The National tribune., 1902-01-02
METROPOLIS OF THE YUKON.
Wonderful Advancement OF Dawson City
During Past -Four Years.

Wonderful Advancement OF Dawson City
During Past Four Years.
| When Foghorp George, the sQuaw man,
with his Siwash brother-in-law, washed
the first Klondike gold in the Summer of
1886 he little realized the avalanche Of
civilization that his discovery would pre-
cipitatc in the frozen North.
! Rudolph Kerstine, who went to Daw-
son last Summer BY steamer and palace
car, laughed when asked if he noticed any
dead men on the trsil
There isn't eveR = horse skeleton to
| be seen in White Pass" he said, and this
| where in '91 5000 horses persisted in three
months,
In '97 / was seven months without
hearing from my family. Now the Daw-
son newspapers complain that their mail
service is not on ~ par with that Of the
larger towns i'll the States and Canada,
and the rural free delivery system has its
counterpart on the Yukon.
Even Meme has never been so com
pletely isolated asz'DaMson WAS in ~,
nor is il likely that & city Of 5000 souls
will ever again bc.cut off for an entire
Winter from news. of the outside world,
or pay hundreds of daiiars to hcar the tic-
count OF Bcwcy's victory read from Il pa
per printed a month before.
Civilization in 5,00S years hardly made
greater progress than Dawson accom-
pliShed in rhc fogr years from 1898 to the
present time.
Even the dance houses aud gambling
establishments have felt the effects of the
new order and their old-iimr supremacy
is only memory. IN" cold ald Winter
darkness. arc still IL evidence. but coal and
its products. steam and electricity, have
been called in 10 celAbar them, and mod
cIn methods have robbed hose two spec
tcrs of !hcir tcrrnrs
The gold dust currency is fast giving
place 10 legal tender. and JUST now its
exit is accelerated by the discovery of
wholesale aduit2.T'tion WITH imitation mug
gets manufactured in San Francisco.
Cents are 50 rare. however, that Indians
still accept the bright ones Tor iiyc-dollar
gold pieces. Change Of less than - cents
or two bits valuation is not common.
Not counting the quota from outlying
mining camps, there are more than 100
school children in. Dawson from kinder
garter 10 ID" highcst grades.
''Ih" Canadian Government has Just
completed Il handsome ncw sc!toolhouse
for their recommendations Beside the
school, a new Court House has recently
been completed, az well as an Admins
tlaliou building and q residence for the
Governor. all Of which are crcditable
% the Yukon.
"Dawso, h, iad the distinction of be-
ing the largest 10" CRY in the world, hut
the log cabin i4 giving way 70 the ordi-
nary frame dwelling, which is cheaper and
more III keeping with the modern town.
MANY fire, large, two and three-stOry
frame business houses have been erected,
and corrugated iron warehouses have been
put M this season with capacify for per
haps lJ.GGo or 10000 tons storage. in ad-
ditlon to what there was in the city last
Winter. Several thousand tons of warm
storage quarters have been added One
fine two-story brick building has been
erected at cost Of 100000. This, il may
bc mentioned, is the second brick building
in Dawson. Nor are these the only i'm
prnvemcnts.
The l'rcsbgterians are erecting n fine
modern church after the style of the Eng
lish country church, with Seatng capacity
for several hundred. Three of the churches
Of the city will have pipe organs this
Fall"
Many of the fresh vegetables for the
Dawson market are raised in the imme,
date neighborhoOd. and so are barley,
wheat, oats, buckwheat ami rye The
latter crops are grown for the hay and
fed to horses unthRashed
That there ere difficulties TO be sur
mounted by the farmers and trucknen is
not To be DENIED, as sthe prices paid for
the commodities will Indicate The hay
from single acre. of oats or rye has not
infrequently sold fen Sl;000, and potatoes
by the end of the Winter reach - cents Il
pound, while turnps, -hsets and other root
crops cost about the sane.
Dawson now has an Odd Fellows Lodge
under the direct dispensation of the Soy
ereign Grand Lodge az Baltimore. Ii has
district messenger service with electric
call boxes, and the, telegraph line to the
outside world, which has long been in sue
ceSSfnl operation, will soon be in connec-
tion with a line to- Nome.
Native coal of good quality lies avail
able for Dawson in three separate mining
localities above and below, and is brought
from each in considerable quantities.
Perhaps not the least significant of the |
signs Of the times is the influx of women |
of education, school teachers, nurses, |
clerks and the like, and the fact that tbey |
have hard work finding employment. not
because there is no employment for busi- |
ness women, but because the field has al |
ready been occupied.
The retail trade Of Dawson, which was
originally controlled by few large cor
porations, is now divided among several
hundred business concerns of moderate
capital.
Dredging and damming are going on
along the upper Yukon, chiefly during the
last Summer in the neighborhood of Lake
La Barge, and the powders of the Thirty
Mile, 200 in number. have been removed
Hell Gate will be tackled next and the
last of the terrors Of navigation removed |
Dawson will soon have n network. of
radiatiDS out to neghboringl
camps.