The Daily Alaska empire., 1951-06-27

crossed the boundary line into AL
 aska, the members of the party picked the gravel bench at the
 mouth of Mission Creek as their
 townsite.
 The first order of business was
 selecting a name. They had started
 out to found American City, but
 when a golden eagle circled over-
 head as they landed, some of the
 people switched to Eagle. A vote
 was taken and it ended in a dead
 lock. They settled it by Tipping a
 double -eagle, and Eagle came up
 on top.
 By November, 1898. there was a
 postoffice at Eagle, and soon after
 ward a Customs office was opened
 and the town became the port of
 entry for the upper Yukon.
 WiIdes P. Richardson, then only
 lieutenant and with the Richard son Highway far in the future, wis., tied Eagle in 1899 and selected it as the site for a new Army post,
 Fort Egbert. With the fort came
 the military telegraph line from Valdez to Fort Egbert to St. Mich ael, with Fort Egbert as the head quarters.
 At about the same time there was great deal of agitation for an All-American route to the Yukon ] and trail was pushed through from Valdez to Eagle, much of it following the route of the present highway. Eagle had mail service then from Valdez, from Skagway by way of Whitehorse and Dawson. and in summer from Seattle by way of St. Michael.
 There were several proposals, too, to build a railroad to Eagle from one place or another on the coast, but none of them got beyond the
 talking phase.
 Two additional judges for Alaska were authorized by Congress on
 June 6, 1900, and Eagle, the met ropols of the Interior, was named headuuarters for the Third Divi- sion. Judge James Wickersham ar rived at Eagle on July 15, 1900, to- gether with U. s. Marshal George
 c. Perry and U. s. Attorney Alfred M. Post, and soon was holding court mot only at Eagle but at Circle and
 Rampant and other mining camps Eagle became an incorporated city
 in January, 1901, and as the supply
 center for miners on American
 Mission, Boundary, Washington
 Fourth of July and O'Brien Greeks
 as we'll as the Forty Mile and Sev-
 enty Mile Rivers, it was a busy
 place in the early years of the century.
 ] The Northern Commercial Co.
 then as now, had a store at Eagle and other stores were operated by
 the North American Transportation and Trading Co. and by Ed Peo-
 ples and F. M. Woodruff. There
 was Presbyterian church, witt
 free library in connection, in charge of Rev. James w. Kirk, and { Catholic hospital and church undel ' Father Munroe. s. J. The Episcopa
 church soon afterward bought tht
 property of the Presbyterians ant
 established St. Pauls church anc
 mission.
 1 Dozens of. steanbOats, upbcunt flor Dawson or downbound for St
 Michael and way ports, called a
 Eagle. The Alaska Pioneer Minint and Milling Go. operated a sawmll i and there was another sawmiH a the fort. Lem Stenger, Fred Vande wall, c. L. Andrews, John J. Hill
 ard and George Woodruff were il the Customs Office, and Luther c Hess was assistant U. s. Attorney 1 J. P. Coulter and D. H. Jonas raj a saloon and so did Ben Boon ! land w. w. Mcdonald and w. A Robertson and several others, whil 1 Gus Bruns operated the Eagl' Brewery. Among the men who ling cred awhile in Eagle before golni | on to other prospects were H Graehl, Phil Stack, J. B. Powers i Jay Livengood, Jim Lennon, E. K lesson and Fred Horn.
 Felix Pedro was the man wh started Eagle on the downgrade He found gold in the Tanana coun ] try and soon there was a little up start mining camp approximatel. 2C0 miles due west of Eagle. It wa called Fairbanks.
 The new camp had none of tn advantages of Eagle. It was not ol the broad highway of the Yukoi River, or even on one of the mail tributaries, but off on slougi where it could be reached only nov and then by the smaller rive steamers. It was not on the All-Am erican route or any other regula trail. It wasn't hooked up with th' Telegraph line and it didn't hav' an Army post.
 But Fairbanks did have gold il large quantities in nearby creek and the camp grew into town ant