Glacier Bay, Alaska
“This land is your land, this land is my land”
Today, this land belongs to everyone, and we are all much better for it. However, in the late 1800s, these were probably some of the words used in a border dispute.
We spent all day in Glacier Bay National Park today, part of a vast North American territory for which, by the 1860s, the Russian landowners had little use. The British, Americans and French had decimated the sea otter population. The “soft gold” was gone. A relentless 100-year hunt had reduced otter numbers to the point where the species was no longer profitable to hunt. In 1867 the financially desperate Russians sold the territory to the USA. It was to become the State of Alaska. Seward’s Folly, as it was called, cost the USA 7.2 million dollars in gold bullion. What a bargain!
It was the drafting of the boundaries of the territory that presented problems. The boundary description written into the 1867 Convention between the USA and the Emperor of Russia was vague. Marine charts were crude, land maps non-existent, and needless to say, the satellite-operated global positioning system (GPS) that we know today was not even a dream in the mind of the most far-out science fiction writer. In part, the boundary was to follow “...the summit of the mountains situated parallel to the coast...” from 56 degrees north latitude to the intersection with 141 degrees west longitude, and “...shall never exceed the distance of ten marine leagues” from the ocean. By 1903, with the Klondike gold rush in full swing, the Canadians to the east disputed the boundary as drawn. They claimed that, at least in the north part of the coast, it should run across inlets from headland to headland. This would put the northern reaches of both Lynn Canal and Glacier Bay in Canada. The Americans disagreed. A joint arbitration commission of 3 Americans, 2 Canadians and 1 Briton met in London. The US claim was upheld by a vote of 4 to 2.
We cruised through a small part of the territory today, spotting brown (grizzly) bears, mountain goats, humpback whales, sea lions, seals and many species of seabirds. The puffins—the clowns of the bird world—were a highlight. Off Margerie Glacier, we screamed in disbelief as a massive column of ice—the tower that we all had been urging to fall—suddenly broke away and exploded into the ocean below...truly an incredible experience.
We can agree that, no matter who “owns” this beautiful wilderness,
“This land was made for you and me.”
