The Land of Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

The rock cut sheltering part of the train shown on the (back) cover of this booklet is obviously not the same as the rock cut on yesterday’s booklet, but where might it be? The illustration appears to portray the train route into a town located on the west side of a large river with McKinley or some other large mountain in the background.

Click image to download an 24.4-MB PDF of this 24-page booklet.

The Alaska Railroad follows the Susitna River between Anchorage and McKinley Park but the tracks and towns are on the east side. Further north, the town of McKinley Park is not on a river, and while Nenana and Fairbanks both are, the tracks are not located in such a way that a portrait such as this one would be possible. I also don’t see any places south of Anchorage that look like this painting. Illustrators often exaggerated distances or proximities, but this image seems purely imaginary.

Though unsigned, it does seem likely that this illustration was done by the same artist who did the one on the 1932 booklet presented here yesterday and the 1931 booklet presented the day before. However, the style differs from the Willard Cox painting on the 1927 booklet shown the day before that.


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