The entire volume of traffic shipments in and out of Alaska for the fiscal year ending 30 June 1916, amounted to $97, 646,430, including copper, gold and silver. The shipments increased enormously in value for the fiscal year ending 30 June 1917, the aggre gate being $121,265,947. Articles to the value of a million dollars or more were shipped into the Territory as follows: Breadstuffs, $1,303, 218; cotton manufactures, $1,530,197; explo sives, $1,278,026; machinery, $3,932,189; other iron and steel, $6,209,227; meat and dairy products, $3,493,876; oils, $1,385,186; tin man ufactures, $3,894,165; wood and manufac tures, $1,822,549. The comparative shipments out of Alaska for the years 1916 and 1917 of the more valuable articles were: Furs and fur-skins, 1916, $588,035; 1917, $711,550; fish, $19,629,431, and $23,833,662; copper, $26, 488,288 and $33,098,190; gold ores, etc., do mestic $16,195,635 and $15,409,529. The salmon industry has increased greatly from shipments of $17,590,317 in 1915 to $21,195,612 in 1917, and will be very materially increased for the fiscal year 1917-18. The most phenomenal growth has been in the shipments of copper, ore, etc., which has risen in value from $5,182, 004 in 1915 to $26,488,288 in 1916 and $33,098, 190 in 1917. The increase in pounds has been from 35,994,812 to 117,338,937, and finally 120, 670,352 pounds in 1917.
Commercial Development. Three products have in turn dominated the commercial interests of Alaska - furs, fish and gold. Copper now forges to the front, while coal looms up in the near future. The develop ment of these industries will be separately considered. In the minds of the multitude Alaska was for many years associated only with the furs of the otary or eared-seal. The breeding grounds of these mammals are almost exclusively confined to the Pribilofs - four isolated, barren islets in the middle of Bering Sea, of some 65 square miles in area, equi distant 200 miles from the Aleutian Isles, the Alaskan mainland and the Nome region. Set apart as a reserve by Congress in 1868, the Pribilofs were leased from 1870 to 1890 to the Alaska Commercial Company, with authority to kill 100,000 seals each year. From 1870 to 1889 inclusive the company took 197,273 pelts, valued at $29,473,050. The maximum produc tivity, including seals killed outside of the Prib ilofs, was in the two years, 1888 and 1889, when 272,568 pelts were taken, valued at $4,333,809. In 1890 the concession passed to the Northern Commercial Company with the right to take 40,000 pelts annually. As early_ as 1885 ri pelagic or open-sea sealing by various i nations in the waters adjacent to the Pribilofs, seriously affected the fishery. Thousands of seals, many with babes, were slaughtered out side of the Pribilof reserve. The annual means of 136,000 pelts taken (1888-89) fell to less than 29,000 for the five years ending 1908. The Paris convention for the correction of the evil proved to be of little value. In 1911. the
governments of Great Britain, Japan, Russia and the United States agreed to a convention which promises to restore the seal herd to large proportions. Until 1926 pelagic sealing is pro hibited in the seas of Bering, Japan, Kam chatka, Okhotsk and to the north of the 30th parallel of latitude in the Pacific Ocean. Aborigines living on the coasts of these regions are permitted to take native-fashion such seals as are needful for local uses. Under the con vention the products obtained by sealing on the islands are to be equitably divided between the countries named, and during close seasons an indemnity must be paid by the United States to Great Britain and Japan. By the Act of 24 Aug. 1912. Congress established a close season for five years, with a proviso that resi dent natives may kill such seals as are neces sary for food, clothing and boat-making. Under such conditions the product of fur-seals cannot average much over $200,000 annually. In round numbers the aquatic furs of Alaska from 1868 to 1915 inclusive have a value of $65,000000, the fur-seal products amounting to about $51,000,000, The beneficial effects of the closed season at the Pribilofs are already ap parent. The seals were enumerated at the rookeries with the following results: 1912, 215,738; 1913, 268,305; 1914, 294,687; 1915, 363, 872; and 1916, 417,281. With the same rate of increase the seal herds should number about 550,000 when the open season begins in 1918.
Land In comparison with the sea furs those obtained from land mammals are of minor importance, though considerable in value. The values of land furs by decades are as follows: 1871-80, $1,596,494; 1881-90, $2,360,115; 1891-1900, $2,335,862; and 1901-10, $2,381,925. The aggregate values to include 1915 amount to $11,518,188. The enormous slaughter of land animals threatened at one time the destruction of the industry, as in 1899 the product was only $45,725. Under restric tions as to close seasons, prime skins, use of poison, etc., the trade has very much improved and the maximum year of products was 1914, $632,063. The furs taken in 1914 were as fol lows: Ermine, 6,873; red fox, 14,967; white fox, 6,530; lynx, 6,930; marten, 6,497; mink, 65,623; muskrat, 101,202; and land otter, 1,008. In October 1915 the United States sold at auction 513 blue-fox skins at an average of $114.45, an advance of $72 over the last sale. Selected lots ran from $245 to $273 per pelt. The white fox pelts averaged $24.55. The value remained materially unchanged in 1916 and 1917. A novel industry was introduced about 1894, the breeding of foxes. Thirty or more uninhabited islands, principally situated from Prince William Sound westward to the Fox Islands, have been leased by the United States to the breeders. Few of these enterprises have resulted in returns adequate for the labor and capital therein involved.