USA > Alaska > Alaska and the Klondike > Part 3
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I N Dawson you are either tolerated as a " Chee- cha-ko " or you have established social standing as a " Sour Dough." Pedigree, which is often worth so much in other places, " cuts no ice " where that com- modity is perpetual at a depth of two feet. Indeed, it is wiser, as a rule, not to enquire too closely into ante- cedents or pedigree, and às for money as a guarantee of social position-any one is likely to have that to-morrow if he hasn't got it to-day. A " Chee-cha-ko" is only a tenderfoot, but to belong to the real aristocracy of the " Sour Dough " one must have spent a year " inside " and have some personal experience of a winter in a Yukon or Alaskan mining camp.
The senatorial " Chee-cha-kos " who landed in Dawson July 8, were expected-for Dawson has telegraphic com- munication with the outside world and daily newspapers -and were very cordially received. The warmth of the welcome extended to the representatives of the United States Senate was nowhere more marked in Alaska than here on the British side under the Union Jack. A major- ity of the people of Dawson, if now subjects of the crown, were at one time citizens of the United States, but it would be ungracious to suggest that that fact had any bear-
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ing upon the interest aroused by the arrival of this official party.
The first sensation experienced in Dawson was that of surprise at the size and appearance of the town. With a population of about 7,000, with streets solidly built up for nearly a mile along the river, and business extending back from the river front to Third Street; with graded streets, water service and sidewalks and comfortable log and frame storehouses and dwellings, the impression cre- ated is one of solidity and permanence, which I venture to say is not generally entertained by those who have not seen this metropolis of the Yukon. There are no stone build- ings and but one brick building in the town, so far as I observed, and not a square yard of plastering. Dawson is built on what is doubtless an old glacier, now covered with a deposit of earth and gravel, washed down from the encircling hills. Two feet beneath the surface the excavator strikes the perpetual ice. Foundations laid upon the ice are necessarily insecure. While the general surface of the ground does not thaw out to a depth of more than two feet in summer, an excavation results in further thawing of the surface at that point and a con- sequent settling of the foundations, which are raised again by the freezing in winter. The outer foundations, too, are subject to greater variations than those under the centre of the building and particularly those on the south side, so that, while there may be little change by reason of freezing or thawing in some parts of the building, in other parts there is considerable. This would ultimately
The Governor's Residence in Dawson
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destroy a building constructed of brick or stone and loosen the plastering on the walls of a wooden building.
Nearly all kinds of mercantile business are carried on in Dawson. The leaders, of course, are the old Yukon River trading and transportation companies. These are the Northern Commercial company, and the North Amer- ican Transportation and Trading company. These com- panies bring their stock of goods up the Yukon River from St. Michael, and were engaged in business here before the White Pass road opened a shorter route. They do a freighting and transportation business on the river and were the beneficiaries of a large trade before the Klondike was discovered. Their establishments are, in reality, department stores ; they carry everything needed, from a miner's thawing machine to a watch; from Indian mukluks to jewelry and laces; from hard-tack and bacon to gentlemen's dress suits, in one of which a member of our party-not prepared to find that such things are required up near the pole-was arrayed for the governor's social function. It cannot be said of Dawson that business is very lively there just now. The boom is over, but there is a fair volume of trade on a reasonably permanent basis. During the summer of 1904 Dawson and the Klondike district are said to have lost 2,000 to 3,000 people by the rush to the new diggings at Fairbanks on the Tanana. But that is the fortune of the mining camp; a large part of its floating population is here to-day and gone to- morrow.
The public buildings of Dawson are exceedingly credit-
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able. They consist of the post-office, which serves the postal department on the first floor and the customs and other Dominion departments on the second; a fine eight- room public-school building; what is known as the ad- ministration building-the office building of the Yukon territory; the municipal courthouse; the governor's ele- gant residence; the Mounted Police barracks and others. The schoolhouse cost $40,000, the administration build- ing $50,000, and altogether about $250,000 have been expended here in public buildings. Dawson is not with- out churches, and the strict observance of Sunday is some- thing worthy of remark, although not unusual under the British flag. The day following our arrival wit- nessed great demonstrations of welcome in honour of Evangeline Booth of the Salvation Army, whose organisa- tion has a strong garrison at this point. Miss Booth during her stay was a guest of the governor and his wife, and was honoured with an official address of welcome.
Dawson lies north of the 64th degree of north latitude and experiences as wide differences of temperature, prob- ably, as are known in any inhabited portion of the globe. The thermometer had registered 90 above a few days before our arrival and two days of our stay were uncom- fortably hot at midday. In winter 60 or 70 below is not a very rare experience. And yet the "Sour Doughs " speak with real enthusiasm of the winter climate. " It is all right here in winter," said our hospitable host at the Regina, " except when it moderates sometimes and the temperature rises to 25 or 30 below. You see, it feels so
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much like spring our people foolishly expose themselves and catch cold." I can bear no testimony to Dawson's win- ter climate; I am only a " Chee-cha-ko "; but I can testify as to five perfectly glorious days there in July.
I was surprised, too, to find the markets so well sup- plied with fresh fruits, vegetables, meats and all kinds of provisions, though not at prices which prevail in Minneapolis. For instance, eggs were quoted, as the market reporters say, at $I to $1.50 a dozen; butter, $ I a pound; flour, $14 a barrel; beef, 50 to 80 cents a pound by the quarter; ham, 42 cents; bread, two loaves for 25 cents; sugar, 10 cents a pound; oranges, 50 cents to $I a dozen; potatoes, 10 cents, although a short time prior they were 18 to 20 cents a pound. These are summer prices, when transportation is open. In win- ter they are multiplied by two or three, if the supply hasn't run out. Shoes and clothing may be obtained al- most as cheaply as in Seattle, but anything that is of a perishable character costs money, and this is true of some things that are not perishable. Hay has been as high as $300 a ton in Dawson, and was quoted at from $80 to $90 at the time of our visit, and other kinds of feed and forage at corresponding prices. It costs so much to feed a horse in Dawson in winter that it is cheaper to shoot the horse in the fall and import a new one in the spring, and that is sometimes done. Lumber is $50 a thousand; hardware prices correspond. That one of the senatorial party hesitated to order more than one egg for his first breakfast lest he might soon exhaust the committee's ap-
Looking Northwest down the Yukon
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propriation, may be explained by the fact that there have been times when eggs were worth $2 apiece in Dawson.
In this far-away, isolated country the people are thrown almost wholly upon their own resources for their winter amusement, which becomes a necessity to successful resist- ance of the depression which often seizes upon those who are shut off so completely from sharing in the pleasures and occupations of the outside world. It therefore follows that Dawson has a good theatre, an athletic clubhouse for winter sports and athletic grounds well prepared for baseball, cricket and tennis. The champions of the prize ring find many interested in their exhibitions here and the event of the week prior to our arrival had been a fight to a finish. A peculiar institution is the town crier, known as "Uncle John," who parades the streets with a mega- phone, an improvement on a bell, and announces the hour and place of forthcoming events. The long midsummer days simplify the arrangements of this character materi- ally. The baseball crank and the office boy are not com- pelled to devise excuses for neglect of their business in the middle of the afternoon in order to witness a baseball game. The game does not begin until 8 o'clock in the evening, and the theatre, recognising it as a stiff competitor, does not ring up its curtain until 10 o'clock. This means, of course, that the play is not over until 12.30 or I A. M., but inasmuch as the night is nearly as light as the day no inconvenience is suffered on that account. It necessarily follows, however, that business is not generally resumed as early the next morning as it is where the occupations of
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the day are taken care of during the day and those of the night are given their proper hours.
It was a " Chee-cha-ko," of course, who, when asked if he wanted to " see the town," said : " Yes, of course, but I never go to 'see the town' by daylight." He was in- formed that he must see it by daylight or not at all; or, he might wait six months, when he couldn't see it by day- light, unless he was mighty quick about it. Dawson is on a parallel with the centre of Iceland, and the winter days are so short that school children are obliged to carry lan- terns to light their way to and from school. You may be surprised to find that Dawson has about 400 pupils in her public school, and that as evidence of the up-to-date- ness with which they are conducted they are thoroughly trained in the fire drill. Dawson also boasts a Carnegie public library, the one nearest to the North Pole.
The town of Dawson extends back from the river bank half a mile and well up the slopes of the encircling hill or mountain, the extreme summit of which is called the dome. Here on the 21st of June great crowds repair to witness the midnight sun. Visitors are promised a grand prospect from this dome and up its steep ascent Mr. Brackett, Senator Patterson, of Colorado, and I climbed, one bright, clear day. The distance from the hotel to the summit is about three miles, but the magnificent view afforded from this elevation was worth the effort. Stretching away to the north- west could be traced the winding course of the Yukon on its way to its extreme northern point at Fort
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Yukon, where it crosses the Arctic Circle. On the north and east were visible, nearly 100 miles away, the snowy peaks of the great world's ridge, which sweeps northward from the plateau of Mexico, rises into the heights of the Rockies and is perpetuated in the northern chain of moun- tains across British America to the Arctic Ocean. On the southeast lies the valley of the Klondike and its tributaries, the great gold field, which has lured tens of thousands of eager and hopeful " argonauts " and which, since its dis- covery eight years ago, has contributed over $100,000,000 to the world's supply of the precious metal.
If any one brings to Dawson the idea that life and property are not safe in this community, that desperate characters throng the streets and that disorder prevails day and night, he will soon discover his mistake. A more orderly, law-abiding community it would be difficult to find. There was no key to my room at the hotel and when I asked for one it was found with difficulty. "We never think of locking our doors here," was the explanation, and I found this to be true in private houses, as well as in public. I began to look around me for the reason. Surely, I thought, the leopards who come to this far-away country have not changed their spots ; there must be among the promiscuous throng some thieves; crime can hardly have lost its attractions for all the adventurers who flock to this far frontier. If this were simply a mining camp with only a few tents, where justice was administered in the rude and simple way usually pursued where society is but crudely organised, such confidence in the safety of
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one's possessions wherever he might leave them would not appear so remarkable, but this is a city of 7,000 people.
I found the reason I was looking for at the south end of the city, where were flying the flags of the Northwest Mounted Police. Here are the barracks of this splendid organisation under the command of Major Z. T. Wood, whose initials stand for the name of a former president of the United States, from whom he is descended. Major Wood is from Nova Scotia, but there courses through his veins the blood of Zachary Taylor. His family re- moved to Halifax after the war on account of their irrecon- cilable feeling towards its results. In 1895 when the Forty-Mile district on the British side was attracting attention as a mining region, the Dominion Government sent up a small force of Northwest Mounted Police to administer law and preserve order. So inaccessible was this country at that time from Canada that by special permission of our Government these men were brought by the way of St. Michael and up the Yukon. To-day there are fifty-five police stations in the Yukon territory having three men each, besides the garrisons at Dawson and White Horse. These stations are scattered along the Yukon and through the mining districts. A weekly patrol is maintained between Dawson and White Horse, from outpost to outpost, and at all the roadhouses on the winter trail which connects these posts a register is kept where the passengers are required to register at every stop, in order that when it may be necessary to locate any one for whom enquiry is made, his whereabouts at certain times
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may be definitely known. Every boat, scow or skiff leav- ing the upper lakes for Dawson in summer or leaving Dawson for the lower river, is registered and the names and addresses of the passengers taken. In all cases of
78- 104 19 11 ¢ LLLET
Northwest Mounted Police
accidents resulting in death and in cases of suicide and murder the police exercise not only the duties of a police magistrate but of coroner and make full enquiry. On the arrival of boats they assist the customs officers and in Dawson serve as a police force for that city. The men are enlisted for five years with the privilege of re-enlist- ment for one, two or three years, as they desire. This
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force is recruited largely from the best families of Eng- land and Canada and includes not only fine specimens of manhood, physically, but among the number are men from the great universities and colleges.
Dawson is not a no-license town; dance-halls and bar- rooms are sufficiently numerous, and other resorts of vice, all under close restraint. Public gambling is not tolerated, and Major Wood, who is a member, by virtue of his office, of the Yukon council, introduced, while we were there, a bill to prevent women from frequenting bar- rooms, to deny to dance-halls the power to take out liquor licenses, prohibit public gambling, to close all side doors and back doors, chutes and dumb waiters, to remove screens during the prohibited hours and closing saloons from 12 o'clock Saturday night until 6 o'clock Monday morning. The penalties range from $50 to $100, with forfeiture of license for a second offence. Of course, this measure provoked a loud roar of protest from the saloon- keepers and gamblers and the dance-hall proprietors, but the bill represented the ideas of a department which has a high reputation for efficiency, and if the council saw fit to enact into law what he proposed for the promotion of the peace of Dawson, Major Wood has the power and the disposition to enforce it.
During the summer of 1904, the Yukon council sub- mitted to the voters of Dawson a proposition to rescind the charter of the city and take the administration of the affairs of the town into the hands of the council. A large number of the most important interests favoured
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such action because the municipal government had be- come extravagant, and the proposition was adopted by a large majority. More recently the police authorities decided that there were too many saloons in Dawson and on the creeks and closed thirty-five of them in one day, an incident suggestive of the arbitrary manner in which authority is sometimes exercised by this organisation. This might not do on the American side, but it "goes " in the British territories. At the same time the need of a more efficient police service in Alaska is recognised and Judge Day, who investigated conditions in the district in the summer of 1904, is understood to have recommended the organisation of a mounted constabulary somewhat after the order of the Northwest Mounted Police, though not clothed with such arbitrary power as that organisation exercises in the territories of the Dominion.
Dawson has two daily papers. The Yukon World is the Government organ; the News, a vigorous and pros- perous opposition paper, stands for the enlargement of the element of home rule in the Territorial Government. It is set on a Mergenthaler machine, affords a photo-engrav- ing plant which produces first-class results, and serves its readers with an average of four to eight pages a day at a cost of $24 a year, single copies 25 cents. This is the ruling price of all newspapers in Alaska and the Yukon, whether daily or weekly. The same charge is made for newspapers from the States, and magazines which can be bought in Minneapolis for 10 cents cost 50 cents on the Yukon.
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I have spoken of the courteous reception accorded the visiting senators by the officials of the territory. Our entire party was favoured with an invitation to a formal dinner at the executive mansion, where Commissioner Congdon served to sixteen or eighteen gentlemen, includ- ing territorial and municipal officials, as well as the United States consul and the visiting senators from the States, a dinner as elegantly appointed as I have ever par- taken of anywhere. The floral decorations were particu- larly tasteful and varied, including specimens of at least a dozen varieties of flowers. The executive mansion is a handsome frame structure, thoroughly modern, electric- lighted, finished throughout in British Columbia fir in its native tints and contains the private office of the governor, a billiard-room, a reception-room, spacious parlours, a state dining-room, large chambers and a grand hall and stairway.
The British Yukon enjoys something which American Alaska is asking for and is destined to secure in time. The British Yukon is an organised territory, having a gov- ernor, who is known as the commissioner of Yukon terri- tory, three judges and an executive council.or legislature consisting of five members elected and five appointed or ex- officio. The governor is also appointed and presides over the sessions of the council, giving the appointed members a majority of one. When the territory was first organised the council contained but two elective members. Constant agitation, however, in favour of home rule has enlarged the elective membership to five and the agitation, still con-
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tinuing, is likely to increase that number. The Yukon also has a delegate in Parliament, another boon for which Alaska prays without division of sentiment. The territory has a full complement of officers, including a gold com- missioner, land agent and a superintendent of roads. Three years' residence is necessary in order to vote and then the franchise may not be exercised except by full citizens. It is estimated that 65 per cent. of the population are Americans-that is to say, from the States. No taxes are levied on property outside of incorporated towns, but a liberal territorial revenue is derived from the export tax on gold of 2 1-2 per cent. In the incorporated towns taxes for municipal purposes are levied on property on the valuation basis.
The second day of our stay in Dawson was devoted to the mines. As the guests of M. L. Washburn of the Northern Commercial company and T. A. McGowan, United States consul, our party was driven in road wagons eighteen miles up Bonanza and Eldorado creeks through the heart of the Klondike mining region. The British Yukon has the best system of wagon roads to be found in any mining district in the world. These roads are built by the Dominion Government, and the enterprise dis- played in construction and maintenance is an object lesson the value of which should not be lost on our Government.
While we were waiting to take the train at Skagway an Indian dressed in the ordinary garb of the white man, but very drunk and very tearful, addressed himself to nearly every one on the platform, expressing his grief in badly
Street Scene in Grand Forks
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GOLD HILL HOTEL
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broken English over the death of his mother. It appears that his mother had died a long time before, but he was indulging in a new burst of grief, along with some other things conducive to mellowness, and seeking sympathy wherever he could for his forlorn condition. This weep- ing inebriate was "Skookum Jim," and "Skookum Jim " was in at the beginning of things when gold was discovered on Bonanza Creek in 1896. " Skookum," by the way, means big.
Of course there are rival claimants for the honour of having made the original discovery in the Klondike.
Robert Henderson has applied to the Dominion Gov- ernment for recognition as the original discoverer, basing his title on the representation that he had sluice boxes in operation on Hunker Creek in July, 1896. At that time it was known as All Gold. He says that after staking his claims he returned to Ogilvie for supplies. Securing an outfit he started down the Yukon again for his claim. At the mouth of the Klondike River he came upon George Carmack and his Indian associates, " Skookum Jim " and " Tagish Charley." He advised them to go over with him to All Gold and Gold Bottom and take some claims. They did so, and then started back across the divide to Bonanza Creek, then known as Rabbit Creek. As they left, Henderson requested them, if they found any good-looking prospects on Rabbit Creek, to send him word and he would pay the messenger for his services. Henderson says that on that return trip to the river Carmack panned on the rim rock of Rabbit Creek with
George A. Brackett Washing out a Pan
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sensational results, and was so excited over his discovery that he forgot to send back the messenger, but hastened on to Forty-Mile, where he recorded as the discoverer of the district. When Henderson went to Forty-Mile a little later he was notified that Carmack had already filed the first, or discovery, claim. Henderson claims, however, that his original discovery was entitled to be regarded as the discovery claim because it has since paid a royalty on $450,000, and afterwards was sold for $200,000, and is still a valuable property. The honour of discovery is not empty, as the original discoverer is allowed to stake the next claim above or below on the same creek.
George Carmack's story, however, which is more popu- larly accepted as the true version of the original discov- ery, is that while he and the Indians " Skookum Jim " and " Tagish Charley " were fishing for salmon at the mouth of the Klondike they decided, the catch not being very satisfactory, to go back on the creeks along the Klondike and do a little prospecting. They strolled up the Klondike River, panning for gold here and there but with indiffer- ent success, until noon on August 16. When they stopped for lunch they noticed what seemed to be very favour- able indications on the exposed rim of the left bank of what is now known as Bonanza Creek. A pan produced surprising results. In a little while they had washed out over $12. The following day they staked a claim cover- ing the site of their discovery and one each side of it. They then went down to the mouth of the Klondike River, and on the present site of Dawson built a raft on which
A " CHEE-CHA-KO" IN THE KLONDIKE 61
they floated down the Yukon to Forty-Mile, where there was a considerable mining camp and the territorial head- quarters. They filed their claims and told what they had found. Their reputations for veracity were not high, but the next morning nearly every man who had heard their story at Forty-Mile was on his way to the Klondike.
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