The Daily Ardmoreite

U. S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY IS.

SUES BULLETIN ON ALASKA

Petroleum was one of the first useful minerals found in Alaska, but the earliest attempts at its systematic development in the territory were confined to a very brief oil boom that began in 1901, but that soon collapsed, owing to the rapid development of oil in California. All the oil lands in Alaska were withdrawn from entry in 1910, and patent has been granted to only one claim, which is in the Katalla field, where a few productive oil wells have been drilled. In spite of the small developments, however, Alaska has produced about 56,000 barrels of petroleum, all of it taken from the Katalla field. This oil has been consumed locally, most of it by a small refinery near Katalla.

The passage of the oil and gas leasing act of February 25, 1920, started small stampedes to all accessible places where oil seepages were known and led to the staking of many claims, some of them in areas where no indications of oil have been found. Up to September, 1920, the Juneau land office had received 178 applications for oil-leasing permits, covering in all 388,673 acres of land, which by no means includes all the land staked, most of which will no doubt be found worthless as oil land. Systematic drilling for oil will probably be begun in Alaska this year, and oil fields will no doubt be developed in Alaska, but the geology of the territory, so far as known, does not indicate that any startling discoveries will be made.

Investigations of oil in Alaska were made in 1903 by the United States Geological Survey, Department of the Interior, which has since then from time to time devoted considerable attention to this subject. The Survey has just published, as Bulletin 719, a report entitled "Petroleum in Alaska," by George C. Martin.

The report describes fully the geography and geology of the areas in which indications of oil have been discovered and places special emphasis on information that may be valuable to geologists, engineers, and prospectors in the search for oil or in plans for its use or shipment. It contains corrected reprints of all the available topographie and geologic maps of these areas, as well as brief descriptions of other localities at which indications of oil have been less reliably reported and references to other published descriptions, as well as bibliography showing all the publications relating to oil in Alaska.