The record-union., 1898-04-07
WHAT FRANK JACKSON SAYS.
HE ADVISES HIS FRIENDS NOT
TO GO TO KLONDIKE.
The Pay Streaks in the Creeks Are
Only in Places and Not Many
Strike Them.

On Hunter Creek, February 9. 1898.
Dear Brother: At last | have an OPP
portunity to send letter out-the nrst
time since my arrival here. | have
written several which will reach you
some time, / suppose, but in every IN
stance when l have placed letter
with the usual fee of SD / have learn
ed that the party failed to get away.
The Government, too, has promised TO
send mail out on different occasions.
and at last prohibited private indiVid-
uals from taking letters to the outside.
giving cut at the same time that a
monthly mail was to be established
within the next few weeks. Thinking
that my letters would reach you the
sooner, l foolishly left letters at the
office and came up on to the creek
where | have been since October, know
ing all the time that the officials had
made no move, but being powerless to
give a letter to the care of the many
who have tramped out over the ice.
Denham will give you a description of
the Countrywide Ups and downs of
the thousands Of "chechaWkavs" who
stampeded into the country last fall.
Unprepared by any former experience.
he is one of the many who blindly
rushed into a condition or a situation
of which he could never before realize
and his opinions will be painted ac-
cordingly, but he can't go far astray
in enumerating the difficulties one runs
into here. My other letters will reach
you in due time, and in them l have
gone into detail about a prospector's
life in the northwest. In the three
short months Of summer one can only
travel into the back country on foot
and with provisions and the necessary
camping outfit you can imagine how far
one would so and the work that could
be accomplished in the time or could
exist on the load he could carry on his
back Heretofore prospectOrs would
hire the aid Of Indians, but now all is
changed and unless a Vanderbilt in
wealth one is pOwerless to go any dis
lance to hunt new fields, rich though
they may be in gold. True-in the Win
ter one could haul two or three hundred
pounds of provisions on sleigh, but
that would mean that you would be
compelled to live in a tent or at the
expense of much labor build a log
house and prepare to spend a whole
year in prospecting a locality that
might prove worthless, for, unlike the
placer diggings of California, many of
the creeks here are almost entirely
barren.
But of all this Denham can inform
you and i Will speak of my own eX~
perience, mostly. -Four of US left Daw-
son the last of October, to take a lay
on 81 bunker Creek. A one-half inter.
est Of this claim is owned by LOnnie
Eckhardt of Folsom, and through my
friendship with him we secured a lay
on what was thought to be one of the
most promising localities of the dis
trict. In former letter I told of the
many acts of kindness l received from
Lonnie when l first arrived at Dawson,
and to any of his Folsom friends you
may meet make it known that he is
as fairly prosperous as the average old
time Yukoner.
With two sleighs, loaded with 400
pounds of provisions each, we made
perhaps fifteen miles the first day and
We're brought to a standstiH by coming
to an opening in the ice which made it
impossible to proceed further by that
mode Of travel. That night we made
camp and slept on boughs we cut from
trees and threw on top of the snow
and next morning We back tracked to
Dawson. The following day three of
the boys took packs on their backs and
started for the mine. leaving me to fol-
low as soon as one of them could start
back the day but one following, as only
three could crowd into the cabin of
the owner of the claim. This we calcu-
lated would allow two to commence
work on the cabin while two could be
busy carrying up the necessary sup
plies. Having had quite enough ex-
perience, however, in the packing bust
ness over the trail, l decided to take
30 pounds on sleigh and in company
with another person who looked at
matters in the same light, attempted
the trip by breaking a trail through the
woods where the ice was not firm on
the river. 1t took us four days to make
the trip, but l landed more grub there
than l could have packed up in two
weeks. We were without q tent and
had a SnOWStOrm every night
The first night out my companion
hung his German socks in a pine tree
presumably to keep them from damp
ness. The following morning we aWoke
to realize that we We're under the
weight of six inches of snow and my
first glance from under the covers en-
cOuntered my friends socks filled to the
top with wet snow. The following night
they We're again suspended from limb
but with ends reversed.
To work a lay means that provisions
sufficient for the crowd interested must
be portrayed to the spot-a distance Of
from twenty to fifty miles. A log cabin
must be built for the winter and when
erected in the fall. as nearly all We're.
the material is of frozen logs which
thaw out and make glacier of ice from
roof TO floor. so that one lives in an
ice howell in reality all winter Then
dry wood must be collected and hauled
for a distance of q mile or more for
house use and shaft burning This takes
from month to six weeks OF valuable
time. and then sinking" begins With
Us in the first four shafts put down We
encountered water when near bedrock.
RT n N