Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park | |
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Location | Alaska and Washington, United States |
Nearest city | Skagway, Alaska and Seattle, Washington |
Coordinates | 59°34′31″N135°15′49″W / 59.57537°N 135.26367°W |
Area | 12,996 acres (52.59 km2) [1] |
Established | June 30, 1976 |
Visitors | 860,048(in 2011) [2] |
Governing body | National Park Service |
Website | Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park |
Klondike Goldrush National Historical Park | |
Alaska Heritage Resources Survey | |
Location | Union of Chilkoot Trail and Dyea Site and Skagway Historic District and White Pass |
NRHP reference No. | 76002189 [3] |
AHRS No. | SKG-086 |
Added to NRHP | June 30, 1976 |
Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park is a national historical park operated by the National Park Service that seeks to commemorate the Klondike Gold Rush of the late 1890s. Though the gold fields that were the ultimate goal of the stampeders lay in the Yukon Territory, the park comprises staging areas for the trek there and the routes leading in its direction. There are four units, including three in Municipality of Skagway Borough, Alaska and a fourth in the Pioneer Square National Historic District in Seattle, Washington.
A fuller appreciation of the story of the Klondike Gold Rush requires exploration and discovery on both sides of the Canada–United States border. National historic sites in Whitehorse and Dawson City, Yukon, as well as in British Columbia, complete the story. In 1998, Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park joined with Chilkoot Trail National Historic Site, Dawson Historical Complex National Historic Site, and "The Thirty Mile" stretch of the Yukon River to create Klondike Gold Rush International Historical Park, allowing for an integrated binational experience.
The Skagway unit includes much of the historic downtown such as buildings owned and restored by NPS and others, some leased even today for ordinary commercial purposes to recreate the city's bustling activity. The visitor center in Skagway is located in railroad depot building at Second and Broadway and is a good place to begin tours either led by a ranger or self-guided. Junior rangers can plan their activities further and earn their badges further up Broadway at the Pantheon Saloon. [4]
The park includes as one of its units the White Pass Trail. White Pass is a mountain pass that leads from Skagway to the headwaters of the Yukon River in British Columbia. The trail was one of the two main routes used by prospectors to get from Skagway over the Boundary Range on their way to the gold fields in the Yukon. The White Pass and Yukon Route railway, completed in 1900, used White Pass to bring prospectors from Skagway to Whitehorse, Yukon.
The historic townsite of Dyea is also part of the historical park, from which the Chilkoot Trail leaves and runs to Bennett Lake in British Columbia. From there, prospectors generally rafted to Dawson City, Yukon. The trail center in Skagway, operated by both the National Park Service and Parks Canada, has information regarding current conditions along the Chilkoot Trail as it travels through both countries. A permit is required to hike the 33-mile (53-kilometer) trail.
The Pioneer Square Historic District has several buildings dating to the 1880s and 1890s. The Cadillac Hotel (built 1890) at 319 Second Avenue South was a major point of outfitting and departure during the gold rush stampede. Severely damaged in the 2001 Nisqually earthquake, it was rehabilitated in 2004–2005 as home to the interpretive center and museum for the Seattle unit of the park, and was opened and dedicated on June 26, 2006. [17] [18]
The Seattle unit's visitor center originally opened June 2, 1979 [19] [20] in the Union Trust Annex (built 1902), [21] across Main Street from Occidental Park. Other historic buildings include the Pioneer Building (1892), Schwabacher Building (1890), Grand Central Hotel (1889), and Metropole Building (1895).
The National Park Travelers Club held its 2014 convention at Klondike Gold Rush. [22]
In 1969, the United States and Canadian governments jointly declared their intention to make Chilkoot Trail a component of a Klondike Gold Rush International Historic Park. The U.S. portion was eventually established in 1976 as part of Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park.
The Canadian portion of the trail became Chilkoot Trail National Historic Site, one of several sites in the national park system associated with the Klondike. But it was not until the centennial of the gold rush, in 1998, that the dream of an international park was realized, when Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park and Chilkoot Trail National Historic Site were declared to constitute jointly the Klondike Gold Rush International Historical Park. [23] Their previous legal names were retained, while the new name reflected co-operative management between the two park services, and the formalization of relations which had in fact been going on for years.
Beyond this, joint resolutions recognize the relevance to gold rush interpretation of the Dawson Historical Complex National Historic Site, in Dawson City, Yukon, which includes significant buildings. Parks Canada identifies Dawson City as a unit of the international park, [24] as well as "The Thirty Mile" section of the Yukon River, a national heritage river from Lake Laberge to the Teslin River. The river has been recognized by both countries as part of their joint interpretative efforts. [25]
Beyond the formal international historical park are national historic sites in Yukon concerned with the gold rush:
The Municipality and Borough of Skagway is a first-class borough in Alaska on the Alaska Panhandle. As of the 2020 census, the population was 1,240, up from 968 in 2010. The population doubles in the summer tourist season in order to deal with the large number of summer tourists each year. Incorporated as a borough on June 25, 2007, it was previously a city in the Skagway-Yakutat-Angoon Census Area. The most populated community is the census-designated place of Skagway.
The Klondike Gold Rush was a migration by an estimated 100,000 prospectors to the Klondike region of Yukon, in north-western Canada, between 1896 and 1899. Gold was discovered there by local miners on August 16, 1896; when news reached Seattle and San Francisco the following year, it triggered a stampede of prospectors. Some became wealthy, but the majority went in vain. It has been immortalized in films, literature, and photographs.
The White Pass and Yukon Route is a Canadian and U.S. Class III 3 ft narrow-gauge railroad linking the port of Skagway, Alaska, with Whitehorse, the capital of Yukon. An isolated system, it has no direct connection to any other railroad. Equipment, freight and passengers are ferried by ship through the Port of Skagway, and via road through a few of the stops along its route.
The Chilkoot Trail is a 33-mile (53 km) trail through the Coast Mountains that leads from Dyea, Alaska, in the United States, to Bennett, British Columbia, in Canada. It was a major access route from the coast to Yukon goldfields in the late 1890s. The trail became obsolete in 1899 when a railway was built from Dyea's neighbor port Skagway along the parallel White Pass trail.
Chilkoot Pass is a high mountain pass through the Boundary Ranges of the Coast Mountains in the U.S. state of Alaska and British Columbia, Canada. It is the highest point along the Chilkoot Trail that leads from Dyea, Alaska to Bennett Lake, British Columbia. The Chilkoot Trail was long a route used by the Tlingit for trade.
Bennett Lake is a lake in the Province of British Columbia and Yukon Territory in northwestern Canada, at an elevation of 656 m (2,152 ft). It is just north of the border with the United States state of Alaska, near the Alaskan port of Skagway. The lake has an estimated area of about 90.68 or 96.8 km2. The average depth is 61.9 m (203 ft) and the maximum depth is 123 m (404 ft).
Bennett, British Columbia, Canada, is an abandoned town next to Bennett Lake and along Lindeman Creek. The townsite is now part of the Chilkoot Trail National Historic Site of Canada and is managed by Parks Canada. Bennett is also a stop on the White Pass and Yukon Route railroad during the summer months.
White Pass, also known as the Dead Horse Trail, is a mountain pass through the Boundary Ranges of the Coast Mountains on the border of the U.S. state of Alaska and the province of British Columbia, Canada. It leads from Skagway, Alaska, to the chain of lakes at the headwaters of the Yukon River.
Dyea is a former town in the U.S. state of Alaska. A few people live on individual small homesteads in the valley; however, it is largely abandoned. It is located at the convergence of the Taiya River and Taiya Inlet on the south side of the Chilkoot Pass within the limits of the Municipality of Skagway Borough, Alaska.
The Klondike Highway is a highway that runs from the Alaska Panhandle through the province of British Columbia and the territory of Yukon in Canada, linking the coastal town of Skagway, Alaska, to Dawson City, Yukon. Its route somewhat parallels the route used by prospectors in the 1898 Klondike Gold Rush.
Joseph Francis Ladue was an American prospector, businessman and founder of Dawson City, Yukon, Canada.
The Taiya River is a 17-mile-long (27 km) river in the U.S. state of Alaska running from the border with British Columbia, Canada, to the Taiya Inlet of upper Lynn Canal.
The Yukon Trail is a 1994 educational computer game from the Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium (MECC), similar to their previous Oregon Trail series but set during the Klondike Gold Rush of the late 19th century. Players start out in Seattle and must make decisions concerning supplies, a partner, and travel plans as they head to Alaska before boating down a river to Dawson City and staking a claim to mine for gold. The game features the famous author Jack London and authentic 19th-century photographs that show what life was like back then.
Isadore "Ike" Bayles was an Alaskan businessman and considered one of the founding fathers of Anchorage, Alaska. He was part of the Klondike Gold Rush and the Fairbanks Gold Rush where he set up businesses to service the gold rushers. He set up a clothing business in Fairbanks around 1905 and was active in the first Jewish congregation in the area. He was also part of the Iditarod gold rush, where he established the Bayles Clothing Company with locations in Iditarod and Discovery. Eventually, he created the Jaffe & Bayles Leading Clothier, and it was one of the first businesses in Anchorage.
The Skagway Historic District and White Pass is a National Historic Landmark District encompassing a significant portion of the area within the United States associated with the Klondike Gold Rush. It includes the historic portion of Skagway, Alaska, including the entire road grid of the 1897 town, as well as the entire valley on the United States side of White Pass all the way to the Canada–US border. This area includes surviving fragments of three historic routes used during the Gold Rush, as well as the route of the White Pass and Yukon Railroad. Almost 100 buildings remain from the Gold Rush period. Portions of the district are preserved as part of Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park.
A. J. Goddard was a Klondike Gold Rush era sternwheeler owned by Seattle businessman Albert J. Goddard and built for transport of men and supplies on the Upper Yukon River in Canada. She was assembled from pieces which were manufactured in San Francisco, shipped up to Skagway, Alaska, hauled over the Coast Mountains, and finally assembled at Lake Bennett. She made one trip to Dawson during the gold rush, was sold and sank in a storm on Lake Laberge in 1901. Her wreck was discovered in 2008 by Doug Davidge and was designated as a Yukon Historic Site.
The Klondike Gold Rush is commemorated through film, literature, historical parks etc.
Eric A. Hegg was a Swedish-American photographer who portrayed the people in Skagway, Bennett and Dawson City during the Klondike Gold Rush from 1897 to 1901. Hegg himself participated in prospecting expeditions with his brother and fellow Swedes while documenting the daily life and hardships of the gold diggers.
Larss and Duclos was a photographic studio partnership between Per Edvard Larss and Joseph E. N. Duclos (1863-1917) in Dawson City, Yukon Territory during the Klondike Gold Rush era of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Lindeman Creek, formerly known as One Mile River connects Bennett Lake to Lindeman Lake, areas on the Chilkoot Trail in far northwestern British Columbia, Canada.