The Dupuyer acantha. [volume] (Dupuyer, Mont.) 1894-1904, 1898-06-23
LIFE IN DAWSON CITY.
THE REAL Ell DORADO IN FAR
NORTH.
A Struggling Collection of Log Huts
and Tents - Old-Timers Have Got
Used to Seventy Degrees Below
Zero in Tents. a

Used to Seventy Degrees Below
Zero in Tents. q /
The River Trip to the Klondike" is
the title of an article in the Century, |
written by John Sidney Webb. The
author says:
On the morning of Aug. II, at about
4 o'clock, broad daylight, we came up
to that collection of forty large log
cabins and five hundred tents, sprawled
at the foot of Moose-skin Mountain,
named Dawson City. H~elter-skelter'
in a marsh, lies this collection Of Odds
and ends Of houses and habitations,
the warehouses of the two companies
cheek by jowl with cabins and tents;
a row of bar-rooms called Front street;
the side streets deep in mud; the river
bank a mass of miners boats, Indian
canoes, and logs; the screeching of the
sawmill; the dismal, tuneless scraping
of the violin of the dance-halls, still
wide open; the dogs everywhere, fight
ing and suarling; the men either
"whooping it up" or working with tie
greatest rapidity to unload the precious
freight we had brought-all Of this
rustling and hustling made the scene
more like the outside of a circus-tent,
including the smell of the sawdust,
than anything else in the world. This,
then, is the real Ell Dorado! One Won
ders where they all live. One wonders
in amazement where they are all going
to live through the awful winter that is
approaching. Here is the true pinch G
the situation. 1t is not a question OF
food; it is a question of shelter. There
are no logs fit to make a cabin to be
found on the river within thirty miles
of Dawson City. To wait for winter
means that it will be too late to build
a cabin, because the moss which is
used to fill the chinks between the logs
by that time will be frozen solid, and
be useless unless thawed out over a
fire, a very wearisome job. The old
timers have got used to 70 degrees be-
low zero in tents; and even If the robe
we them freezes solid, a match is
smuggled from under the b~edclothes,
a fire somehow lighted in the sheetiron
stove, and there they lie until the stove
is red-hot before they dare emerge
from under the skin rugs. But how
are the newcomers to survive the cruel
exposure-the lawyers, clerks, doctors
and mechanics? Dawson City seems
like a joke. Eighteen hundred and ff-
ty miles from St. Michael Island-this
is where they have gold, millions of
gold, and nothing better than a mud
dy swamp to live in; gold-dust and
nuggets in %profusion, and yet the ne
groes in the cabins of a Southern plan
tation live better than the richest man
in the country. Our arrival at Dawson
was at a very critical time. We had
brought with us nearly four hundred
tons of provisions, and this fact served
to allay the anxious fears of many who
were becoming panic-stricken at the
idea that there would be a scarcity of
food during the winter. No news had
come to us by way of the ocean of later
date than June 10, but newspapers had
been received over the summit at Daw-
son of date as late as July 26; and SO
the report that crowds were swarming
into the gold-fields had reached them
but was news to u.s.. The town was
thoroughly scared, and was overruu
with men who had come down from the
diggings, often twenty and twenty-five
miles, to make sure of their outfits fol
the winter; and so determined were
they to procure them that they sal
themselves down calmly in line, like
men waiting to buy seats at a first
night performance, determined to wal
until the goods were put up and Sc
aside in their m An outfit fol
a miner means everything that he USE
during the winter, and this, being re
duced to it's lowest terms, means, ba
con and beans. There are other things
of course, in tins and in gunny-sacks-
flour, sugar, salt, pickles, dried fruits
desiccated potatoes--to suit the taste
but the work is done, and the gold i
found and cleaned up, and miles AM
miles of the wilderness conquered, an,
cold weather and wintry winds with
II stood, on bacon and beans. 1t is tn
= easiest food to pack, the quickest t
l prepare, and the most lasting and sus
tanning. The miner usually reckons o.
getting his outfit in November, becaus
he can carry ON a sledge, after tn
= snow has set in, four times as much a
= he can pack on his back, and if he
fortunate enough to have dogs he ca
draw much more.