Letter from [John Muir] to Wanda, Helen [Louie], 1899 Jul 8.

• Main Author: Muir, John
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: Scholarly Commons 1899
• Subjects: Environmentalist; naturalist; travel; conservation; national parks; John Muir; history; correspondence; letters; Lawrence Island; Seal Islands; St Lawrence Island; Alaska
• Online Access: https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/muir-correspondence/2421; https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/context/muir-correspondence/article/3420/viewcontent/muir10_0877_let.pdf

To Wanda MuirUnalaska, July 8, 1899My dear Wanda and Helen and Mama:We arrived here this cloudy, rainy, foggy morning after a glorious sail from Sand Harbor on Unga Island, one of the Shumagin group, all the way along the volcano-dotted coast of the Alaska Peninsula and Unimak Island. The volcanoes are about as thick as haycocks on our alfalfa field in a wet year, and the highest of them are smoking and steaming in grand style, Shishaldin is the handsomest volcanic cone I ever saw and it looked like this last evening. [Drawing], I'll show you a better sketch in my notebook when I get home. About 9,000 ft. high, snow and ice on its slopes, hot and bare at the top. A few miles from Shishaldin that blew or burst its own head off a few years ago, and covered the sea with ashes and cinders and killed fish and raised a tidal wave that lashed the shores of San Francisco and even Martinez.There is a ship, the Loredo, that is to sail in an hour, so I'm in a hurry, as usual. We are going to the Seal Islands and St. Lawrence Island from here, and a point or two on the Siberian Coast-then home. We are taking on coal, and will leave in three or four hours. I hope fondly that you are all well.[Give my love to Maggie. I hope May's baby is well.] I'll soon be back, my darlings. God bless you.Goodbye.[John Muir]73802601