There's GOLD up there! Hear the call.
Another verse in West Frontier's hymn.
Stampeders by the tens and thousands
Hopeful seekers, women and men.
Unfazed by the Arctic North
Though ignorance doesn't end in bliss
As historical record shows
This is ADVENTURE I'd choose to miss.
Up the White Pass from Skagway
The hopeful scrabbled each hard yard
Twenty brutal miles one way
Ant that's NOT shifting TON, there, Pard'.
Now the pass draws different awe
We ride the train up, luggage light
No longer grueling Nature's maw
White Pass is an excursioner's delight.
A most "bizarre and unforgettable moment in history," writes Pierre Berton in his “Klondike: The Last Great Gold Rush, 1896-99.” "It was impossible to emerge from it unchanged, and those who survived it were never quite the same again. It brutalized some and ennobled others, but the majority neither sank to the depths nor rose to the heights; instead, their characters were tempered in the hot flame of an experience which was as much emotional as it was physical." (
visit link) "
The man who had a family to support who could not go was looked on with a sort of pity..." journalled J.E. Fraser, a "Klondiker" from San Francisco. The man "who didn't care to leave his business or for other trivial reasons, was looked on with contempt as a man without ambition who did not know enough to take advantage of a good thing when placed in his reach."
"It is all rocks and mud -- mud and rocks," wrote Tappan Adney one of a small army of newspaper and magazine correspondents sent to the Yukon in 1897 to "furnish news and pictures of the new gold fields."
For the detail prospector, White Pass' fame is thumbnailed nicely in this article from the White Pass & Yukon Route Railroad (
visit link)
Basically, in August 1896, gold was found by prospectors near Dawson in the Klondike area in Yukon Territory, Canada. Because of the remoteness of the Klondike, the news spread slowly but as soon as it reached the large cities of the US West Coast in July 1897, the floodgates opened, and folks seeking fortune or adventure (or an escape from the Depression that gripped the lower States) turned gold prospector overnight and rushed North to the reportedly infinite Klondike gold fields.
Of the roughly 100,000 people who started for the gold fields, less than 50,000 actually reached the Klondike. Getting there, you see, was far from trivial. From the east, they could route through Canada, or go around Alaska by ship and then up the Yukon River to the booming city of Dawson. Both ways were long and slow. A more direct route, but equally difficult, was to take the Inside Passage from Vancouver to Skagway or Dyea, then to hike one of the two Indian trails through the Coastal Range and enter Canada at White Pass or Chilkoot Pass to reach Lake Bennett in British Columbia. From there, it was possible to get to the Klondike by sailing down the Yukon River, but only when the river was free of ice during the summer months.
White Pass was surveyed by William Moore, a member of the William Ogilvie expedition, a Canadian survey party, and Skookum Jim, a Tlingit from the Carcross-Tagish area. It was seen as a viable alternative to the wickedly rough Chilkoot Trail. A lower pass, perhaps, but still steep enough to kill most packhorses who attempted it (true, they were fairly decrepit nags to begin with). In fact, the trail was known as "Dead Horse Trail" -- and the stench from "Dead Horse Gulch" (WP&YR mile 17.5) was said to be 'incredible.'
To cross into Canada, Stampeders had to bring “One Ton of Goods.” A man can carry, what, say 50 lbs average, given packs of the time and general fitness of the individual. This is likely generous, actually, Though I’ve hefted some goodly packs myself. Ok. So load up 50 lbs. Carry it five miles. Cache it. Go back. Count: 10 miles. Repeat. Repeat 2,000/50 or 400 times. That’s 4000 miles to just cover 5 miles. Fraser is at milepost 27.7. Lake Bennett, where they would queue up for the spring thaw, was at milepost 40.5. Do the math. Yeah.
Enter the White Pass & Yukon Route (WP&YR) railway -- considered an impossible task but literally blasted through coastal mountains in only 26 months. This $10 million project was the product of British financing, American engineering and Canadian contracting. Tens of thousands of men and 450 tons of explosives overcame the unimaginable challenge of climate and geography to create "the railway built of gold." Indeed, the railroad, begun in 1898 (and completed in 1900) more than paid for itself before it was finished by starting service for each mile of completion. Revisit the math -- each 5 miles that, say, a railroad could carry a ton of goods took Four HUNDRED miles off the trek. You darn betcha it was profitable.
The White Pass leg of the WP&YR climbs almost 3000 feet in just 20 miles and features steep grades of up to 3.9%, cliff-hanging turns of 16 degrees, two tunnels and numerous bridges and trestles. The steel cantilever bridge (now bypassed via a tunnel) was the tallest of its kind in the world when it was constructed in 1901.
For more of THAT history see (
visit link)
The AlCan was no less a challenge -- the Klondike Highway coming down the opposite side of the pass from the railroad. Stretches are suspended from the mountain. Remarkable.
Notes and observations from our own visit -- riding the WP&YR UP and the Klondike Highway back DOWN:
No gold was discovered the Skagway side of the summit.
Dead Horse Gulch was called that because of all the pack animals who died at that juncture. For starters, there were those in the line of Soapy Smith who would buy knacker nags in Seattle and then sell ‘em for a premium. [Well, there was that pesky RCMP requirement of a ton of goods – something about not caring to have a mass of starving flatlanders – er, Stampeders – around your Port of Entry. And a pack animal carries more than a man – that is, if it could get more ‘n five miles out of town.] Anyway, the stench from all the dead horses was, history said, stupendously rank.
We were climbing well by this point, into a rainy mist. Very atmospheric. Questionable photography from a dark and rocking platform.
The footers of the cantilevered bridge appeared in and out of the mist – Morrie (our Train Docent) called it a “Ghost Bridge” today. Use was discontinued after the digging of the 750 foot long tunnel we immediately plunged into and a more modern railroad bridge.
The steep, legendarily steep, hills around us were covered with Hemlock and Spruce -- which turns out to provide (via the needles) an essential source of vitamin C for the Stampeders, made palatable by brewing them into BEER. The bright pink of fireweed was almost neon in the soggy weather. Lots of wild celery and devil’s club, and, well … it’s GREEN. Today pretty saturated green – in more ways than one.
...Though they converge at Fraser, the AlCan Highway tends to be on the opposite side of whatever valley from the railroad. ...The AlCan’s traverse of White Pass is as impressive as the railroad’s – though it was still rainy and misty and dark – beautiful, but not at all photogenic, especially from the steamy bus windows. [We were handed paper towels on the train, rather than using the ‘Conductor Defroster,’ our sleeves. On the bus, our driver ran the a/c until people got too cold.]
Anyway, the AlCan is every bit as precariously perched along the mountainside, with answers to geological problems as clever as the cantilevered stretch into Glenwood Springs in Colorado. For example, at one juncture we zipped along a suspension bridge out from the cliff – it secures the road next to an active fault line. I sketched the cable couplings, but will spare you....
And so, in the course of minutes, we comfortably zipped across the miles that killed many Stampeders. Probably turned a few away, too.
For the still curious, an awesome timeline can be found at (
visit link)
and I would point you to Skagway and White Pass & Yukon Route Railway sites (via Google) as well. The latter, at www.wpyr.com is particularly packed with fascinating history.
Yes, via train, bus/car, or on foot – the White Pass is still a marvel. Hope you enjoy it.
NOTE: waymark was taken at the summit – but visitors to any point up/down the Pass are welcome to post a visit – provided your logs and photos rock! =wink!=