The Rev. Jack Middaugh, pastor
of suburban Methodist churches,
told the senators his first impres
sion of Alaska was that it cele
brates Independence Day more
eagerly than do the states. But, he
declared the Alaskans don’t share
the freedom July 4 denotes. •
The pastor said declining sal
man runs werd evidence of fed
eral mismanagement of natural
resources and that these things
can happen to oil, timber, game
and minerals.
He charged ihai his parish
ioners still are unable to get
the Bureau of Land Manage
ment to answer letters to the
Anchorage office. A state man
ager would not last long in such
situation, the Rev. Middaugh
said.
Mrs. Olson, who trolls for sal
mon with her husband, cited con
structive biological studies of the
new Alaska Department of Fish
eries as evidence that Alaskans
correct evils of long distance con
trol when they have a voice in
managing resources.
She said the chain of reaction
from Alaska up to Congress is
long and broken as evidenced
by ignoring of the statehood
referendum vote. But when
Congress needs money, man
power, airplane spruce, strate
gic materials or military bases,
Mrs. Olson declared, Alaskans
are as loyal as any in respond
ing to the need.
Turns Robber Into Customer
ALBUQUERQUE, UP) — A stub
born clerk Tuesday turned a
would-be holdup man into a cash
customer.
Frances Edwards, 22, said an
aged man approached her park
refreshment stand, displayed a
gun and threatened to kill her if
she didn’t hand over the money
in the cash drawer. She refused.
The elderly bandit ran around
the stand shouting “Let me in.
Give me the money.” Finally he
put up his gun, ordered three
bottles of pop, paid for them, hop
ped in his car and drove off.