United States. Office of Territories

The Matanuska Valley Colony, one of President Roosevelt's New Deal relief projects, was a cooperative agricultural colony created in Palmer, Territory of Alaska, around 1935. It was created by the Alaska Rural Rehabilitation Corporation, an Alaskan corporation, with funding from the U.S. Federal Emergency Relief Administration through the U.S. Office of Territories. Two-hundred three families, mostly from Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota, were invited to join the Colony. They arrived in Palmer in the early summer of 1935. Although the failure rate was high, many of their descendants still live in the Mat-Su Valley today (2002). [Alaska Department of Community & Economic Development, Division of Community & Business Development].

From the description of U.S. Office of Territories photograph collection, 1935. [graphic]. (Alaska State Library). WorldCat record id: 50406495

The Office of Territories was established July 28, 1950, by administrative order of the Secretary of the Interior to carry out certain of his responsibilities pertaining to areas noncontinguous to the United States and under U.S. jurisdiction. The Office, the successor to the Division of Territories and Island Possessions, established by Executive order of May 29, 1934, is concerned with the development of the economic, social, and political life of the territories and with the advancement of international peace and security by the close coordination of territorial affairs with the defense and foreign policies of the United States. Before 1873 it was a function of the Secretary of State to serve as the channel through which officers of the territorial governments communicated with the Government in Washington and to act in a supervisory capacity over these officers. By an act of March 1, 1873, these powers and duties were transferred to the Secretary of the Interior, who exercised them through his immediate office until the newly established Division of Territories and Island Possessions was made responsible for them in 1934. The accelerated acquisition of territorial possessions outside the continental United States after the Spanish-American War, although offset to some extent by the creation of new States from former territories, emphasized the need for a centralized administration of territorial governments.

In 1907 President Theordore Roosevelt directed that all Government activities relating to the territorial possessions of the United States, except the Philippine Islands, should be handled by the Department of the Interior. Between 1907 and 1934, however, the Department's territorial functions were considerable decentralized. Although the functions of the Bureau of Insular Affairs relating to the administration of the government of Puerto Rico were transferred to the new Division of Territories and Island Possessions in 1934, it was not until the Bureau was terminated in 1939 that the division inherited the last territorial responsibilities of the War Department, many of which related to the Philippine Islands. Control of the government of the Virgin Islands was transferred in 1931 from the Department of the Navy to the Department of the Interior. Direct supervision of certain territorial governments by the Navy Department was continued until 1951 when the control of American Samoa and the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands was transferred to the Interior Department.

Territorial functions of that Department have included not only supervisory responsibilities of the respective Governors' offices, but also those relating to the insane in Alaska, Alaskan reindeer, the Government-owened Bluebeard Castle Hotel at St. Thomas in the Virgin Islands, and the operations of Government units, such as the U.S. Antarctic Service, the Office of the U.S. High Commissioner to the Philippine Islands, the Alaska Railroad, the Alaska Road Commission, the Virgin Islands Company, the Puerto Rican Hurricane Refief Commission and Loan Section, and the Hawaiian Homes Commission.

From the description of Records of the Office of Territories (Record Group 126). (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 122333673