VOLUME XIV. NUMBER 89.
SEWARD, ALASKA.
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 1929.
PRICE TEN CENTS
TIC OF THE m
NUMEROUS MEASURES ARE IN
TRODUCED BY MEMBERS
BOTH HOUSES
JUNEAU, April 17, (Special to
the Gateway)—The house, yes
terday afternoon by a vote of 11
to 5. passed its own version of
Steel’s comptroller bill but in
such shape its own father would
fail to recognize it; it ceased to
be “the comptroller bill” and be
came a measure for creating the
office of auditor and the popular
election of an auditor and treas
urer, leaving executive powers of
the Governor untouched.
, Murray, dean of the house,
declared it to be a workable meas
ure in its present form and char
acterized the bill, as received from
the senate and amended by the
house, as “A mixture of dish
water and dynamite.”
Members voting against the
passage of the bill were Fisher,
McCormick, McCain, Nylen and
Winn. Fisher explained later he
would not vote for any measure
having any connection with the
comptroller bill.
Foster introduced a measure
levying a five dollar head tax to
defray additional costs of old age
allowances, for indigents and
children.
Shattuck introduced a measure
pioviding for the annual sinking
of funds amounting to $40,000, un
til it reached $250,000 as a pioneer
home building fund.
Zeigler introduced a bill ap
propriating $30,000 for operation
? ^ of the Ketchikan fish hatchery
which was discontinued two years
ago.
i: LEASED FROM QUARANTINE;
FOUR STEERAGE PASSEN
GERS ARE HELD
> -
KETCHIKAN, April 17, (/P)—The
A. S. S. company’s steamer Alaska
is steaming northward today after
being placed in quarantine yester
day.
The four steerage passengers for
Ketchikan' who came in contact
with the Filipino meningitis germ
carrier have been placed in isola
tion. Fernato Ferrer whose pres*
ence aboard the Alaska, which led
to quarantineing the ship was kept
aboard in strict isolation. Ferrer
is said to have been in contact
^ with persons suffering from men
ingitis.
CHARGES HE FILED F89
ILLEGAL POSSES* FI
SEATTLE, April 17, ‘(^ — Infor
mation was filed in the federal
court by Assistant United States
Attorney Heirnan, charging illegal
shipment of 55 marten skins against
Charles Markle, who is claimed to
have sent the skins from Wrangell
to Seattle without tagging them,
as required by the Alaska game
code.
—
He win ir Out History
JT^VERY totem pole, bit» or little, has carved deep
into it the history, the mythology, the legends
of Alaska, according to Ray Ready, member of the
Hcida Indian tribe. Here he explains the legend et
the White Raven.—(Post-Intelligencer Photo.)
THE. WHITE R/WEl
EVIL SPIRIT
MOTHER of chTlO ^
HELD IN BOX
TO PREVENT j
EVIL. DOING
J
PRISON BOX of
RAVEN CHILD
THE RAVEN
AGAIN
Jf RAVEN (
CHILD ; |
RAVEN CHANGED
SELF TO Pine j
NEEDLE, SWALLOWED
E>V W0NAAN *. * )
Rfc&OPN A
RAVEN CHItw ^
WHITE RAVEN
turned Black
and its ^ml
POWER
SHATTERED
SPIRIT
OF TIDES
SHE
SLEPT -
THUS
THE
FLOOD
V
“If the same amount of re
search and earnest effort to un
derstand, were devoted to a study
of the North American Indian as
has been lavished on unearthing
the secrets of the pyramids of
Egypt, it would bring to light a
veritable treasure house of inter
esting and extremely valuable in
formation in a practically un
explored field of ethnology. It
; would doubtless disclose many
| hitherto unsuspected facts that
would constitute an invaluable aid
jin determining the origin of the
various peoples inhabiting the
western hemisphere prior, to its
occupation by the Caucasian race.
It might even furnish the connec
ting link showing the long sus
pected, but never quite established
| relationship of the Aztecs and Tol
tecs of Mexico and Central Ameri
ca to the ancient Egyptians.
I At least this is the firm con
viction of Raymond L. Ready, mem
iber of the Haida tribe of Indians
in Southeastern Alaska, who is
an earnest and well-informed stu
dent of the history, traditions,
legends and religious beliefs of
j his people. In addition to this he
, has made an intensive study of
jtotemism. “The totem poles of
the Alaskan Indians,” Mr. Ready
j said, “are not merely fanciful
'carved ornamentations, as is gen
j erally and erroneously supposed,
| but are actually religious and his
Jtorical documents. Their analogy,
in some instances, to events chron
icled in our own Bible, is so strik
I ing as it- constitute in itself a
decidedly worth-while field of
study.
‘The Indians do not worship
| these totem poles as gods. They
; are the real histories of the North,
jlnto those poles are carved hun
jdreds of legends of the Northland,
i They are a strange combination of
j mythology, Biblical incidents and
'history. They attempt to preserve
their history thru the carving on
the poles.”
The totem pole here pictured
| serves as an illustration. It towers
150 feet on a hilltop at Wrangell,
! Mr. Ready’s home town, and
j chronicles the history and religi
[ ous traditions of several of the
'Northern tribes, as follows:
i ‘‘The white raven, seen at the
i top, is a spirit having supreme
; power. He can make either day
or night last a long time. The
Indians sought to capture and im
prison the raven, which proved
elusive because he had power to
change himself into other objects
and escape.
1 “One day with the Indians
[close on the trail, the Raven
j changed himself into a pine needle.
The wind was blowing, the pine
needle was blown into the creek
and was swallowed by the beauti
ful raven princess, the next lower
figure carved on the pole,
j “It was necessary for the white
raven to be reborn as the raven
child. Dawn followed the long
Arctic night scon after the raven
‘Continued from Page Two)
i
Colonization Plans
Are Set Forth By
Manager Railroad
COLONEL OHLSON, GENERAL MANAGER OF THE
ALASKA RAIL,ROAD, TELLS OF DETAILS IN
CONNECTION WITH PUTTING SETTLERS UPON
FARM LAND ADJACENT TO RAILROAD BELT—
IS CONFIDENT FIRST FARMERS WILL ARRIVE
' THIS SUMMER—SNODGRASS WILL LEAVE FOR
| STATES SHORTLY TO INTEREST PEOPLE IN
FARMING CENTERS—DEMONSTRATION FARM
HEAD COOPERATING TO FULLEST EXTENT.
Combining four distinctive and important elements
into a whole, General Manager Otto F. Ohlson, of the
, Alaska Railroad, who arrived in Seward today, has
| launched upon a plan for attracting and holding settlers
on the land in the Railroad Zone which promises to
have a far-reaching effect, and is a distinct innovation in
this line of empire building.
C lining four distinctive and im
portant elements into a whole,
General Manager Otto F. Ohlson
of the Alaska Railroad has launch
ed upon a plan for attracting and
holding settlers on the land in the
Railroad Zone which promises to !
have a far-reaching effect, and |
is a distinct innovation in this
line of empire building.
' The settler will have (1) free!
land, (2) cheap transportation
from the States, (3) aid in clear
' g the land, and (4) means of
aancing himself during the pro
cess of conquering the soil. j
Assisting Colonel Ohlson in the
colonization plan is M. D. Snod
grass, to whom may be accredited
a suggestion which solves the
fourth element. It is a change in
the timber laws, or rather an ex
ecutive interpretation, which gives
to the settler the timber upon
i his homestead, to be sold as it is
'cut, and which reserves from pur
chase under the rules governing
exporting timber from Alaska, all
land suitable for farming.
The importance of this innova
tion will be shown when it is
pointed out that the best farming
land in the Railroad Zone contains
heavy stands of birch and cotton
wood. Hence the settler or local
homesteader will have a valuable
crop already standing, which may
be harvested while he is clearing
his land, and the returns from
which will go far toward defraying
the expense of developing a farm.
All that is needed to set the ma
chinery into motion is a birch
| cutting sawmill to purchase the
dogs and convert them into lum
ber and dimensions.
The Alaska Railroad has a quan
tity of equipment suitable for pull
vided into units, one being em
ing stumps, and this will be di- |
ployed wherever land clearing is
in progress on an extended scale, j
Here again, the settler is freed |
of the burden of purchasing ex- i
pensive stump pulling equipment,
and instead of waiting a long
period of years before having an j
appreciable acreage cleared he will j
be prepared to begin cropping an
area sufficient to give him an ap
preciable monetary return at once. !
Thus, instead of a paternalistic
program calling for large appro
priations, which would be fought
in Washington , a self-assisting
plan has been created which will
apply to resident homesteaders as
(Continued on P_ge Five)
SCHOONER TORN FROM MOOR
INGS AND HURLED UPON
THE ROCKS
NEW YORK, April 17, V^P)—
The Atlantic coast from Maine
to Virginia is strewn with high
wreckage piled up under the bat
tering northeast storms raging
for the past 24 hours.
Wind and waves sank small
craft and demoralized shipping;
damaged shore structures along
the coast and inflicted loss else
where.
There was a heavy snow storm
in western Pennsylvania and in
New York harbor a tug and two
barges sank. Six liners were held
in the outside harbor waiting for
the weather to moderate before
proceeding to their piers.
The tide rose to within a foot
of the top of the Battery wall,
close to a record, being four feet
above normal.
At Bell harbor, in the Rockaway
district, a three-story frome build
ing collapsed when the tide brot
high waves to hammer against it.
The wind rose to a velocity of
50 miles an hour along the Maine
coast where a five-masted schoon
er was torn from its moorings and
thrown on the rocks.
In central Vermont the rain
turned into snow and roads in
the mountains became blocked.
At Atlantic City the wind at
tained a velocity of 78 miles an
hour.
FATAL TRAIN WRECK
HAL, Belgium, April 17, </P)—
Ten were killed and a score ser
iously injured when a Paris-Am
sterdam Express ' collided with a
freight train. It is feared that
more bodies will be found under
the wreckage. The engineer on
the passenger train was arrested
charged with over-running an ad
verse signal.