N. AMEB. /7OO I GOOD NEWS FROM ALASKA ¥ THE TRAIL OF PRESB YTERIAN HOME MISSIONS THE BOARD OF HOME MISSIONS of the Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A. 156 Fifth Avenue New York City HARVEY C. OLIN, Treasurer NO. 196, 7, 1904 ALASKA. As the facts concerning the resources of the great Territory of Alaska come slowly into public view it bulks not less but larger in the interest of the country. We no longer feel, as Congress did when Alaska was purchased, that the price was exorbitant, for the seven million two hundred thousand dollars paid for it in 1867 were more than covered by the catch of salmon alone in 1902. The Alaskan mines have sent to Seattle alone four- teen million dollars in gold dust and bullion — almost twice the purchase price of the Territory. In 1901-2 the total output of gold in Alaska was more than four times the amount paid to Russia,, The fur companies have paid into the United States Treasury in the last thirty years more than Alaska cost us. Meanwhile the output of gold, copper and other minerals is steadily increasing. Railways are being built, and there is even talk of at some time con- necting the Aleutian Islands with Siberia by a rail- road tunnel. Remote as that time may be, the time is now at hand when the Church should do not less but more for the development of Christian civilization along those stormy coasts. The past year has been one of persistent and faithful work on the part of our missionaries and teachers. Saxman. Saxman, the first station one approaches in a trip to Alaska, has for its missionary the Rev. Edward Marsden. He has been successful in strengthening the Church and in helping the natives in certain 2 industries which will enable them to have perma- nent homes instead of living the nomadic life of the past generations. With his little steam launch, the " Marietta," he continues to visit islands fifty or sixty miles from Saxman in various directions, where small settle- ments of natives are found without any gospel message or culture except such as he is occasionally able to give. The great need of that station has been a medical missionary who could visit these native settlements from time to time in a professional way, ministering to their physical needs, for which they now have no one to care, and at the same time bringing them the gospel message. The Board has just appointed for this service John L. Myers, M.D., a graduate of Park College and of the Kansas City Medical Col- lege. He enters upon his work in April and will have a field of large and pressing usefulness. Wrangkll. A few miles north of Saxman is Wrangell, where for many years we have had both an American and a native church. The Rev. B. F. Miller became minister to both churches in 1903. The conditions there have been unusually hard. There has been a serious diversion of people from the church, but all the services have been maintained, and the faithful little bands are not without hope of recovering the ground that had been lost. By the developing of mining interests in the regions round about, Wrangell is likely to attract an increasing number of people. 3 Kasaan. Not far west of Saxman is the new settlement of Kasaan, to which last summer the Rev. D. R. Montgomery went from his station at Jackson. The people of Kasaan had been earnestly appeal- ing for gospel privileges and on the seventh of June the Presbyterian church was organized. The importance of this village consists in the fact that the Kasaan Bay Mining Company has exten- sive interests there. The failure of the company last October changed .somewhat the plans which our missionary had for building, but he is expecting that things will revive during the spring and sum- mer, if not under the present management then probably under a change of hands. At Karta Bay, only a few miles distant, during the fishing season there are gatherings of natives with whom our mis- sionary is in constant touch. Sometimes they come in a body to the village in order that he may give them religious instruction. Mr. Montgomery writes: "The work has been very pleasant and reasonably encouraging. The native services have been fully attended and entered into with charac- teristic warmth. In the evening we have had an average white congregation of twenty or twenty- five, besides all English-speaking natives. I have reason to believe that the congregations would have been larger had there not been a general exodus during the early winter." Another mining camp, twelve miles from Kasaan, is Hollis, which our missionary also occasionally visits, as well as Hole-in-the-Wall, ten miles in the opposite direction, where there are sometimes hun- dreds of men at work upon the smelter. 4 In view of these varied opportunities it was thought best to locate Mr. Montgomery perma- nently at Kasaan. Meantime we have been able to give only occasional service to the Indians at Jackson, but the Board has in contemplation send- ing a missionary to that field as soon as the right man can be found. Klawock. The Rev. David Waggoner, our missionary, reports a very interesting year. He writes: "Early in June we held our communion services. Eight candidates presented themselves for admission to the church. Seven were received on profession and one by letter. In the afternoon a baptismal service was held in place of our regular Sabbath-school. Sixteen children were presented by their parents for baptism. This was the first infant baptism per- formed in our church. " Christmas was a bright spot in our work. We had a splendid exercise from the Board of Publica- tion and Sabbath-school Work. This was added to with anthems and a few recitations on the Christmas time. Some of the ladies from the P'ifth Avenue and Brick churches had sent us a large number of presents for our people, and a former schoolmate sent us four dozen Bibles for those who could read. How I wished that night that the givers could have seen the joy of their brothers and sisters who re- ceived the gifts. "Our children spend a great deal of time with their Bibles, getting their verses to read in the En- deavor meetings. We have four such meetings every week. They bring their Bibles to school for 5 the teacher to help them on their verses. Even the little first-reader pupils try to get easy verses. Our Christmas not only gave us a happy, joyous time but is bringing blessings every day. "Our winter communion service was very helpful in a great many ways. Seven were received into the church on profession of their faith." Juneau. The American church has had a successful year. It is more fully organized than it has ever been, and the growth of the town will make it a still more im- portant station. The Rev, James H. Condit con- tinues his faithful ministrations. The native church, the Rev. L. F. Jones, mis- sionary, has been strengthened by the improvement of its property and by the erection of a native social hall. In the building of this gathering place for the natives the Indian boys did a good deal of the work. It will be a center of helpful influence to the natives who, without it, were often tempted to frequent places ruinous alike to body and soul. Services have been maintained at Douglas Island also, with a better attendance than usual and better spiritual results. HOONAH. Passing west from Juneau we come to the island of Hoonah, where the Rev. William M. Carle has been missionary for the past five years, and where by earnest and spiritual work a good native church has been gathered. The opposition of evil-minded white people has counted a good deal against the work there, as in other places in Alaska, but it has . 6 been resisted with courage by the missionary and with a good deal of Christian devotion on the part of the people themselves. Sitka. At Sitka the Rev. William S. Bannerman has had a prosperous year in both the American and native churches, the work in the latter having been especially fruitful. The regular Sabbath attendance in the native church has been the largest in its history. The school has been large, and special efforts are being made to develop it farther along industrial lines, especially in the way of subduing and culti- vating some of the land around the mission. It will be a formidable undertaking, but it is expected to pay both economically — in the direct fruits of the ground, and spiritually — in the added training of the boys. The hospital has been without a physician for some months, but it is hoped this need will soon be supplied. Haines. Our missionaries at this station of growing im- portance are the Rev. Norman B. Harrison, and Mr. A. R. Mackintosh, who is in charge of the industrial department. The usual mission services have been attended with large interest. The dedication of the new- church on November eighth was followed by a week of meetings, which were very fruitful. At a con- ference held later the people proposed to band themselves together more perfectly by the appoint- ment of committees for the various phases of work, giving every one some specific duty. So they have 7 committees on membership, prayer-meetings, visit- ing, social, strangers, reading-rooin, lecture and entertainment. How busy our missionaries there have been is indicated by Mr. Harrison when he says: " During the quarter Mr. Mackintosh has conducted thirty- four meetings with a total attendance of one thou- sand seven liundred and tliirty. I have conducted forty-four, aggregating one thousand nine hundred and thirty-two in attendance. Besides these I held fifteen cottage meetings with a total attendance of about two hundred and fifty. " We are beginning the new quarter with the plan we have been working up to — meetings every night of some sort. Monday night is given to the social or entertainment and lecture committee; the rest of the week to gospel meetings — two led by the mis- sionaries, three by natives under our instructions; on Sunday are preaching and Sunday-school, with an evening service by Mr. Mackintosh, while I am preaching to the whites." The industrial features are being developed as rapidly as possible. The practical training of the hand as well as of the head and heart renders a needed threefold help toward the Christian develop- ment that the Indians must have to take their true part in this town of increasing commercial promi- nence. KLUCIvWAN. Another point of which Mr. Harrison has general supervision is Kluckwan, twenty-five miles above Haines, on the Chilkat River. During the past vear the natives have built a church and manse at 8 this point, doing a large part of the work them- •selves. Not the least of their labor was taking the materials for the buildings in canoes against the stiff current of the Chilkat river. It was expected that the natives might contribute three hundred dollars' worth of labor for the erection of the build- ing. , It is now thought that five hundred dollars is a low estimate for the labor they have actually given. This is an illustration of the interest these grateful people take in what is done for them and of their disposition to help themselves. Mr. Fred R. Falconer is in immediate charge of the work. He writes that during his absence last spring at the General Assembly several of the natives conducted religious services among themselves, be- coming, as he says, more and more capable in this matter. The self-helpfulness of the people is illus- trated by the fact that before the church was built the natives had raised money and purchased a large tent to serve as a temporary auditorium and also to enable the missionary to follow the people to their camping grounds, to which they scatter from their homes when the fishing season begins. Skaguay. For two years this church took care of its own financial needs. Fluctuating conditions of popula- tion compelled its return to the Board for the single year just closed. There had been a large exodus of people, and the population was reduced from some thousands to about fifteen hundred. Notwith- standing, under the pastoral care of the Rev. James Thomson, formerly of Seattle, our services have been well attended— the night audience aver- 9 aging over one hundred, mostly men. There has been a steady increase of the membership, and the Y. P. S. C. E. on Sabbath evening has had an atten- dance so large as to compel the opening of the fold- ing-doors to the auditorium to accommodate the increased audience. The prayer-meetings also have increased over fifty per cent in attendance over last year. The church has agreed to be self-supporting this year and is much to be praised for its brave work under adverse conditions. Eagle. The work in the interior of Alaska has been subject to the usual fluctuations caused by the movements of the population hither and thither in pursuit of gold. The Rev. Charles F. Ensign and his wife have continued their service at this station, the principal event of the year being the organiza- tion of a native church. The name of the church is this: Tsheh-tut-thut-tlui (che-tu-thut-li), or Big Rock. It is the Indian for Eagle Rock, referring to the big rock at the edge of the town, which turns the current of the river. The missionary expresses the hope that the church may be as the rock, turn- ing the current of men's thoughts toward better things. They have one elder and thirty members. The missionary is making efforts to secure a good building for the school and the church. Rampart. The Rev. M. Egbert Koonce, Ph.D., has had varied experiences in and around this camp. A comfortable little house has been built, so fitted ID up that in it the missionary and his wife provided entertainment during the long winter evenings for the homeless and lonely men. In this way they were able to get hold of many who could not be reached by the ordinary methods of church work, and who were thus kept from frequenting the saloons and worse places. A reading-room and library has been maintained by the contributions of the community, which is improving in general character. There is now assurance of a permanent and growing population. P'amilies are coming and establishing homes. This means much to the success of the mission work. A church has not yet been organized, but the mis- sionary is looking forward to the time when this may be accomplished. On the Tanana. Both Dr. Koonce and Mr. Ensign have during the year visited the Tanana country, to which there had returned a great stampede of gold hunters. A recent report from Dr. Koonce indicates a most interesting and appealing condition of affairs in that region. He made the trip up in eight days and back in seven. He says: "The hotel accommo- dations along the way are not up to the modern standard, but it costs a dollar for lodging, when one carries his own blankets and bunks on the dirt floor of a log shack. The regulation price of meals is one dollar and fifty cents to two dollars, but I used my own provisions wherever possible. In all, the trip was accomplished with so much more comfort than that of last winter, when there was not even a cabin along the way, that I felt as if I were travel- II ing in luxury. The thermometer registered as low as fifty-six below on my journey up, but I kept agoing and suffered no more serious ill than a frozen nose and cheeks." He says he visited not only the towns of Chena and Fairbanks but all the creeks that are tributary, and after thoroughly investigating the whole situ- ation he does not hesitate to predict that the camp will be the best and largest yet discovered in the interior of Alaska, possibly rivaling both Nome and Dawson. The camp has been handicapped by the lack of supplies. He writes: "If there had been grub in the camp at a reason- able price three times the amount of work would have been done this winter, and many new creeks would have been prospected. It is really pitiable to go into the cabins of some of these men and see what they are living upon. Many of them have neither flour nor bacon and are living on the rab- bits which they shoot or snare and of which there is, fortunately, a good crop this winter. I saw a man offer his claim, situated on one of the good creeks, for a sack of flour and a slab of bacon; fail- ing in this, he traded it for a shotgun and a hundred rounds of ammunition. He was 'dead broke* and the last ounce of grub was gone, and he figured that with the shotgun he could get rabbits enough and grouse to keep him alive till summer. Taking into account the long season that yet remains before navigation opens, I cannot see how the most of these people will live; there certainly will be a great deal of suffering." Chena is on the main channel of the Tanana river, and it is believed this will be the principal town, 12 although Fairbanks, on a slough of the river ten miles from the main channel, is at present the more important. At the former place Dr. Koonce at his previous visit secured a location and put up a cabin for a church. Mr. Ensign, who visited the place. a year ago, also put up another cabin on the ground which was intended to be used for a hospital. Dr. Koonce appeals for help for this important mission field. The Board has received an urgent letter from a miner in that far-off region begging that the Presby- terian Church send more missionaries to follow the wandering miners of the Tanana and other Alaskan regions. He closes his letter with this appeal: ' ' Life among us is hard at best. Death alone is certain and inevitable. The pay streak of Eternity is as wide as the heavens and deep as God's love. The trail to those diggings through the snows of life is dim and wind-blown and has many branches. We have no guide. Will you send us one?" The Board hopes that the Church will enable it this year to provide services for that busy and needy camp. Teller. The Rev. Hermann M. Hosack has had a year of peculiar difficulty at Teller. Sometimes but a few people remained in camp, but both the preach- ing services and the Sunday-school services have been steadily maintained. The native service has also been held for the Eskimo people, the atten- dance reaching ninety in a room fifteen by twenty feet. There is a good deal of development, however, along that coast between Nome and Teller. Where it will crystallize it is impossible to determine. The first sailing of the Nome fleet last summer brought about thirty-two hundred people to the Seward Peninsula and many were unable to secure passage. A railroad is being built from Solo- mon, on the coast, to Council City. The railroad company claims it will finally "gridiron Seward Peninsula." Meantime our missionary is watching developments and is doing the best he can to meet the religious needs of the scattered communities. Point Barrow. There is not much to report from this station. The distance is so great as to preclude late infor- mation. The last letters received from Dr. Marsh and Mr. Spriggs were written in September and reached the office about the ist of Apnl. "When this report was written there had been much sickness and many deaths among the natives. The work has gone on with the usual difficulties, encouragements and discouragements. The total membership of the church at last accounts was fifty-four and the average attendance at the Sun- day-school about thirty. We were in much anxiety regarding the condition of our missionaries at that station when tidings came to us last fall that the revenue cutter "Thetis" had failed to get through to Point Barrow. The supphes which we had put on board therefore could not reach their destination. We were relieved, however, a few months afterward to hear that the missionaries had been able to secure supplies from a passing whaler sufficient to put them through the winter. 14 Mr. Spriggs, the missionary teacher, writes: "I tell you this is a terribly desolate-looking place when you have but a half-sack of flour in your larder. But we thank Providence for returning a whaling ship that went in fitted to winter, and largely from her stores, at high prices to be sure, we have secured a supply ample for our actual needs for the winter." Dr. Marsh writes that, because of the pressure of the long and trying winters on members of his family, he must come out next summer. Where is there a consecrated physician who will be willing to take up the work thus to be laid down at this remote and difficult station ? 15 IRVING PRESS NEW YORK