After the Robert Service program I headed back to Front Street for an ice cream, then went to visit the Commissioner’s Residence.

Territorial administration is a little different from that of the provinces and I’m not quite up to speed on it. If I understand correctly, the Commissioner of Yukon is the Queen’s representative in the territory, similar to the role of the Governor General.

At the time when Dawson was the capital of the Yukon territory, the commissioner resided in a grand house on Front Street. It was grander once upon a time, but burned down during a Christmas fire and was rebuilt much more simply.

Today, it’s possible to tour the house and grounds at your leisure. There isn’t much information provided, so it’s not the best value attraction in Dawson. I’d do it as part of the Pick-a-Pack and consider it the ‘free’ option.

Like many buildings in Dawson, the gorgeous bright yellow exterior of the house is a façade belying the fact that most of the interior is a wreck. The front bottom half of the house was restored to Edwardian splendour and reminds me of Rutherford House in Edmonton, decorated in the same era. The back bottom and top halves of the house are almost in ruins. This actually adds a level of interest to the visit. In the second incarnation of the home, it was used as a hospital run by nuns, so wandering through the house you can see all the layers of history associated with it. I loved that I could open just about any door and peak inside, but was disappointed that the third story is off limits. My favourite part of the house was the huge second story porch. I can just imagine sitting up there with binoculars and watching steamboats go up and down the Yukon River.

A notable resident of this home was the Honourable Martha Black, Canada’s second female Member of Parliament (MP) who took on the mantle after her husband died in office. Mrs. Black came over the Chilkoot Pass with her brother and is one of the most famous women associated with the golden age of the Klondike.

the Commissioner’s Residence, all decked out for the tea on Saturday afternoon

Entrance

study

drawing room

parlour

I fell in love with this chair

interesting wallpaper pattern on the ceiling

dining room

dining room

sideboard in the dining room

lamp in the dining room

servants’ stairs

kitchen

this was a makeshift confessional for the nuns who turned the top of the house into a hospital

bathroom (hospital era)

there are several fuse panels like these throughout the house

original wallpaper discovered after paneling was taken down

pictures of a fire and water damage that gutted the house in the early 1900’s

view of the Yukon River from the upstairs porch

wicker furniture on the upstairs porch

door detail

overlooking the grounds

second story porch

water damage in an upstairs room

water damage in an upstairs room

rear exterior

rear exterior

door going nowhere…

window details

Thus ended by mostly free day and off to work I went. I still have several attractions to visit!

Dick North, a Yukon historian now based in Whitehorse, can be credited for finding the facts about novelist Jack London’s year in the Klondike. There has been so much myth and conjecture, but he found irrefutable pieces of evidence that form a picture of the year that served as a catalyst for London’s writing career.

Jack London was born into desperate poverty in Oakland, California. He laboured part-time as a child until he left school at 14 to work sixteen to eighteen hour days, seven days a week, at a pickle factory. When he’d had enough of that, he became an able bodied seaman and traveled to the most far flung corners of the world.

When news came to the outside world in 1897 that there was gold in the Klondike, London was ripe for adventure. He headed north with his brother-in-law, their outfit financed by London’s step-sister. London came over the Chilkoot Trail in August 1897, a year ahead of the column of people who would eventually make it to the gold fields.

Dick North found, while searching through archives, a photo of a group at Sheep Camp and by identifying each person in the photo he was able to identify Jack London. This photo is the only known photo of London not only on the Chilkoot, but in the north.

London made it to the Klondike and staked a claim at Henderson Creek, this fact supported by a document found by north: Jack London’s claim registration, dated October 1897 and signed in Dawson City!

While London was only in the north for a year, forced out by scurvy, it proved to be a transformative experience for him and inspired him to write many novels, the most famous of which is Call of the Wild. He sold the rights to this book to MacMillan publishing for a few thousand dollars. This book has not been out of print since and contributed to making MacMillan the powerhouse publisher that it is today.

As if the Sheep Camp photo and claim registration documents weren’t enough, Dick North found his holy grail: one of the cabins Jack London stayed in during his long, dark Klondike winter. This cabin was identified in two ways. The first is that it is described in perfect detail in one of London’s books. The second is a piece of graffiti: London’s signature in pencil scrawled on the inside of a wall.

The cabin was falling to ruin and at risk of getting lost in the wilderness. Funds to rescue it were hard to find, but when the city of Oakland got wind of North’s discovery it offered to finance the rescue on the condition that the cabin be brought to Oakland for display in their Jack London Square.

North decided that this wouldn’t do and he had a crazy, but rather brilliant, idea: split the cabin in two. There are now two Jack London cabins to be seen, one in Dawson, Yukon, and one in Oakland, California. The Dawson cabin’s bottom half is original while the top is a reproduction. The reverse is true for the one in Oakland!

Next to the cabin in Dawson is a bear proof food cache and a newer building that houses pictures and documents related to London’s life.

This excellent exhibit and talk from the Klondike Valley Association come with a $5 admission fee, but it’s only $2.50 upon presentation of an entrance coupon from Diamond Tooth Gerties.

Before I share pictures, here is a quote from Jack London that echoes something I said last summer about my own Klondike experience:

It was in the Klondike I found myself. There nobody talks. Everybody thinks. You get your true perspective. I got mine.

the building on stilts is a bear-proof food cache

London’s eldest daughter; looks just like him!

London’s notebook

London at Sheep Camp on the Chilkoot Trail, and him dressed as a tramp for some research he was doing for a novel

map of the routes to the gold fields

London and his youngest daughter, circa 1904. He looks like a Kennedy!

London wrote an average of 1,000 words a day for more than seventeen years

document proving that London staked a gold claim in the Klondike

document proving that London staked a gold claim in the Klondike

document proving that London staked a gold claim in the Klondike

document proving that London staked a gold claim in the Klondike