| Rita's ~
VINTAGE READING®
~ Notebook
Since 1947, "Mrs. B." has found and verified countless people, events . . .
and--at times--even
figments of imagination. We offer an example:
APRIL -
MAY 2008 :: © 2008 Buday Books / Vintage Reading®
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Klondike Gold -- All You Find Is Yours!
Adapted from an 1897 Account and a 1901 New York Times Story
By Rita Buday
I last saw Joe in 1897
at the Ladue homestead a few miles west of Plattsburgh, N.Y. He
was in his early 40s; U.S.-born of a French-Canadian family. His
mother passed away when he was very young; after his father died
in 1874, 19-year-old Joseph Ladue went west, looking for gold in
Colorado, Wyoming, Dakota. He found a few flakes here and
there, though never enough to speak of; did whatever came to hand so
he could keep moving on. Gold gets to be a fever--the next
shovelful might make you rich--it takes hold of you.
Eventually he got to Alaska; kept prospecting, farming;
partnered with Art Harper to trade with the native Indians. He
heard a couple of prospectors just hit paydirt in the Klondike; figured
soon as word got out, there'd be a gold rush like they had in
California, 1849. He bought 175 acres of shore land where
Klondike Creek joins the Yukon River in Canada; registered it with
their government; called the place "Dawson" after George Mercer Dawson,
the geologist who fixed the boundary between Canada's Yukon and
Alaska. Joe cut down trees; made lumber from logs with his
sawmill; built the first warehouse, the first saloon, the first
houses. He divided his land into 50-foot-wide lots; started
selling a few for bargain prices. Then the stampede began; miners
took out thousands of dollars in gold per month; Joe's land prices went
up mighty fast.
After years of looking and earning just enough to get by,
he finally hit the jackpot with money from selling land, building
houses, renting his storage buildings, and mining gold nuggets from
claims he'd staked out.
He was still the quiet, unassuming man I knew twenty-three
years ago. When I asked if he came back to live a life of ease,
he said "Came to marry Kittie [Anna Mason]. I've got plenty enough
to last us, but we have to go back to Dawson. There's the
timber logging, sawmills, building more houses and stores; and I--now
it's Kittie and me--WE--own claims that have to be developed; our
lawyer is setting up a company that'll bring in mining engineers and equipment to
do things better and faster.
"There were 2500 people in Dawson when I left; and solid line of
men from Dyea at the head of Lynn Canal, over Chilkoot Pass, going past
the lakes, portages, rapids, and on along the Yukon to Dawson. Every
dock in Seattle was loaded with prospectors waiting for
passage. There's three routes: go by St. Michael's and take a
steamer up the Yukon 1700 miles; you go between June and October when the
River's not frozen. It's easy, but your supplies go by freighter,
not with you, so no telling when freight'll arrive. Or, you can go
to Skagway, cross White Pass, fight your way past Whitehorse Rapids to
the Yukon, then float to Dawson. Your outfit goes with you; you
can hire Indians to help carry your goods over the Pass, but it's still
a hard trip. Last way is to start at Dyea, then cross Chilkoot
Pass--it's about 700 foot higher, but a lot easier to climb.
Indian people help carry your stuff over; but then you have a real long
hike to the River.
"My guess is prospectors are coming all ways, headed to
Dawson and the Klondike Creek--the Indians call it "Throndiuck"--it means
"salmon" because it's so full of that fish."
"If a man wanted to go," I asked, "what would it take?"
~
"I don't advise anyone
to go," he said; "Many don't survive; those who do mostly don't find
enough to cover their cost. First, you have to pay your way to
Seattle for passage north. Buy your outfit in Juneau; it'll cost
no more than buying in Seattle. From Juneau, steamers
let you take your goods with you to Dyea--for a price.
"Your least outfit should be: a camp-stove, fry-pan,
coffee-pot, kettle, knives-forks-spoons, canvas tent, ax, hatchet,
whipsaw, a good hand-saw, two-inch ice auger, pick-and-shovel, ten
pound of nails. Heavy wool clothes--no furs--two pair of stoutest
overshoes, arctic socks. You'll need a sled, six to eight foot
long and sixteen inches between the runners. Buy it in Juneau;
the others don't track right. Strongest canoes are Victoria
B.C.-made; don't buy any other kind. It has to be strong or the
River rapids'll tear it apart. It'll add 160-200 pounds to be
carried. Easier way is to build a raft of logs--you'll need two
pound of oakum, five pound of pitch. Take a year's supply of
grub: 100 sacks flour; same of sugar; 100 pound of bacon; thirty of
coffee; ten of tea; 100 pound of beans; same of mixed fruits; fifty
pound of oatmeal; fifteen of salt; ten dollars of nick-nacks and
spices; buy some quinine for colds. Cost of this grub runs about
$250 but no man should start with less than $500 for outfit and grub;
twice that amount is ten times as good.
"Don't waste money buying
a rifle or revolver--no game in the Yukon to speak of--and the Mounties
won't let you take in firearms if they know you've got 'em.
"Crime's no real problem; most miners are decent and get along
OK. Mounties give miners a fair shake, but they don't tolerate
trouble. They're judge and
jury--just as soon ship you out as not. There's gambling and
saloons--not much else to do during the long nights or when it's so
cold a witch's heart freezes.
"There's gold flakes and nuggets mixed in the
frozen ground you get at with placer mining--washing the dirt separates
it from the gold. When creeks and River are frozen, you build
fires on the ground to thaw it so you can shovel up mounds of it; come Summer when ice melts, you have water for washing gold.
"People get that funny look in their eyes when they hear
about Klondike gold. Oh, it's true enough--one man left
Dawson with over $60,000 for two months' work; another one dug out
$7,500 worth in three weeks, then sold his claim for $50,000. But
physically it's hard on a miner to get there and hard to work a
claim. There is no such thing as "free and easy."
Everything comes with a cost."
~
June 28, 1901--an obituary in The New
York Times announced that Joseph Ladue, founder of Dawson City, died
June 27th at his home in Schuyler Falls near Plattsburgh, N.Y. He
had spent the past Winter at Colorado Springs hoping to recover from
consumption. His wife and a son survive. "He was a reticent
and retiring man who possessed great perserverance and business
tact. His successes made no change at all in his deportment and
he was as modest during prosperity as he had been during his earlier
years."
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