Evening star., 1934-11-11

knew thing two about placer mining. He
seems to have had experimental turn of
mind; or perhaps he was just idly trying to
kill time At any rate. he began panning the
sand of the open beach-and discovered that
it fun of gold
Here was something new under the Sun-an
open beach whose sand was full OF gold dust!
1t was paradise for the miner. Not even the
stalking Of claims was necessary. You simply
went to the beach and got rich-or. at any
rate, you did if you were one of the lucky
early arrivals.
News of this discovery spread back through
the United States in no time Where one man
had gone to Nome before three went now.
What happened to the soldier who had started
it all-Whether he got rich. left the Army and
led the pleasant life which is the lot of lucky
gold-seekers or whether he somehow missed
out on things and went back TO the daily
routine of doing squads east in the land of
the midnight SUMS nowhere stated. So much
was happening that the gold-seeking private's
name got lost in the shuttle.
For the boom And what a booml
Within two years Nome was the largest city
in Alaska, with a population of 10000 in the
Summer of 1902. The gay old story of the
mining camp was re-enacted, far up in the
Arctic. on the shores of a sea that was frozen
for seven months out of every year. Good
men and bad men, strong men and weak ones,
kind men and cruel ones saints and villains
Iney were all lnere, uISndNen ana nara
just as they had all been present in the boom
towns of California and South Dakota and
Nevada and Colorado.
A ND some of them. of course. did actually
cash in on the dream that had led them
there. Some of them did actually get rich
quickly. the way they all planned to do.
One Missouri Bill gathered Sl2 900 in one
day. Two others pocketed SO 800 in two days.
Within two months of the time the infantry
man had made his strike more than 81 900 900
worth Of gold had been taken from the sands
The beach yielded S5 900 900 in one year In
the three years from 1902 to 1904. inclusive,
the peninsula's output nearly S13 500 900.
All of this meant that life moved high. wide
and handsome in Nome. Prices scared to the
very sky. Lumber sold for s4OO thousand feet.
tiny one-room shack could be sold for 5000.
ton of coal brought from $50 to 500, One
man became rich by the eXpedient Of bringing
in cow and selling fresh milk at s5 bottle.
incidentally, he was suspected OF stretching his
cows output by diluting the milk with corn
starch. water and other things.
Banks. lodging houses, restaurants, dance
halls saloons-saloons without number-ware-
houses, stores, private lodgings and so on,
sprang up overnight. The streets became bot
tomleSS lanes of mud, for Nome is built on the
black soil of the Arctic tundra. To get about
the town at all the citizens had to pave the
streets with boards.
Such writer's Rex Beach and Jack London
were among the newcomers and they lived
to write gaudy, stirring tales of the life there.
Yet their tales hardly scratched the surface.
Life moved so fast it was so coorful and
eventful, so unpredictable and tumultuous, that
the busiest writer could not tell tenth of it all.
THERE was a missionary. for instance who
| came to Nome-came down from the upper
Yukon reaching Nome with just SIS in his
lyof- Dry tla hn NOD rNni6 for thn
right to sleep on the floor of an Indians hut,
and had bought supper and breakfast he had
IS cents left Then a prospector learned that
a man of the cloth was in town and took
advantage of the occasion to get married to
a dance hall girl The missionary paid
SIS in gold dust. 1t tided him over until
remittance could arrive from the States
But as the wide open stage passed oppor-
tunities for we'll financed mining companies
remained. Dredges were put to work up the
river. Mines were dug farther inland Popuia-
ton declined, but the boom passed steady,
unspe ctacular gold trade took its place.