Word: matanuska
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Dates: during 1935-1935
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...scheme: to transplant strapped U. S. farm families wholesale to southern Alaska's Matanuska Valley, whose 76,000 tillable acres now support only 117 families. It was decided to send about 1,000 people (200 families) first, follow them with more if the plan worked. The transplantees had to be used to hard winters, so state relief workers in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan were detailed to call for volunteers. Out of 6,000 applicants they picked farm families who had long been on relief, in which father & mother were young, sturdy, courageous. Early last week an advance guard...
Arriving at Matanuska Valley, 125 mi. inland from Seward, each transplanted family will get a 40-acre tract, a log cabin, livestock and farm equipment. They will have 30 years to pay the Government $3,000, with 3% interest, the first payment due in four years. The cabins will have built-in furniture, running water. A physician, dentist and Red Cross nurse will be in attendance. Warmed by 20 hr. per day of summer sunlight and wet by heavy rains, Matanuska loam yields whopping crops. The Japanese Current keeps winter temperatures well above those of northern Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin...
Chief of the colony will be Don L. Irwin, general manager of the newly formed Alaska Rural Rehabilitation Corp. A lanky, pleasant Kansas State Agricultural College graduate, he was a successful Wyoming rancher until the Government sent him to head its Agricultural Experiment Station in Matanuska Valley three years ago. Of his Utopian project, Chief Irwin said last week: "Almost the first job will be to clear out the mosquitoes. They are the chief handicap...
...rich Willow Creek gold mines, bituminous coal fields and Matanuska Valley agricultural district are all located within 50 miles of Anchorage...