Alaska (94 page)

Tom, from the edge of the crowd, saw a medium-sized Irishman in his early thirties, haggard as a hungry ghost but smiling roguishly at the men about him. He had dark, uncut hair which came down about his eyes, heavy clothes tattered from his ordeal north of the Circle, and a positive passion for talking: 'Name's Matt Murphy from a town west of Belfast. Five of us from London hurried to Edmonton as soon as we heard of the Klondike find. Set out down the Mackenzie in July 1897, got lost, one man drowned, one starved to death, one died of scurvy. That tall fellow you saw come in with me, he'd had enough. Kited right back to London. Me? I'm here to stay. Determined to find meself a gold mine.'

His listeners broke into laughter, not derisively but with a desire to straighten him out: 'Every good site taken three years ago.'

Tom saw with admiration how the stranger reacted to this shattering news: his shoulders drooped ever so slightly, he took a deep breath, then he asked almost jocularly: 'Any place a man can grab a beer?' and when one was provided, the first he had had in two years, he sipped it as if it were nectar, then asked quietly: 'Now, if there was to be new sites found, where would they be?' and solemnly the men replied: 'There won't be any.'

For just a moment Tom wondered if Murphy was going to faint, but then he flashed an irrepressible Irish smile and 567

said softly: 'Your news is not comfortin'. I've come so far, so close to starvin'

. . .'

The miners, ashamed that they had not acted sooner, led him to a tent restaurant where eggs, bacon and pancakes were available, and Tom, once more at the edge of the crowd, watched as the newcomer ate in a way Tom had never seen before. With infinite care, as if trying to hold back rearing horses, he cut his food into minute portions, eating them one by one like a dainty bluebird. 'Ain't you hungry?' asked the miner who was paying the bill, and the Irishman said: 'I could eat everything in this tent and in that one over there. I haven't seen food like this in two years.'

'Then eat up!' the miner bellowed, but the stranger said: 'If I did, I'd drop dead,'

and he continued placing in his mouth one tiny morsel after another.

In the days that followed, Tom spent a good deal of time with the incredible Irishman, listening to his account of the epic trip north and of the dreadful deaths which had overtaken the gold seekers. 'My father died too,' he told Murphy. 'Pole doubled back on him while we were riding an ice sled with a sail.'

The boy was impressed by the self-discipline with which Murphy continued to handle his meals, still eating them piece by piece, but always as they ate, the Irishman asked questions about gold, and Tom could see that he was obsessed by his determination to find himself a site, any kind, at which he could go through the motions of panning or digging. Not wanting to dismay Murphy by reiterating that there were no more sites, Tom threw the burden onto the able shoulders of his friend Sergeant Kirby of the North West Mounted, who had dealt with many latecomers like Murphy.

'Spots to claim? The good ones were nailed down three years ago. Will there be any new ones? Not likely.'

When Murphy, gaunt as a bear coming out of hibernation in April, heard this confirmation from an expert, he masked his disappointment, whereupon Kirby made a suggestion: 'There's a chap named Klope out on a ridge. Digs day and night. Feels sure he's on to something good. He needs help.'

'How do I fit in? Do I buy part of the claim?'

'No, you work for him. He pays you wages, and when he runs out of money, maybe he'll offer you a share of the claim to keep you on the scene.'

'You're sayin' he's not finding any gold?'

'Down along the stream you pan the placers and know immediately if you've hit. Up on the benches, you dig, dig, dig and never know anything till you reach bedrock.'

Murphy, not yet strong enough to take hard knocks like 568

this, sat down: 'You mean . . . I've come all the way from Edmonton . . . You can't know what that's like.'

'I think I can,' Kirby said. 'Half a dozen parties have straggled in. I've had to bury some of them.'

'Did any of the Edmonton men find gold?'

'Like you, they never even found a place to dig for it.'

For some moments Murphy sat with his face buried in his shockingly thin hands. Then he straightened his shoulders and stood erect: 'Where's this Mr. Klope's ridge? By God, I'm the one that came the Edmonton route that's going to make a try, at least.'

Kirby drew him a rough map, at the bottom of which he wrote: 'John Klope: This man has come from Edmonton. He knows how to work. Will Kirby, North West Mounted Police.'

When Murphy climbed the hill above Eldorado and presented his recommendation, Klope said: 'We've been at wit's end. I keep digging, but Missy here can't work the windlass and do the cooking both. We need you.'

So the Irishman started work for wages, and when Missy saw how emaciated he was, and yet how eager to take over the heavy labors that she had been performing, she felt it her duty to feed him generously, but he would not gorge himself, just carefully ate all those things which would send energy through his body and antiscurvy fluids down his legs. When he found that Klope had a good rifle, he remembered hunting tricks he had learned in Ireland, going far into the country and bringing back quarters of meat when other hunters were getting nothing.

When his strength returned, he proved a diligent laborer, hauling up the muck and getting it ready for the summer washing, so that after the second month Klope raised his pay from one dollar a day, which was standard in the mines that were producing nothing, to a dollar and a quarter, which encouraged Murphy to even greater exertion.

But as he worked aboveground while Klope slaved away deep inside the frozen earth, he had an opportunity to spend hours each day with Missy, who became attracted to his witty stories of Ireland, his accounts of horse racing in that country, and especially his explanation of what had gone wrong with the Edmonton gold seekers: 'We were like men chasing the northern lights. We could see the golden colors dancing just beyond our reach, but when we struggled to catch them, we found ourselves lost in snow and ice.'

When he related his harrowing experiences, she said: 'I'm glad you told me this, Murphy. I was beginning to feel sorry for myself on the Chilkoot.'

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Both Klope and Missy enjoyed the musical manner in which Murphy spoke and they marveled at his use of big words. 'You're a poet,' Klope said one summer night as the Irishman prepared to take his evening stroll with Breed. He took such a walk fairly regularly, wishing out of delicacy to be away from the cabin part of each night so that Klope and Missy could be alone, but of late in these pleasant ambles, with the twilight lasting for hours, he found himself thinking only of Missy. And one morning, halfway between breakfast and when Klope would be climbing out of his shaft for a bite to eat, while he and Missy were working together at the pile of muck which they would soon be sluicing, he very carefully laid aside his shovel, took Missy's away from her, and kissed her fervently.

She did not respond, nor did she rebuke him. Reaching for his shovel, she handed it to him, then took her own and said: 'We're after gold, and don't forget it.'

But on subsequent mornings she began placing herself so that Murphy had to pass near her, and they began kissing without the formality of putting aside the shovels, and by autumn, when it was clear that the painfully accumulated muck contained no gold whatever, it was also clear to them that John Klope's would-be mine was a lost hope and that he was lost too. Missy saw him as the big, unresponsive, unimaginative lout he had always been, and Murphy discovered that the poor man had almost no money left to pay anyone to help him dig his unproductive mine.

As the days shortened and Murphy recalled those two tragic winters when he was trapped in the arctic, he began to feel a repetition of that sense of doom, and one morning at breakfast he threw down his fork and said: 'I've got to get out of here, Klope.

I see no chance of gold on your claim.'

'Maybe it's best,' Klope replied. 'I've little left to pay you with,' and then he descended with his hopes into his hole.

Murphy spent that morning packing while Missy worked the lift, but after lunch, when Klope was back at his digging, the two in the cabin drifted almost automatically into a passionate encounter, after which Missy said: 'I'm going with you, Matt,'

and he said: 'We'll find something.'

They did not tell Klope that night, but he must have suspected something, for instead of staying in the cabin with Missy while Murphy went for a walk, it was he who left, and when he returned, silent and moody as ever, he went right to bed without conversation.

In the morning Missy prepared breakfast, ate none herself, and then informed Klope: 'We're going in to Dawson. I pray you'll find your gold, John.'

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'Leaving?' he asked.

'Yes. It's better.'

'Coming back?'

'No. It's worked out, John.' He could not tell whether she meant that the mine was finished or her relationship with him. He looked at the Irishman and said: 'I could break you in half.' Then he shrugged his shoulders: 'What would be the use?”

Left alone in the late autumn sunlight, John Klope watched the travelers depart, with Murphy pushing the handcart Tom Venn had bought for the handling of their goods.

When the sound of their departure was silenced, he walked purposefully to the hole, adjusted the bucket rope so that he could work the removal of muck by himself, and without any visible sign of emotion climbed down to the thirty-second foot.

Of all the gold seekers who had come up the Yukon River in 1897 on the Jos. Parker, not one had found gold. Of those few who had tried the Mackenzie horror, not one had even filed a claim. And of those who scaled the Chilkoot Pass with the Venns and braved the canyons in their wake, not one found gold. But all had participated in the great adventure provided by the dying century, and as Matthew Murphy said on approaching Dawson behind the cart: 'I dreamed of digging for gold, and I did.'

WHILE JOHN KLOPE, MATT MURPHY AND TOM VENN Labored in anonymity seeking gold on the Yukon, there was another group of men who attained vast publicity from their participation in the rush. Jack London, the proletarian writer from San Francisco, would find here material for his most notable stories, while the Canadian poet English born, Scottish reared Robert W. Service would immortalize the sourdough with poems that may have been no more than jingles but which proved unforgettable: The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, But the queerest they ever did see Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge I cremated Sam McGee.

Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee . . .

He misspelled Lake Laberge in order to find an attractive rhyme, but this and his other misconstructions did not matter, for he breathed into his yarns of the Yukon a vitality and

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charm that will apparently never fade. Two remarkable facts highlight his career: he did not get to the Klondike until 1904, when the great days were long over, and he wrote his most famous poems about it, including those featuring Dan McGrew and Sam McGee, long before he had set foot in Dawson City.

Tex Rickard, famous fight promoter and friend of Jack Dempsey, spent time on the gold fields, as did Addison Mizner, notable wit and Florida real-estate genius, Nellie Ely, the famous New York reporter, and Key Pittman, a future senator from Nevada, notorious and a power in foreign relations.

But early in the existence of the Yukon fields, the flat-bottomed river steamer Jos.

Parker

puffed into Dawson City for an overnight stop, bringing a passenger who epitomized those visitors who stayed only briefly but who nevertheless added to the world's knowledge of the Klondike. He was dressed in Eskimo costume and at age sixty-three was one of the oldest men on the diggings.

His boat laid over in Dawson only one day, but in these twenty-eight hours the little cyclone moved up and down the dusty main street introducing himself to anyone he thought might be an authority: 'Hello, friend! I'm Dr. Sheldon Jackson, General Agent for Education for Alaska. I'd like to know what plans you have for schools in your gold camps.'

Like a little ferret he pried into the quality of the hotels, the system of paying for purchases in gold dust, and the condition of women, but he spent his major effort in learning about religion in the camps. He was welcomed by ministers as soon as he presented his imposing card: DR. SHELDON JACKSON

Moderator of the General Assembly The Presbyterian Churches of America Knowing clergymen would ask: 'Isn't that the highest office in your church?' and he would reply almost apologetically: 'Yes. Three of us contended for the post. Our former President, Benjamin Harrison, the millionaire businessman John Wanamaker, and me.' Then he would cough modestly: 'I won on the first ballot . . . overwhelmingly.'

He made a nuisance of himself that day, but next morning when the Parker headed down the Yukon, he carried with him knowledge enough to use the rest of his life in his popular lecture: The Gold Fields of the Klondike.

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IX

THE GOLDEN BEACHES OF NOME

No move by Captain Healy and Reverend Jackson to improve the quality of life in Alaska elicited the scorn of their enemies like their attempt to import Siberian domesticated reindeer to feed the starving Eskimos during winter famine. The stubborn do-gooders were accused of being idiots, thieves and secret agents for the Russians: 'You wait, when the books are inspected you'll find them two stole four-fifths of the money the government has poured into this hare-brained scheme.' And of course Jackson was denounced, with some justification, for having delivered most of the reindeer that did reach Alaska to his Presbyterian settlements up and down the coast.

In the spring of 1897 the Army command in Washington dispatched a Lieutenant Loeffler of its Supply Corps to look into these charges of gross mismanagement: 'Tell us whether the idea is practical.' In obedience to his orders, the lieutenant visited eight of the sites where Dr. Jackson had tried to establish his herds, and sent Washington a just summary of the situation: It is prudent for the Army to express interest in this experiment because the time could come when our troops operating in the arctic would want to rely upon reindeer as a major source of food.

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How has the experiment gone? Poorly. Many of the first imports died either during the sea crossing from Siberia or shortly thereafter because the Alaskan Eskimos had no concept of how they should be husbanded. Reindeer which had been accustomed to the most thoughtful care in Siberia and treated as if they were valuable cattle on some Iowa farm were turned loose as if they were wild caribou, with the result that many reverted to untamed ways and were seen no more, while others died for lack of attention and their customary food.

The result? All the reindeer settled in the Aleutians are now dead or have disappeared.

That experiment was a disaster. Most of those brought to settlements along the northern seacoast have fared poorly, so that one must look upon this adventure as having come to very little. The Army would be ill-advised to rely for the foreseeable future in any important way upon domesticated reindeer as a major source of food supply.

But in fairness, Lieutenant Loeffler did report upon one establishment where the Healy-Jackson reindeer imported from the Cape Dezhnev region of Siberia had prospered, and he must have liked what he saw, for he wrote of it with obvious enthusiasm: However, I did find one installation where, due to a peculiar set of circumstances, the reindeer experiment did work. At the western end of Seward Peninsula, a bleak place which has been named Port Clarence contains a settlement called Teller Station, and here a Norwegian named Lars Skjellerup, thirty-three years old and unmarried, has put together a team of three helpers who appear to know how to handle reindeer.

When Skjellerup came to Alaska he brought with him a short, tough Laplander named Mikkel Sana, who can think like a reindeer. Because he anticipates what they're going to do, he guides them quietly but firmly around to his purposes.

The second helper gave me problems. He is Arkikov, no first name, brought over from Siberia by Captain Michael Healy of the famed revenue cutter Bear.

This Chukchi Eskimo may know reindeer but I found him surly, not given to following directions, and difficult to discipline. But when I asked Skjellerup: 'Why do you 574

bother with this man?' he told me: 'Arkikov is a man, and from time to time in this work you need men.'

The third helper was a shy Eskimo lad of nineteen, not tall and with a dark, round face. Skjellerup told me: 'Ootenai is special. He has no family, they died during one of the famines, so he appreciates our project as his only chance for a good life.

One day he'll be head of this station.'

Well, there they are, and should the Army ever be required to work with reindeer in Alaska, I recommend that our officers ignore all other stations and head directly for Teller.

After Loeffler submitted his report in the spring of 1897 he returned to his regular duty in Seattle, where, in the early autumn of that year, he handled the urgent telegram that came from Washington:

DOZEN AMERICAN WHALERS TRAPPED IN ICE POINT

BARROW STOP RATIONS SHORT STOP NO MEDICAL STORES STOP EVALUATE RESCUE OPERATIONS