The Oroville weekly gazette. [volume] (Oroville, Wash.) 1905-19??, 1910-01-14
LIFE IN THE POLAR LAND
Twelve Years Spent In The
Bleak And Barron Vastness
OF The Arctic Region.
PROsPECTOR AND FUR TRADER

An Okanogan Resident Who Has
Had Strange Experiences in
the Frozen North.
Oscar Anderson was in Orovile Sat
urday looking over the location with Il
view of putting in Il steam laundry,
and he was so well satisfied with the
out the plans he has in contemplation.
If he goes into the business it is the
intention of Mr.. Anderson to install n
complete and up-tO-date plant, and
engage the services of an experienced
and tirst-class laundryman to operate
it. If he succeeds in doing .ood work
and that is his intention. there is no
reason why the venture should not
prove financial success.
And mentioning the fact that Mr..
Anderson is about to locate in Oroville
it is not out of place to state that he
has recently returned to Okanogan
county after an absence of twelve years
spent in the distant and frigid region
of Alaska and the Northwest territory.
The last time the writer met Oscar
Anderson was in 1897. He was then
a stripping. hardly out of his teens.
1t was only a short time before he
started upon the long trip that carried
him beyond the confines of civilization
for so many years. Today he is a
ruddy-faced, well porportioned, power
full looking man, the picture of health,
and in the very heyday of life. Mr..
Anderson lived upon the old Anderson
place, near the international boundary
line, q few miles northwestern Oroville.
up to the time he sought his fortune
in the icy north. Fired by the first
reports of gold discoveries in the Klon-
dixie he left the home place with pack
horses and started on the long over
land trip, striking directly north, to
the scene of excitement. He was
among the first to thread the way
through an unknown country to the
upper Yukon, and it was hard and
trying experience. He spent six years
in Alaska chasing around after every
new discovery, putting in time >with
Indifferent success at Dawson, Nome,
Fairbanks, and other camps familiar
in the history of the struggle for riches
in that country of hope, realization,
disappointments and magnificent dis
tances. Six years ago he travelled with
dog team across country to the Mack
enzie liver, where he entered the fur
trade with free company, and even
tually secured an interest in the busi-
ness. He had a station on the Mack
enzie river, and there he put in six
long winters and six short summers,
making frequent excursions for long
distances into the surrounding country.
Mr.. Anderson talks interestingly OF
the great, silent, almost uninhabited
territory so little known to the out
side world, and which will continue to
be unknown to the crack of doom, as
there is nothing to attract settlers, nor
support any large number of people.
1t has been the home of wild animals
and scattered tribes of Indians and
EsquimauX since the beginning of hui
man and animal life. For eight months
in the year the streams are ice locked.
The summer months are pleasant, but
too short for maturing grains, and veg
etables, although Mr. Anderson states
potatoes can be and are grown for hun
dreds of miles even north of where he
was stationed. Big game abounds,
and of course it is the paradise of fur
bearing animals. Moose, lowland and
upland caribou and bear are to be
found in numbers. The natives live
principally on game and fish, as the
price OF the most common commodities
are out of reach of the man of ordin-
ary means. Flour is $50 a sack, sugar
80 cents pound, beans the same, ba-
con 10 cents, dried fruits 80 cents, and
other things in proportion.
The winters are long, intensely cold,
and solitude broods over the land
that is almost maddening. There are
Indians scattered along the rivers, one
tribe known as the Long Knives, num-
bering some 5000 members. 1t is the
Indians who gather the pelts, barter
ing them with the traders for such ar
ticles as meet their requirements.
During his stay in the country Mr..
Anderson made one trip to the mouth
of the Mackenzie river, where it emp