Klondike Karen Ward and Connie Naegle TSA CUSD

Klondike Karen Ward and Connie Naegle TSA, CUSD 2001

Alaska’s Gold Website http: //www. library. st ate. ak. us/goldrush/

1. Identify the Yukon Territory 2. In what country is the Yukon located? 3. According to this map what city was the final destination?

What is the Klondike? • Background information on the Klondike – http: //school. discovery. co m/homeworkhelp/worldboo k/atozgeography/k/302420. html • Information on the Inuit Indian people http: //yukonalaska. com/klond ike/beforegold. html

Getting to the “Fields” http: //www. library. state. ak. us/goldrush/ARCHIV ES/PHOTOS/384_81. htm

Preparation to go to the “Fields of Gold”

Chilkoot Pass • A 35 -degree slope of snow and ice -- four miles long, requiring fifty trips ( six hours each ) to bring a year's worth of supplies per individual, as required by Canadian authorities, to the top. At the height of the rush, 22, 000 seekers endured the ordeal. Primary Resources--Personal experience Crossing http: //www. washington. edu/uwired/outreach/cspn/curklon/klondoc 088. html

Chilkoot Pass Photos of a human chain of stampeders trudging up the Chilkoot Pass have come to symbolize the Klondike Gold Rush. In 1897 -'98, the North West Mounted Police set up a border crossing into Canada at the summit of the Chilkoot. They ordered every stampeder to carry a year's worth of supplies. After all, there was no turning back once they were into the Klondike, and commerce was limited, to say the least. Resource http: //www. goldrush. org/ghost-04 g. htm

Chilkoot Trail 1898 Supplies: As a result, many stampeders struggling up the mountain rampart were bent double under the weight of their packs, which typically contained the following: • Mc. Dougall and Secord Klondike Outfit List (clothing & food): 2 suits heavy knit underwear 6 pairs wool socks 1 pairs heavy moccasins 2 pairs german stockings 2 heavy flannel overshirts 1 heavy woollen sweater 1 pair overalls 2 pairs 12 -lb. blankets 1 waterproof blanket 1 dozen bandana handkerchiefs 1 stiff brim cowboy hat 1 pair hip rubber boots 1 pair prospectors' high land boots 1 mackinaw, coat, pants, shirt 1 pair heavy buck mitts, lined 1 pair unlined leather gloves 1 duck coat, pants, vest 6 towels 1 pocket matchbox, buttons, needles and thread comb, mirror, toothbrush etc. mosquito netting/1 dunnage bag 1 sleeping bag/medicine chest pack saddles, complete horses flat sleighs 100 lbs. navy beans 150 lbs. bacon 400 lbs. Flour and 40 lbs. rolled oats 20 lbs. corn meal and 10 lbs. rice 25 lbs. Sugar and 10 lbs. tea 20 lbs. coffee 10 lbs. baking powder 20 lbs. salt 1 lb. pepper 2 lbs. baking soda 1/2 lb. mustard 1/4 lb. vinegar 2 doz. condensed milk 20 lbs. evaporated potatoes 5 lbs. evaporated onions 6 tins/4 oz. extract beef 75 lbs. evaporated fruits 4 pkgs. yeast cakes 20 lbs. candles 1 pkg. tin matches 6 cakes borax 6 lbs. laundry soap 1/2 lb. ground ginger 25 lbs. hard tack 1 lb. citric acid 2 bottles Jamaican ginger

Chilkoot Trail 1995 Supplies To fit in one backpack: tent sleeping bag sleeping pad warm layered clothing broken-in hiking boots rain/snow gear quick-cooking nutritious food energy bars/chocolate coffee/tea & powdered milk camp stove pots & pans cutlery binoculars camera & film journal or novel trail book personal toiletries first aid kit bug repellent

Requires Supplies 35° Angle http: //www. si. edu/postal/gold/trail 18. html Weight Clothing. . . . 112 lbs. Groceries. . . . 1249 lbs. Footwear. . . . 35 lbs. Hardware. . . . 225 lbs. Cost $75. 00 $75 -$90. 00 $25. 00 $40. 00

Getting across the Chilkoot Trail Ice creepers, iron with commercially tanned leather straps. Found on the Chilkoot Trail Ca. 1898 Alaska Gold http: //www. library. state. ak. us

Trails and Passage

Skagway

Arrival at the “field of gold”

Reaching bedrock at last, Klondikers would hunt for the elusive streak of gold, then dump the rock in heaps beside the mine entrance where it would instantly freeze - until the three short summer months, the only time warm enough for the miners to sluice the heaps.

“Of the one hundred thousand people who set out for the Klondike, thirty to forty thousand got there, and only fifteen to twenty thousand prospected. Possibly 4, 000 found some gold. ” Source--http: //www. calliope. org/gold 4. html

Dreams of Gold—Skagway 1898

Who went to Skagway?

Nome, Alaska

Growth and Overpopulation Year: City 1880 1890 1900 1910 1920 Boise 1, 899 2, 311 5, 957 17, 358 21, 393 Portland 17, 577 46, 385 90, 426 207, 214 258, 288 Seattle 3, 553 42, 837 80, 871 237, 174 315, 312 Spokane 350 19, 922 36, 848 104, 402 104, 437 Tacoma 1, 098 36, 006 37, 714 83, 743 96, 965

Growth of cities • Dawson was a gold rush city, a familiar pattern of accelerated growth. During a few weeks in 1898, the population grew to the size of Seattle - 28, 000 people. The choicest corner lots on Front Street sold for $40, 000, and two sawmills worked 24 hours a day turning out building materials.

Everyday life during the “rush” Some Klondikers took jobs in the mills or worked as watchmen. Others did as their Comstock forebears had done and signed on as pick-andshovel laborers in the mines. But very quickly the rush ended - the large mining companies moved in with big dredges - and took out the Klondike's holdings - about $300 million.

Cabin luxury – home sweet home!

Danger was an everyday part of life.

Only about half of those who fought their way over the passes to the Klondike actually looked for gold. Those who did have a claim mined the earth in the most grueling method imaginable. The gold lay in bedrock under ten to fifty feet of permafrost, so they mined Russian fashion spending the winter months softening the permafrost with fires, digging through it at a maximum of one foot a day.

Jack London in Alaska The monumental efforts of the Klondike hopefuls inspired Jack London, Robert Service and lesser talents to spin romantic narratives of the mining life. But history, just as in California, tells a grimmer story. http: //www. calliope. org/gold 4. html

Martha Louise Black • Abandoned by her first husband en route to the Klondike in 1898, she hiked over the Chilkoot Pass, sailed pregnant down the Yukon River in a homemade boat to Dawson, bore her child in a log cabin, raised money, bought a sawmill, bossed 16 men on a mining claim, married George Black who became Yukon's Member of Parliament and upon his illness ran for, and won, his seat. Martha Black became Yukon's first, and Canada's second, woman Member of Parliament.

The Bishop Who Ate His Boots • This story was the inspiration for the famous scene in Charlie Chaplin's movie "The Gold Rush. " Lost in an ice fog at 40 below with no more provisions, Bishop Stringer hit on the idea of boiling his and his companion's sealskin and walrus sole boots for seven hours, then drinking the broth. According to the Bishop, it was "tough and stringy, but palatable and fairly satisfying. " The Bishop lost 50 pounds, but eventually found his way to a Native village near where Eagle Plains on the Dempster Highway is today and he was nursed back to health.

Diamond Tooth Gertie • Now the name of the gambling hall in Dawson City, Diamond Tooth Gertie (Gertie Lovejoy) was a bona fide Yukon dance hall queen. Her nickname came from the sparkling diamond she had wedged between her two front teeth. She made a fortune unloading the miners of their gold nuggets.

Belinda Mulroney On arriving in the Klondike, she threw her last 50 cents into the Yukon River, swearing she would never need such small change again. She began her quest for riches by selling rubber boots, cotton goods and hot water bottles at a 600% profit. She built a roadhouse at Bonanza Creek, owned six mining properties by the end of the year, and eventually built the Fairview Hotel, one of the swankiest establishments in Dawson City.

Science Connections • Real time-Weather In the Yukon http: //www. weatheroffice. com/scripts/citygen. pl? cclient=ECCDN&ci ty=YDA • Auroras Northern Lights http: //climate. gi. alaska. edu/Curtis/curtis. html • Science Snapshots http: //explorezone. com/snapshots/1999/09_09_aurora. htm • The Aurora: Information and Images http: //dac 3. gi. alaska. edu/~pfrr/AURORA/INDEX. HTM

Midnight in Alaska

Textual Reading Sites Auroras Northern Lights http: //climate. gi. alaska. edu/Curtis/curtis. html Science Snapshots http: //explorezone. com/snapshots/1999/ 09_09_aurora. htm The Aurora: Information and Images http: //dac 3. gi. alaska. edu/~pfrr/AUROR A/INDEX. HTM Image © Jan Curtis "And the skies of night were alive with light, with a throbbing, thrilling flame; Amber and rose and violet, opal and gold it came. " - Robert W. Service Welcome to The Aurora Page http: //www. geo. mtu. edu/weather /aurora/

Teacher Sites • Alaska’s Gold-outstanding site! – http: //www. library. state. ak. us/goldrush/ • California Gold Rush – http: //www. notfrisco. com/calmem/goldrush/ • The Klondike Gold Rush: – http: //www. washington. edu/uwired/outreach/cs pn/curklon/main. html#introduction