![]() And history should not forget another way that prospectors were exploited. Those were the first “golden retrievers” in Alaska, the guide joked. It would be all but impossible to bicycle along either route, much less to carry heavy supplies on the bike, our tour guide pointed out.īut that was not the only scam-not by far. Another one involved selling to the prospectors “gold-sniffing gophers” which allegedly had been trained to run to the gold fields and bring back the nuggets. The bikes had large side baskets, supposedly capable of carrying all the supplies. Scam artists in Skagway capitalized on this. One scheme involved selling “special” bicycles to naïve travelers. To get that many supplies across the Canadian border – after a long trek along either the White Pass Trail or the steeper but shorter Chilcoot Trail –prospectors in the days before the railroad had to carry their loads in stages. It required them to carry approximately two tons of supplies to sustain themselves. Some decided they could fleece the prospectors before they ever left Skagway.ĭuring the time of the 1898 Gold Rush, the Canadian government decided that it had to protect gold-happy prospectors from freezing or starving to death in the Yukon. Not all the people who came to Skagway (a name derived from the Tlingit language for “the place where the North Wind blows”) were intent on traveling closer to the North Wind’s source to find gold. Serving as the port for the would-be gold discoverers, Skagway was incorporated in 1900 as Alaska’s first city, soon to be followed by Juneau. Humor rides along with you on the tracks that first started taking gold prospectors to the Yukon Territory back in 1900 – after a two year, two month and two day construction project that at its zenith employed 35,000 men during the late 1890s. ![]() Well, I will tell you one thing: I have never seen a train stop to take a picture of a bus.” Noting a bus stopped on an apron of the highway across a wide mountain gulch, our guide on the train commented, with pretend contempt, “You might be wondering if you chose the right tour from Skagway today. The onboard magazine, All Aboard, explains that the White Pass and Yukon Route Railroad was so honored because of the “many difficult and hazardous obstacles that construction overcame: design challenges, granite mountains, steep grades, cliff hanging turns and unimaginable weather conditions.”īut don’t get the idea that Alaskans or Canadians bedeck themselves in blue ribbons, or put their noses in the air and sniff when discussing less demanding engineering projects-unless, perhaps, if you’re talking about the Klondike Highway, which at certain points runs a nearly parallel course as the railroad in Alaska. The railroad was designated as an International Historic Civil Engineering Landmark in 1994. SKAGWAY, Alaska –The narrow-gauge railroad that climbs from this town 20.4 miles to the Canadian border at White Pass, and then some 90 miles farther north up to the Yukon territorial capital of Whitehorse, is given the same sort of respect by civil engineers that they accord to such marvels as the Eiffel Tower, the Statue of Liberty and the Panama Canal. Trainman couples locomotive to push WP&YR railroad cars
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |