stefansson-wrangel-09-12-042-001

July 9, 1923.

Mr. A. J. T. Taylor,
Bank of Hamilton Building,
Toronto, Ontario.

Dear Sir:

Thank you for the copies of telegrams and
correspondence regarding Wrangel Island that you have been
sending me.

I cabled Mr. Stefansson immediately upon receipt
of your telegrams of July 4 and July 7th. As yet I have had
no reply to either but I shall, of course, inform you as soon as
I do.

Just before he left Seattle Mr. Noice wired me
as follows: “See LeBourdais immediately stop make him delete
any reference to present Wrangel Relief expedition stop is he
ublishes anything lose several thousand dollars contract
arranged for by Taylor."

I believe you know Mr. LeBourdais, who was with
Mr. Stefansson in Canada.when he gave his lectures there last
spring. Before he left for England Mr. Stefansson encouraged
him to write an article about Wrangel, and this Mr. LeBourdais
sold some weeks ago to one of the Sunday papers here. It was
to appear yesterday in the New York Tribune. This article, of
course, had no mention of any relief expedition, as none was
under way at the time it was written.

As soon as I received Mr. Noice’s telegram, I
phoned Mr. LeBourdais and he came to the office to see me about
it. He was just that morning on his way to a syndicate office
to complete arrangements for sending out substantially the same
story that was to appear in the Tribune. The major part of the
story, of course, has apeared in the newspapers several times
during the last year. On the last page he had a reference to
Noice, telling who he is and mentioning that he had set out for
Nome to take a ship to Wrangel, all of which has also been in the
papers. Although Mr. LeBourdais said he could see no harm in
sending this out, he destroyed his last page, omitting any mention