The only railroad of any size owned and operated by the U. S. Government* is the Alaska Railroad, 500 miles long, finished in 1923, running from coastal Seward to the biggest city in Alaska's interior, gold-mining Fairbanks (pop. 2,101). A dour, 69-year-old, spectacled, Republican Swede named Otto Frederick Ohlson is its top man. Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes, who has jurisdiction over A. R. R., does not oust Ohlson from his $14,500 job because in eleven years Republican Ohlson has reduced its annual operating deficit from $1,000,000 to the break-even point:...
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