Yesterday's News

May 16, 1918

It has been persistently reported in Wrangell that the bakeries of Petersburg were selling bread made entirely of wheat flour. The Sentinel, wishing to know the truth of the statement wrote to T. Elsemore, Food Administrator of Petersburg. Mr. Elsemore’s reply as follows: Gentlemen: In reply to your letter of the 2nd inst., reference the local bakery making bread entirely of wheat flour, I wish to say that to the best of my knowledge there is no foundation for the statements being made. The bakery here makes bread composed of wheat and white barley, which looks like white bread and is hard to detect and I believe this must be the cause of the statements in question. The fact that bakeries cannot buy straight wheat flour from the wholesalers would prevent them from making white bread.

May 21, 1943

Opportunity for small boat owners to get into the service of their country with their boats is being offered here this week through the Coast Guard Auxiliary. Lieut. Earle Watterworth, Coast Guard Auxiliary Director for Alaska, arrived here this week and will have a meeting in the fire hall to outline the plan and form a unit of the auxiliary here. All persons interested are asked to attend. Juneau and Petersburg already have formed units of the Auxiliary. Any vessel owner or part owner who is 18 years of age or older and is an American citizen may join a flotilla. Associate membership is extended to boatmen who do not own a share of a vessel but volunteer for crew duties. Members may fly the Coast Guard Auxiliary flag and wear all authorized insignia of the organization.

May 16, 1968

Officials of Alaska Airlines have offered to construct terminal buildings at Wrangell and Petersburg airports. Meeting with the city councils of both communities, the representatives offered to: Construct steel or concrete buildings with 2,100 square feet of floor space at each airport, furnish an airport manager and provide manpower to operate runway maintenance equipment.

They asked that the cities purchase equipment to maintain the airport runways. O.F. Benecke, properties manager for Southeastern, said the firm feels 2,100 square feet is the minimum size structure for the airports. Within the terminal would be a 720-square foot waiting room to accommodate 65 persons. Also included in the building would be room for cargo and vehicle storage.

Bruce Neilsen, airline property manager, said the structures would follow the same basic floor plan used at Unalakleet and Kotzebue. He said he checked with a Seattle builder and found the cost to be $11,000 for a steel structure.

The same building, however costs $4,500 from the manufacturer he said. The airline can buy from the manufacturer and should be able to put both buildings up for $12,000. The buildings would be of modular design and capable of expansion. “Never build for today,” Neilsen said.

May 20, 1993

Visitors to the Garnet Ledge will find the going much easier, thanks to a joint project between the Forest Service and Todd Harding of T.H. Charters. The two parties combined efforts and money to build a small footbridge that will save cabin and trail users a muddy trek. Until recently, access to the cabin has been by boat to the riverbank in front of the cabin. Over the past few years, a large sand bar has built up near the cabin. When the Stikine is below the extreme high tidemark, visitors must tie up their boats in deep water, a short distance upriver. The visitors would then have to hike along the riverbank and cross a muddy slough to get to the cabin and trail to the Garnet Ledge.

The project took about 10 days to construct and was completed May 7. In addition to the bridge, planking was installed from the bridge to meet that already installed from the cabin to the Garnet Ledge trail.