Many of the
people called the region "Seward's Folly" and said it would
produce nothing but icebergs and polar bears, and General
Benjamin F. Butler, representative from Massachusetts, said
in the House: "If we are to pay this amount for Russia's
friendship during the war, then give her the $7,200,000 and
tell her to keep Alaska." Representative Washburn, of
Wisconsin, exclaimed: "I defy any man on the face of the
earth to produce any evidence that an ounce of gold has ever
been found in Alaska."
To-day Alaska is yielding in gold $10,000,000 per year; its
fisheries are among the richest in the world, including more
than half the salmon yield of the United States; its forests
are of enormous value; its fur-seal harvest is without a
rival; its territory is traversed by one of the greatest
rivers of the world, two thousand miles long and with more
than a thousand miles of navigable waters, and it promises
to become an important farming and stock-raising region. As
for extent, it is large enough to cover more than twenty of
our States. In revenue it has repaid the United States the
original outlay and several millions more; while, aside from
its gold product, its fisheries have netted $100,000,000 and
its furs $80,000,000 since its acquisition. Seward, then,
was wise in looking upon this purchase as the greatest
achievement of his life, though he truly said that it would
take the country a generation to find out Alaska's value.
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