Resources of Alaska. Interesting Lecture by John Muir, Before the Sacramento Literary Institute.

• Main Author: Muir, John
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: Scholarly Commons 1881
• Subjects: Environmentalist; naturalist; travel; conservation; national parks; John Muir; history; pamphlets; journal articles; speeches; writing; annotation; Arctic; Arctic Ocean; Grassy Plains; Yukon; Alaska
• Online Access: https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/jmb/658; https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/context/jmb/article/1657/viewcontent/A5.pdf

THE DAILYJiECQRMJKiON. WEDNESDAY .I.1KITAR1 19, SSSI 6Ysvf:r.^rsv:^"--XT? Ka.KTION. RESOURCES OF ALASKA. Interesting Lecture by John Muir, Before the Sacramento Literary Institute. The first lecture of the season before the I Sacramento Literary Institute was delivered by John Muir at the Congregational Church last evening, upon "The Resources of Alaska." There was a good audience, and the lecture, which was replete with interest throughout, was listened to with most marked attention. The mountains, streams and general features of the Territory were described with a familiarity and clearness which indicated a close study and intimate knowledge of the subject, and which, with the aid of maps and diagrams, was brought to the view of his hearers in a ve;y pleasing and instructive manner. He opened his lecture by saying that Alaska is the most beautiful and the most interesting country he ever saw. In all his travels north and south he had seen nothing to compare with it. Even California, the land of wonders, with its noble mountains, valleys and forests and waterfalls, is far beneath it in grandeur and varied beauty. California has : a majestic mountain range extending 400 j miles. Alaska has a loftier ra┬╗ge, as pro- ' foundly sculptured, extending in this grand curved line along the coast and out into the sea a distance of 2,600 miles, with no material interruption. The hishest summit, that of Mt. St. Elias, is 29,500 feet above the level of the sea. THE ALEUTIAN GRODP, Which is a part of the Alaska Territory, is but a continuation of thi3 mountain range, but at a les3 hight. In this group of islands there have been between forty and fifty active volcanoes within the past 1C0 years, and there are eleven at the present time. The Rocky mountains enter the Territory in the form of irregular spurs and table-lands in the Yukon region, but most is open, rolling grassy plains, with here and there patches of pine and spruce and aspen, while toward the north the ground is quite low, sloping to the Arctic Ocean in lichen ...