The northern gold fleet
Subtitle: twentieth-century gold dredging in Alaska
By: Clark C. Spence.
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
Published: 1996
Place of publication: Urbana
Language: eng
Number of pages: 302
Subjects: Gold mines and mining -- Alaska -- History -- 20th century; Gold dredging -- Alaska -- History -- 20th century; Alaska -- Gold discoveries -- History -- 20th century
Description: The Northern Gold Fleet is the story of how new gold-dredging technology was applied to the rich placers of the Far North from 1899 to the present, leading to mass production and economies of scale that made previously unprofitable resources profitable. The bucket-ladder dredge was a single, complex apparatus that rivaled ocean freighters in size. At once ugly, spectacular, and awesome, the dredges dug, classified materials, and performed gold-saving and tailing-disposal functions.

A richly illustrated and comprehensive history. The Northern Gold Fleet is part environmental, part technological, part corporate, part labor, and part Alaskan in its thrust, offering a picture - both dazzling and absorbing - of how new technology simultaneously helped build the economy and lay waste the resources of Alaska.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [229]-286) and index.
Table of contents: title: "Jackass machinery" at Nome : the early years; title: Small dredges and small profits : the pre-World War I boom; title: "It takes a little more than 'hot air' to thaw some of that ground" : the Hammon Consolidated gold fields at Nome; title: The gold dredging operation par excellence: the Fairbanks Exploration Company; title: Between the wars; title: Fairbanks Exploration goes to war; title: The postwar world of dredging; title: Steam, diesel, or electric power?; title: Winchmen, point doctors, and bull cooks; title: Navigating the northern waters.