Dawson City

We arrived in Dawson City in the late afternoon of August 3^rd after a drive from Whitehorse of @ 330 miles. Leaving the Alaskan Highway 15 miles north of Whitehorse we turn north on the Yukon Highway. The road condition varied from very rough to just a little bumpy. There were several sections where the road dipped, these were hard to see and pretty thrilling to drive over at speed. 

At one point driving over one of those dips I swore the front wheels came off the ground.

    

Recreating Dawson City Gold rush

Dawson City is a very interesting town that dates back to the Gold Rush of 1898. It was not far from town that George Carmack and his brother in law (first nation) found gold in what became known as Bonanza Creek. It was this discovery that set off the gold rush. 

                                                                 

 A sleepy fur trading outpost on the edge of the frontier became a very busy overcrowded town of @ 30,000 in a few short months. The boom did not last long. Most of the best claims had already been staked out by the locals so many of the transient moved on seeking their fortunes elsewhere. By 1910 much of the mining was being done by corporations on a large scale. Gold mining in that area continues to the present with several cooperate mines and a number of family run operations.

Today Dawson City has a population of @ 2000 in the summer and less than 1000 during the winter months. 

Probable the highlight of our visit was the guided walking tour. Our guide Kayla, a 20 year resident of Dawson City and current employee of Parks Canada (Nation Park Service) took us on a 90 minute walk around the city. Kayla had a real passion for the city and an excellent knowledge base for the history. As Kayla walked us through the city pointing out historic buildings and the people associated with them we gained a better understanding of the life and times of the Gold Rush era.

Having read many of his books and short stories another highlight for me was a visit to the Jack London Museum. Jack had come to the Klondike in 1897 as a 21 year old seeking his fortune.  In 1898 an unsuccessful prospector Jack return to California broke and sick.  Jack’s stay in the Klondike was brief but it had a major influence on his writing. By the time of his death at the age of 40, Jack had several best sellers including The Call of the Wild, White Fang and To Build a fire all set in the Yukon. 

Jack London's Cabin 

Corporate Gold mining took over in the Klondike around 1909 /1912. They bought up many of the smaller miners, sometimes unwillingly. The laws were changed in Ottawa giving priority to the owners of mineral rights over the people that owned the land. This affected many First Nation people who were forced off land that had been traditional homeland for centuries. Sound Familiar!  

The dredge was an engineering marvel that had a large grinder / rock cutter that would cut a large trench in the bedrock then transfer the rock into a separator sorting the rocks and sand from the gold then depositing tha tailing out the back. The trench was filled with water creating its own moving pond floating the six story machine forward. The machine ran 24/7 from May until October when it was too cold to operate. These machines were used in Alaska until the 1950's. Engineering marvels and very efficient mining machines the created an environmental disaster. There are miles and miles of the tailings everywhere in the Klondike making the land useless for anything else.