| Summary: | Travel Talks TRAVEL TALKS Historically there is much, in Alaska to work your imagination overtime. We all know something of the famous gold rush days of '98, that cast such a fantastic and tragic aiT about the madness of the times. However, in spite of the fortunes and heartbreaks it cost, the rush to the Klondike and later to Nome did much to bring Alaska into her rightful heritage. Skagway, the gold town of the boom days, today lies dreaming in memories of the time when over ten thousand people crowded her small streets—the sinner and the virtuous—the outlaw and the law-abiding. Sitka is historically the most important town in Alaska, however. It was here that Baranof held sway and ruled with a tyrannical Russian hand. In her jewel-like setting ef islanded seas there is today an air of old-worldliness about Sitka that harkens your memory back to the days when there was much activity and' industry—shipbuilding, iron molding, bell casting for California missions, and the manufacture of min-1 ers' outfits. There are many other sections of Alaska that played important parts in the making of her history. Nome, of gold fame. The Aleutian islands that string out over three-fourths of the way across the Paeific, suffered under Russia's constant demands for furs. Kodiak island, where the headquarters of the Russion Trading company were once located. The whole slow, turbulent awakening of Alaska has been one of constant struggle for fortune—first for furs and later for gold—and now the possibilities of a great commercial empire are taking form. Today, we are suddenly aware that Alaska lies close by, just 48 hours up the hallway from Seattle by steamer. Our last, great frontier is being rapidly accepted as truly our most unusual vacationland. But it is in the southeastern and southwestern sections and the immediate interior that the traveler of today finds bis realization of an unusual vacation.
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