Show explorer sees wealth in antarctic regions noted arctic explorer believes that the united states is wise to acquire territorial rights in the antarctic the vast down under continent he said may prove to be a valuable source of petroleum radium and food and that in the near future it would become valuable for long range weather forecasting he said the value of the antarctic could not be ascertained because no one could look into the future who would have known a hundred years ago that canada some day would become an important source of radium asked benjamin franklin was a wise man and he was smart enough to make a good sized fortune but he knew about petroleum in western pennsylvania and despite his wisdom he could not conceive its commercial value he said moves by the united united states to acquire arctic regions regions might seem ridiculous at pre present sent but that in the future the lands would be valuable when we bought the danish west indies now called the virgin islands said we gave denmark all our rights in greenland now it is known that the territory which was ours in greenland was worth many times more than the virgin islands he predicted that weather observations in the antarctic would make it possible to determine weather conditions in australia a year or two in advance |