Assignment in Alaska

One day last March, in the wilds of Alaska, a small private plane settled down on its landing skis and slid to a stop. A few minutes later, after strapping on some snowshoes, Pilot Terris Moore set out for the last nine miles of his journey on foot. He had come all the way from Boston to make his round of visits; before accepting the presidency of the University of Alaska, he had decided that he should call on each of the regents to talk things over.

Last week, as the university's brand-new president, Terris Moore had just met the faculty, accepted a world's record brown bearskin for the university museum and got settled for the summer in the girls' infirmary while a house was being built for him. A week before, Alaskans had come from miles around to say goodbye to the university's founder and first president, leathery Charles E. Bunnell (TIME,

Dec. 16, 1946)--and to look over the 41-year-old cheechako (tenderfoot) who was to take his place.

As a student at Williams College, Terris Moore dreamed of climbing Mt. Everest. That dream never came true, but he did make the first ascent of Alaska's Mt. Bona (16,420 ft.) and was a member of the only party to reach the top of China's Mt. Minya Konka (24,900 ft.).

Later, he taught accounting at the University of California and wrote Practical Farm Accounts, which sold 100,000 copies. In 1945 he took over the presidency of Boston's Museum of Natural History, in four years cleaned out its moldy exhibits and put through a plan to build one of the most modern museums in the U.S.

The University of Alaska will be a harder problem. Since its founding in 1922, it has been battling an annual invasion of summer mosquitoes, sub-zero winter temperatures and a chronic shortage of money. Nevertheless, with Founder Bunnell pushing determinedly ahead, the university has grown until it now has 698 part-and full-time students and a 42-man faculty. It has become a center for Arctic research, a training ground for mining engineers, a clearinghouse of information for farmers and prospectors.

At Moore's inauguration, Bunnell sounded an old alarm. The impoverished Territorial Legislature had given its university next to nothing for two years, and the regents have had to borrow $225,000 so far to pay off fuel bills and salaries. To Terris Moore, Charles Bunnell made a pledge: "We will not permit the university to close, if we have to go to the people who believe in Alaska and borrow our needs in ten and twenty dollar bills."

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