Early Petalumans caught gold fever in Alaska

The first Yukon gold rush really got going in early July 1897, when a ship docked in Seattle and the World Press blared that miners returning from Alaska were toting “bags of gold” and that the gold strike along the Klondike River was huge.|

The first Yukon gold rush really got going in early July 1897, when a ship docked in Seattle and the World Press blared that miners returning from Alaska were toting “bags of gold” and that the gold strike along the Klondike River was huge. “More than a ton of solid gold!” they said.

Those were exciting words that started a stampede of ill-equipped and ill-advised adventurers.

In Petaluma, the Daily Courier on July 21 stated: “The Alaskan gold fields are taking up the attention of the fortune hunters of the Pacific Coast. Petaluman A.H. Whitney, will leave for the Klondike next week, in company with Laurie Adams and Thomas Magee, the real estate agent.”

William McKinley was president in 1897, and the national focus was on the economy and the gold standard. It was a good time for a gold rush.

Novelist Jack London thought so, too, and he left from his Glen Ellen ranch on July 25 for Alaska, a journey that would inspire him to write some of his greatest stories.

On July 27, the Petaluma Courier stated: “The gold fever in Santa Rosa is spreading, and thirty men will be on their way to the Klondike, this week. Some of them are Fred Thompson, James Goodwin, Tom Blakeley and C.L. White, the liquor dealer, who said: ‘The Yukon is the richest mining country in the world.’?” (Well, sure it was, if you brought a lot of booze to sell there.)

On July 31, D.W. Ravenscroft, editor of the Petaluma Daily Courier, cautioned: “No doubt, it is a rich gold field in the Klondike, but it is a very cold, barren and perilous country. Deprivation, starvation and death stalk the entire region.” Good advice, however his words fell on deaf ears.

And on Aug. 2, he wrote: “Young W. H. Fairbanks of this city, will sail with friends, for the Yukon. They will take a portable boat, a complete outfit weighing six tons, plus seven mules.” A bon voyage dinner was given for these Petaluma boys at the University Club in San Francisco. The San Francisco Examiner said: “These young men are conspicuous as society leaders.”

This was a big deal. W.H. was the teenage son of Petaluma pioneer Hiram Fairbanks, who had made his fortune in the 1849 California gold rush and built the Golden Eagle Milling Company and founded the Petaluma Savings Bank, as well as being voted mayor of Petaluma.

The wealthy Fairbanks family resided in Petaluma’s largest home, with eight bedrooms and five baths. It’s still standing at the corner of D and 8th streets with the marble carriage stepping-stone out front with the name Fairbanks chiseled upon it.

W.H. also had been given some duties to perform on this trip. His father wanted to know more about the burgeoning fur trade in Alaska, and gave his son $5,000 for the venture.

But, the Examiner reporter went on to say: “These boys have sworn they won’t come back until they have made a fortune.”

The fact was, they had promised their mother they would be home by Christmas. But would they be home by Christmas? No.

In their New Year’s Eve review of the year just past, the Petaluma Daily Courier remarked: “Worries are abundant about the boys’ location.” But, those worries were for naught. The boys had struck-out on their gold quest, and they would return to Petaluma, in the thaw of the spring of 1888.

An aside here: the town of Fairbanks, Alaska, had been named for a distant relative of Hiram’s, also from Indiana, U.S. Senator Charles Fairbanks, who was to become vice president under Teddy Roosevelt, in 1905. I’ve found no reference to any contact in Alaska between the Senator and “The Fairbanks Boys” during their time in the Yukon.

Back in Petaluma, in the fall of 1897, you could get clean at the Western Avenue Barber Shop with “hot and cold running water at all hours, 12 cents.” Meanwhile, from the well-known Petaluma dentist, Dr. Lovejoy at 833 Main St., you could acquire: “Teeth, a full set, $7 and up.” Also, “Painless extraction 50 cents, using the modern Electro-Mouth-Lamp.” And, here’s another irresistible item: “Private lessons for club swinging at 786 Keller Street.” In case you didn’t like your dental work, perhaps?

Many of the Alaska “gold adventurers” started returning, as early as December of 1897 and, once again, the Press put forth a promo: “The Steamer Excelsior, arrived in S.F., from the Klondike with a half million in gold dust,” and: “The Steamer Portland, arrived in Seattle with 3.5 million in gold dust!”

The wild unwarranted excitement continued to spread.

Tragically, the true conditions of that first Alaskan gold rush had been very bleak. The Chilikoot and the White passes alone had claimed hundreds of lives in 1897, and most of those attempting that challenge had turned back. It was too steep, and it was too cold.

More than 3,000 pack animals died on those trails. The very determined adventurers, who actually made it through to the gold fields, found that locals had already claimed the good spots and that the stories of great gold riches had been much exaggerated. There would be another Yukon gold rush in 1902-06 that was much more successful.

The year 1897 closed, with the Petaluma Daily Courier noting, on Dec. 24: “Nearly every wagon that left our city today had, as part of its load, a Christmas tree.” And the Fairbanks boys eventually returned safely home to Petaluma after the Alaska thaw, in April of 1898. They went to work in their father‘s Golden Eagle Flour Mill.

A fairly happy ending, I think.

(Historian Skip Sommer is an Honorary Life Member of Heritage Homes and the Petaluma Historical Museum. Contact him at skipsommer@hotmail.com.)

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