F, B. Camp Tells of
Kuby-Tokotna ‘Road’
t Frank B. Camp, in Alaska Weekly.
Alaska was made a part of the
United States almost sixty years ago.
Since that time until today a.certain
section of Alaska, commencing at
Ruby, on the Yukon river, , and ex
tending to the territory in which are
included the towns of Ophir, Cripple,
Tdkotna and McGrath, has remained
practically undeveloped, with the ex
ception of a few properties adjacent I
to McGrath and Tokotna. These two
last mentioned towns can be reached
by large sternwheel steamboats by
the way of Bethel, near the mouth of
the Kuskokwim river. Cripple and
Ophir, for a few weeks each year, can
be reached by small gasboats, the
time depending upon the amount of
water in the Innoko river. But the
vast stretch of land lying hetween
Ruby and Tokotna can only be reach
ed with a pack horse during the
summer months, and then can be
traversed only on the high ridges. In
the winter, dog teams traverse a cer
tain defined route which is used for
transporting the mail. Owing to
these conditions this particular sec
tion of Alaska is practically as it was
sixty years ago, with the exception of
a few almost abandoned mining towns
—Long City and Poorman, in the
Ruby district, and Ophir and Cripple,
in the Tokotna. Between Poorman
and Ophir lies a country as large as
the state of Illinois, a country that is
highly mineralized, a country of
mountain and ridge, of valleys and
canyons, a country containing gold;
placer gold in the creeks and on the
benches, ledges of gold-bearing rocks
'n the mountains. A country that calls
for the prospector and bids him come,
but a country that at the same time
repels him and keeps him away be
cause of its inaccessibility and the
McGrath
Pool Hal!
Cigars
Tobaccos
Candies
Fruits
Soft Drinks
A Place to Meet
Your Friends
Geo. Mutchler
Proprietor
Quicksilver
For Sale
At
$90 Flask
At the
Parks Mine
i
f
YourOtfder Solicited
t
f
(
enormous prices he is compelled to
pay for his food and outfit.
Wealth, much wealth, lies hidden
in this particular section of Alaska,
and it will continue to lie hidden until
our government builds a road, a real
road, from Ruby to- Tokotna. At the ]
present time the Alaska Road Com
mission is working at both ends of the |
road. From Ruby to Long City, a i
distance of thirty miles, the road is <
completed. From Long City it ex- i
tends another mile or two and then i
ceases abruptly. From Tokotna, on i
the other end, the road is completed I
from Tokotna to Yankee creek, a dis- ]
tance of approximately eleven miles, i
at which point it ceases as abruptly 1
as it does on the Ruby road. Not i
more than fifty miles of traversable ;
road has been built by the Alaska
Road Commission during the past ten
years, an average of five miles per
year. .lust why this small amount of
progress has be.en made, the Alaska
Road Commission alone knows official
ly and the people in this certain dis
trict know in reality. Lack of concen
tration, funds and interest are the
chief causes for the present condition
of this particular highway. It should
have been completed several years
ago.
As the government abandoned and
forgot the entire Territory of Alaska
in 1877, the Alaska Road Commission
has forgotten the vital necessity for
this road, and at the present time the
inhabitants of the towns and the
country through which this road is
supposed to run arc beginning to
realize that unless they demand action
from the proper sources that this road
will never be completed for them to
use. Alaska at the present time is
receiving a larger allotment for the
building of roads than it ever has
before; roads that are supposed to
develop the resources of the Territory
and create a tonnage for the huge
white elephant that cannot hope to
survive unless this tonnage is made a
reality. Many such roads have been
built and many such roads are being
built, also many miles of so-called
roads have been built that are praeti-!
cally useless and worthless from a
commercial standpoint. Much money
lias been expended for “Scenery and
Tourist Highways'’ that do not add
one iota to the development of such
districts as lie between Ruby and To
kotna, arid it is only by reaching such j
isolated districts that the real citi
zens of Interior Alaska, the prospec
tor and the miner, can hope to live
and develop the country.
Anyone who will look at the map
issued by the Alaska Road Commis-!
sion about 1920 will notice that the
map shows a complete wagon road'
between the towns of Tokotna and1
Ophir and the towns of Ruby and
Poorman. No such completed road
exists and no such completed road
ever has existed. Eleven miles is
completed on the Tokotna end, instead
of twenty-three, as shown on the map,
and about thirty-three miles on the
Ruby end, instead of the sixty as
shown on the map. Just why the
map should show a completed road is
one of the mysteries that remain un
solved by the people vitally interested
in the completion of this road. Most'
Ladies’
Novelties Store
McGrath
Stop and Think!
Christmas will soon be here.
Where can I Ret a nice present
to send my friends?
Go to Miss E. Marsh’s Little
Cash Store, where tilings are nice
and new.
Silk Dresses
Sweaters
All kinds of Silks
Hose
Hair Nets
Ladies’ Wear
I’retty Dolls
Suitcases and Tranks
Miss E. Marsh
Proprietor
if the people of Seattle, also the ma
jority of people living in Alaska, do
lot know that such a road has been
lutlined, let alone built, and what is
nore to the point,, they do not care.
E5ut the people wh do know and who
lave been impatiently waiting for
/ears for the completion of this road,
mow just what has and is being ac
:omplished, and, knowing, they are
Ictermincd that this road must have
;xpended on it all the money that is
ippropriated for it every year and
hat the present appropriations must
>e increased to a point where this
■oad can be completed within the next
hree years. All they want the Alas
ka Road Commission to do is to build
he road, and build it speedily; to do
is they art? supposed to do, and as
hey tell our Delegate, Dan Suther
and, they will do and are doing.
At the present time there are 181
nen actively engaged in mining ac
.ivities along and in the vicinity of
his proposed road. These men be
cmg to the small percentage ‘ real
\laskans who inhabit the Territory
tnd who have given to it the best
/ears of their lives. These men are
;he men who make it possible for the
nerehants of Seattle to ship in 500
,ons of miscellaneous supplies every
/ear, for which they are compelled to
:>ay exorbitant prices. You people
■vho eat sugar and drink milk here in
Seattle would cry out in protest if
you were compelled to pay $.10 per
hundred for your sugar and 50 cents
per quart for your milk, and $175 per
ton for hay and oats, but these are
the prices that the men who live oti
this “paper road” are obliged to puj
if they want to continue to stay ir
the country. Many have been driver
from the district during the past fiv<
years owing to I he ».:ca ive costs
and others are mere!. ■ ting, am
all because our government, througl
the Alaska Road Commission, ha:
failed to complete this road.
The Bureau of Public Highways
which functions in connection thi
forestry department in some section:
of Alaska, has demonstrated thor
oughly and completely that roads eat
be built in Alaska, real roads, ovei
stretches of country where the nat
ural difficultes are just as plentiful a:
those that exist in the country lyinf
between Ruby ami Tokotna. Thi
Alaska Road Commission has alsi
demonstrated that it. can build roads
excellent roads,. when they realh
Tokotna
Cigar Store
Tobaccos
Cigars
Soft Drinks
Fred Dubois
Proprietor
CHARLIE’S
LAUNDRY
McGrath, Alaska
A Bath in a Real
Bath Tub
Shoe Repairing
Sign Writing
Paper Hanging
Charles Rebhun
The Handy Man
want to build them, and it is because
these two departments have demon
strated that they can build roads that
the people in the district embracing
Ruby and Tokotna want to know why
their road cannot be built in reality
instead of on paper.
With the completion of this road
freight can be shipped to Seward, for
warded on the railroad to Nenana,
placed on a boat at that town and
transported to Ruby by water. From
that point tractors and automobile
trucks can carry it to Long City,
Poorman, Ophir, Cripple and Tokotna
at a cost that will enable the people
I to buy a suitable outfit at a reason
able cost. It will enable hundreds of
prospectors to penerate the district
adjacent to the road; prospectors who
will locate many placer and quartz
prospects that will interest men who
have money to invest in legitimate
mining propositons.
It will open up a section of Alaska
as large as the state of Illinois, a
1 section unknown and unmapped, and
it will do more toward the real de
velopment of Alaska than all the
“Scenery and Tourist Highways” that
have ever been built in Alaska.
Then Kick.
I hate to be a kicker,
I always long for peace,
But th ewheel that does the squeak
ing
Is the one that gets the grease.
—Federal Employe.
The l sual Consequence.
“Is this pre-war stuff?”
“Yes, sir. It’s always followed by
a light.”- -Life.
Bwweusyyrg
i
& MM&l «2o ifc ilfesw'
’iski
$1 Per Month
J
A Dredging or hydraulicing
Proposition, Yankee Creek
About 7 miles long, extending from No. 1 below discovery to
the mouth of the creek.
Pay located all along for a distunce of about three miles from
upper end, and pretty well prospected and cros; cut.
Average depth of ground is from 7 to 20 feet. T > is all black
muck,that can be scraped freely. No rock biggi t than one’s fist.
Ground will go from 15 cents to $1 per square f ot c f bedrock.
Ditch on the ground, 3 miles long, together v ch water rights.
Ground is protty well cleared. There is also a <irain, 3 miles long.
Also a water right on Heady Bullion creek, from which water can
be brought to Yankee creek with a ditch less than a mile long
(4,900 feet), with a pressure of 120 feet, being 1000 feet to the
work from the ditch.
After doing away with muck there will he ft >m ! to C feet of
dirt to handle.
Only about $11,000 has been taken out.
Prospecting work during the past winter has resulted in finding
values that run up to $1 per Square foot of bedrock.
I will eithe- 5 I the ground or give a lease on it. if the prospt t
is satisfactor; he buyer, a cash payment will be exp.cled.
/
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