Condon globe. (Condon, Gilliam Co., Or.) 189?-1919, 1898-12-22

Iieve shall ever forget Christmas. 1t
was Dawson City's first. Dawson was
three months and half old, and had set
tied down to be a permanent town. All
the miners who had made good locations
had by this time housed themselves in
pine board shanties. A few had built
shanty frames about tents to secure
greater warmth within. All of us who
made any strikes OF gold at all had done
SO by October, so we were well along with
our gold digging; but we could do less in
December than in any month in the year.
From the latter part of November to early
in January there is only four hours of
practical daylight in any day. Many
days, when the wind blew hardest-in
fact, it blows gale there all the winter
! long, and snow and pellets of ice were
blown along-candles were kept lighted
all day long. In winter, candles and
lamps were always lighted between and
2 in the afternoon. The mercury ranged
from 26 degrees below zero to 50 degrees
below. So we could not make satisfactory
headway even in the richest of the dig
gings. All through December about half
the miners used to spend days in loahng
about McCarthy's saloon at Dawson. The
other half puttered about their cabins,
dug a little now and then, mended their
fur suits and made shoes from walrus
hide.
"At McCarthy's sometimes $50 or more
men would gather around the roaring FIRE
and a strange scene 1t was. Imagine an
assemblage Of men in rough, barn-like
structure, furnished with board benches,
and Illuminated by dozen Pickering can
dies. Some men are dressed in baggy gar
ments Of fur, others in several coarse,
1 heavy oyercoats over heavy wooden
clothes. All have caps Of half f-cured, shag-
gy, rancid-smelling fur, so that only the
face appears. Every man has a prodig-
ious growth Of whiskers, sometimes q <oot
long. and hair that reaches below the rim
OF the caps and lies across the shoulders.
/ There were but dozen calendars in
| all that region and very few men had any
idea Of dates. Some did not even know
!, what month il was. One day, as we sat
at McCarthy's, some one suggested that
Christmas was approaching and we
( thought Of observing the occasion. A
/ week before Christmas We all agreed upon
celebration, and, crude though 1t was,
| we had day that none Of US viii ever
forget. II was more remarkable from the
| fact that there were in and about the lit
| tie hamlet OF Dawson City over LOO
men. No one earned less than SIG day,
and the larger part had each risen from
poverty to possessions worth several thou
sand dollars in a period Of three months.
/ suppose the combined wealth in actual
gold in the district then was nearly ST.
/ 600, 600, and clear prospect Of increasing
4 II to twice or thrice that sum in another
\ Eve months. | don't believe that com
munity richer per capita has existed in
this world than that was at Dawson City.
| Yet we had mockery Of civilization and
hardly any Of the comforts Of life Of lot
Of paupers.
"Eyery one was informed on Dec. "a
Of the fact that next day would be Christ
mas. Some 300 of us went down to Nc
! Carthy's to celebrate the holiday. Dark
ness set In at that period at about 1:30 p.
! M, but we had become accustomed to the
4 2O-hour nights. When It got along 10
about II 80 D. m. we got our watches out
\ and waited. At exactly II the signal was
| given. The whistle at Joe Ladue's saw
4 mill screeched for a half hour, and over
4 300 shotguns, rifles and pistols were dis
charged, in yolleys, singly, in quartets and
in trios, for hours. Every one shook hands.
Some danced about the room, and big,
burly miners hugged one another, while
Merry Christmas was shouted again and
again. 1t was the first time in the whole
experience OF the Klondike that we felt
in sympathy with the outside world.
ION Christmas morning we brushed up
bit, and putting on our best rubber boots
went and called on our best friends in the
mining cabins and settlements, and re-
ceived our friends from the mining cabins
scattered up and down the frozen creeks
i '.At 2 b, M, when the darkness was set.
i tlinR down in the valleys, several hundred
miners met by agreement at Mccarthy's
4 II was the only building In Dawson that
could comfortably bold large assemblags
Of people Mac had prepared program
inf events for the day and we had each
enipped iu an ounce Of dust toward de
fraying the expenses. The sawdust had
been removed frem the floor and score
4 81 candlcs and lamps were arranged aboui
4 the room. Mccarthy himself wore a boil
/ ed shirt In honor Of the occasion. On /
broad board table along one wall Of tha
room Iuncbeon had been arranged fol