Creator
S. Hall Young
Recipient
John Muir
Transcription
Cordova, Alaska, August 16th, 1910.Mr. John Muir,Los Angeles, California;My dear Friend;- Yours of the 4th inst. came by the last mail and I answer by return boat. I am very sorry you cannot see your way clear to come and see the Miles and Childs Glaciers this season. From all the data I can gater I am satisfied that this is an exceptional season with them. There was a tremendous snow-fall last winter and the glaciers, especially Childs, is coming forward very rapidly. It is pushing the Copper River over to the opposite bank in spite of the high water and the tremendous masses of ice that are constantly falling from the face of the glacier. The outer edgeof the fan is crawling over the ground at the rate of a foot and a half aday; while the engineers compute that in the center of the glacial stream where the river rushes against the concave the ice is coming forward as much as seventy five feet a day. Great waves are occasionally sent to the opposite bank of the river as high as thirty, or forty feet, and from ten to forty feet of the bank, according to its location, including the alders and cottonwoods on it, has been swept away. The extreme edge had crawled towards the new million and a half steel bridge over two hundred and fifty feet from May first to July twentieth, causing some uneasiness to the Company. The form, color, and movements of Childs Glacier, to say nothing of its voices, are most fascinating. They may not be as fine next year.Well, I am having the usual experience of "young" writers. The inclosed letter explains itself. I am now sending the MS to Mr. Briggs, New York Manager for the Fleming H. Revell Publishing Co., with the request that he place it with some good magazine. His friendly interest in me and his wideacquaintance with editors and managers make him the best medium I could think ofin the East.We are having the absol utely perfect weather that only Alaska can furnish in the summer.04848
I was interested in your corrections, and gladly accept them with but onesmall exception: You have cut down the time it took you to get to me fromwhere you first saw me lying on the precipice from twenty minutes to twentyseconds. Yet you allow the sentence in which I speak of hearing you whistling and calling as you scrambled around the top of the slide and then down to my level. It certainly took minutes, and I thought I had your own computation of the time as we talked it over. I have compromised on ten minutes.I am deep in another story of the trail. I am counting the time till the shackles are off my hands and I can spend my whole time on this work. I am now taking care of three preaching places besides Cordova and am travelling almost half my time.By the way, have you read the poems of Robert W. Service? They are published in two volumes, under the titles The Spell of the Yukon and other Verses and Ballads of a Cheechako by Edward Stern and Co., Philadelphia. I consider Service the only real Poet of the North.Please write soon, and if you change your mind and come it will be all the better.Yours from the bottom of my heart,[illegible]
Location
Cordova Alaska
Date Original
1910 Aug 16
Source
Original letter dimensions: 28 x 21.5 cm.
Recommended Citation
Young, S. Hall, "Letter from S. Hall Young to John Muir, 1910 Aug 16." (1910). John Muir Correspondence (PDFs). 5114.
https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/muir-correspondence/5114
Resource Identifier
muir19_0728-let.tif
File Identifier
Reel 19, Image 0728
Collection Identifier
Online finding aid for the microform version of the John Muir Correspondence http://www.oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/kt0w1031nc
Copyright Status
Copyright status unknown
Copyright Statement
Some letters written to John Muir may be protected by the U.S. Copyright Law (Title 17, U.S.C.). Transmission or reproduction of materials protected by copyright beyond that allowed by fair use requires the written permission of the copyright owners. Responsibility for any use rests exclusively with the user.
Owning Institution
Holt-Atherton Special Collections, University of the Pacific Library. Please contact this institution directly to obtain copies of the images or permission to publish or use them beyond educational purposes.
Pages
2 pages
Keywords
Environmentalist, naturalist, travel, conservation, national parks, John Muir, Yosemite, California, history, correspondence, letters
