Contents
Gold Rush Documents
Unless otherwise stated, all documents were downloaded from
www.library.state.ak.us/goldrush
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“Timeline of the Alaskan Gold Rush” ..........................................................
2
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Cost for a miner’s outfit from Miner’s Manual,
United States, Alaska, the Klondike, by Horace Fletcher Clark, 1898 ..................
4
Cover of Brochure: “How to Reach the Gold Fields of Alaska
and the Klondike” produced by the Chamber of Commerce, Portland, Oregon ...........
5
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“Chilkat (Klukwan-Haines) Territory” .........................................................
reprinted from Haa Aani, Our Land by Walter R. Goldschmidt and Theodore H. Haas,
University of Washington Press 1998, Chart 5.
6
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Map of White and Chilkoot Pass Trails .......................................................
reprinted from the web site www.lib.washington.edu/specialcoll/klondike/case5ex.html
7
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“Chilkoot Pass Ownership” ........................................................................
excerpt from letter by Gov. A.P. Swineford to the President, Oct. 1, 1886
8
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Mining Claim Request ................................................................................
9
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Photographs ...........................................................................................
• Dyea Valley, Alaska, c. 1897
• Warning! Poster, March 8, 1898
• Photo of a gold pan
10
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Form for Location Certificate – Placer Claim, 1898 ...................................
11
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“With the Gold I’ll Bring from the Klondike” Song Sheet Cover, 1898
■
Bill requesting justices of the peace and constables in Alaska
Nov. 24, 1896
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Letters from Governor Sheakley about Indian ownership of land ..............
Feb. 23, 1897, and May 17, 1897
15
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Photographs ...........................................................................................
• Athabascan clothing
• Photo of beaded sled bag from Fort Yukon
• Badge (lead cast, silver-colored metal) for Indian Police, 1900
17
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Will of George Thomas of Dome, Alaska, March 18, 1908
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Census pages from 1920
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ALASK A STUDI ES
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UNIT 4, Gold Rush Documents
1.
Timeline of the Alaskan Gold Rush
Reprinted with permission from
Gold Rush Centennial Task Force, State of Alaska
1849
Russian mining engineer discovers gold and coal on Kenai Peninsula.
1861
Buck Choquette discovers gold at Telegraph Creek near Wrangell.
1870
Gold found at Sumdum Bay, SE Alaska.
1871
Gold discovered at Indian River near Sitka.
1873
Jack McQuestern, Arthur Harper and Alfred Mayo begin prospecting
along the Yukon River.
1880
Indians agree to allow prospectors to use Chilkoot Pass.
Joe Juneau and Richard Harris make major gold strike on Gold Creek
near Juneau.
1884
Congress passes the Organic Act of 1884, providing a civil government
for Alaska.
1886
Howard Franklin strikes gold on Fortymile River in Interior Alaska.
1888
Alexander King discovers gold on Kenai Peninsula.
1893
Gold discovered near Hope, Rampart and Circle.
1896
George Washington Carmack, Tagish Charlie and Skookum Jim make a
discovery on Bonanza Creek, setting off the great Klondike Gold Rush.
1897
S.S. Excelsior and S.S. Portland arrive at San Francisco and Seattle
loaded with Klondike gold. The stampede begins.
U.S. Army establishes Fort St. Michael, first of six Gold Rush posts.
1898
Sixty-five people die in Chilkoot Pass avalanche.
U.S. soldiers arrive in Skagway to maintain order.
Construction begins on White Pass & Yukon Railway, completed July 29, 1900.
Notorious Soapy Smith shot and killed in Skagway.
The “Three Lucky Swedes,” with the help of local Inupiat, discover gold on Seward
Peninsula.
1899
Mining begins on the beaches of Nome.
Construction begins on Valdez-Eagle Military Trail, later to become the
Trans-Alaska Military Road.
2.
ALASKA STUDIES
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UNIT 4, Gold Rush Documents
1900
Congress authorizes construction of telegraph lines and submarine cables to
connect Alaska’s military posts with each other and with the rest of the U.S.
Alexander McKenzie and Judge Arthur H. Noyes arrive in Nome and start a
fraudulent scheme to seize rich mining claims.
Son of the Wolf, Jack London’s first book on the Klondike, is published.
1902
Felix Pedro discovers gold on Pedro Creek. Leads to the founding of
Fairbanks.
1903
Boundary Tribunal settles boundary dispute between Alaska and British
Columbia.
1906
Robert Service writes his first two poems, “The Shooting of Dan McGrew” and
“The Cremation of Sam McGee.”
Nome Kennel Club organizes to promote sled dog racing.
Gold discovered in Chandalar District.
1908
Alaska Road Commission surveys route from Seward to Nome, later called the
Iditarod Trail.
1909
Iditarod discovery made.
1910
The “Sourdoughs,” four Kantishna miners, make first ascent of Mt. McKinley’s
North Peak.
Stampede to Ruby.
1911
Kennicott copper mines begin production.
1912
Congress passes Organic Act of 1912, giving Alaska Territorial Status and a
Legislature.
1913
Gold found at Marshall.
Sidney Laurence completes his first monumental painting of Mt. McKinley.
1914
Gold discovered at Livengood, near Fairbanks.
A L A S K A S T U D I E S • UNIT 4, A Gold Rush Documents
3.
Miner’s Manual, 1898
Cost for a miner’s outfit
4.
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UNIT 4, Gold Rush Documents
Brochure, Chamber of Commerce, Portland, Oregon
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UNIT 4, Gold Rush Documents
5.
Chilkat (Klukwan-Haines) Territory
Showing Aboriginal Use and Ownership, and Present (1946) Uses
6.
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UNIT 4, Gold Rush Documents
Map of White and Chilkoot Pass Trails
En Route to the Klondike, 1898.
ALASK A STUDI ES
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UNIT 4, Gold Rush Documents
7.
Chilkoot Pass Ownership
From a letter from Governor A.P. Swineford to the President,
October 1, 1886
Background:
An archbishop and members of his party journeying to the Yukon Territory in 1886 were
stopped by a chief of the Chilkat Tlingits and told to pay a fee for passing through their area.
When the archbishop protested, the chief reportedly assaulted him. Upon hearing of the complaint, Governor A.P. Swineford (along with 12 men) traveled to Chilkoot village and arrested
the chief, who
“boldly asserted the right to exact payment for the privilege of
passing through the country he claimed as belonging to him and his
people.”
Swineford then talked with the Chilkats, warning them that they
“must abandon their pretentions of right to collect toll from
white men passing through the country inhabited by but not
belonging to them in a political sense. . .”
from Robert D. Arnold’s Alaska Native Land Claims 1976, p. 67.
8.
ALASKA STUDIES
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UNIT 4, Gold Rush Documents
Mining Claim Request
Karta Bay, Alaska, July 17, 1902
Governor Brady
Sitka, Alaska
Dear Sir:
I am a native born of Fort Wrangell and would like to know if
there is any chance of getting papers for holding mineral lands in
Alaska. I was educated in the East, in Philadelphia, and at Carlisle
Indian School. I was almost brought up as a white person, and I have
lived up to it ever since I left school.
If you want to find out about my reputation you can find it out
from my brother-in-law, John Kelly, who has lived in Killisnoo and
Sitka for a good many years. Also, you can inquire of any merchant in
Wrangell.
I like to prospect, but as a native have no right to hold a claim,
and I never know what to do with the prospects that I have found, and
there are only a few white men that can be trusted, to my knowledge, in
a case of this kind.
I am 26 years of age, and I think I could do well if I could succeed in getting my citizen papers or rights for holding mineral lands in
Alaska. I want you to advise me what to do to get it, or if you can do
anything for me let me know it soon and oblige.
My address will be Loring, Alaska.
Yours very truly,
Thomas Jackson
Reprinted from Robert D. Arnold’s Alaska Native Land Claims 1976, p. 73.
ALASK A STUDI ES
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UNIT 4, Gold Rush Documents
9.
Dyea Valley, Alaska c. 1897
This warning card was issued
and distributed by the
“Vigilance
Committee”
appointed by
the citizens of
Skaguay to rid
the community
of the Soapy
Smith Gang in
the spring of
1898.
10.
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UNIT 4, Gold Rush Documents
Gold Pan from the Alaska
State Museum
Location Certificate—Placer Claim 1898
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11.
Song Sheet Cover, 1898
12.
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Bill requesting justices of the peace and constables in Alaska,
Nov. 24, 1896
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13.
14.
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Letters from Governor Sheakley, 1897
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15.
16.
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UNIT 4, Gold Rush Documents
Photo of Athabascan summer clothing, tunic and
leggings. Finely tanned light-colored caribou skin
with geometric patterns made from porcupine
quills, dentalium shells and seeds.
Indian Police Badge, ca 1900.
Beaded sled bag from Fort Yukon.
Native tanned bag with floral beadwork
on the front panel. “Sled Bag” beaded
in the upper right corner, ca 1920.
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UNIT 4, Gold Rush Documents
17.
The Will of George Thomas of Dome, Allaska, March 18, 1908
18.
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Addendum to the Will, December 1, 1908
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19.
Census, 1920
20.
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