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VOICE ONE:
This is Bob Doughty.
VOICE TWO:
And this is Phoebe Zimmermann with the VOA Special Englishprogram, EXPLORATIONS. Today we tell the second part of our storyabout the discovery of gold in the area of Canada called the Yukon.We tell about the thousands of people who traveled to Alaska and onto Canada hoping that they would become rich.
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VOICE ONE:
Last week, we told how three men discovered huge amounts of goldnear the Yukon River in northwestern Canada. Their discovery starteda rush of people traveling to the American territory of Alaska andacross the border to Canada. History experts believe that betweentwenty and thirty-thousand people traveled to the area.
Newspapers printed stories thatsaid it was easy to become rich. All you had to do was pick up thegold from the ground. Books and magazines told how to travel to thearea and the best method of finding gold. However, most of thisinformation was false. It was not easy to find gold. It wasextremely hard work under very difficult conditions.
VOICE TWO:
The first ship carrying the goldseekers arrived in the port town of Skagway, Alaska on Julytwenty-sixth, eighteen-ninety-seven. These people were very lucky.It was summer and the weather was warm. However, they found fewplaces to live in Skagway. Most people had to make temporary housesout of cloth. Skagway was a very small port town. It had very fewstores. And everything was very costly.
Skagway also had a crime problem. One of the chief criminals wasa man named Jefferson Randolph Smith. He was better known as “Soapy”Smith. He did his best to take money from men who were on their wayto seek gold.
One method he used seems funny, now. Soapy Smith had signsprinted that said a person could send a telegram for five dollars.Many people paid the money to send telegrams to their families backhome to say they had arrived safely in Skagway.
But they did not know that thetelegraph office wires only went into the nearby forest. It was nota real telegraph office. It was a lie Soapy Smith used to take moneyfrom people who passed through Skagway.
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VOICE ONE:
Most of the gold seekers wanted to quickly travel to the areawhere gold had been discovered. However, the Canadian governmentrequired that each person had to bring enough supplies to last forone year if they wanted to cross the border into Canada. This wasabout nine-hundred kilograms of supplies.
People who brought their supplies with them on the ship werelucky. Others had to buy their supplies in Skagway. They had to payextremely high prices for everything they needed.
VOICE TWO:
When they had gathered all the supplies, the gold seekers thenfaced the extremely hard trip into Canada. Their first problem wascrossing over a huge mountain. They could cross the mountain in oneof two places — the White Pass and the Chilkoot Pass. Each goldseeker began by moving his supplies to the bottom of the mountain.Their progress to the mountain was painfully slow.
A man named Fred Dewey wrote to friends back home that it tookhim two weeks just to move his supplies from Skagway to themountain. His wrote that his body hurt because of the extremely hardwork.
VOICE ONE:
Then the gold seekers had to move their supplies up the mountain.Some men made as many as thirty trips before they had all of theirsupplies at the top. But others looked at the mountain and gave up.They sold their supplies and went back to Skagway.
At the top of the mountain was the United States border withCanada. Canadian officials weighed the supplies of each man. If thesupplies did not weigh enough, the men were sent back. They were notpermitted to cross into Canada.
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VOICE TWO:
A gold seeker who had successfullytraveled up the mountain still faced the most difficult anddangerous part of the trip. Both trails up the mountain ended nearLake Bennett in British Columbia. From there it was almostnine-hundred kilometers by boat down the Yukon River to the town ofDawson were gold had been discovered.
But there was no boat service. Each person or small group had tobuild their own boat. They cut down many trees to build the boats.Within a few months, some forests in the area were gone.
The summer quickly passed and winter began. The gold seekers werestill building their boats. The Yukon River turned to ice. Winter inthis area was extremely cold. The temperature often dropped to sixtydegrees below zero Celsius. The cold could kill an unprotectedperson in just a few minutes.
VOICE ONE:
American writer Jack London was among the gold seekers. He becamefamous for writing about his experiences in Alaska and Canada. Hewrote a short story that perhaps best explains the terribleconditions gold seekers faced. It is called “The White Silence.”
In the story, Mister London explained how the extreme cold madethe world seem dead. It caused strange thoughts. He said the coldand silence of this frozen world seemed to increase a man’s fear ofdeath. This cruel cold could make a man afraid of his own voice.
The story also tells what could happen to a person who had anaccident. There were not many doctors in the gold fields. Aseriously injured person could only expect to die. Jack London’smany stories truthfully explained just how hard it was to be a goldseeker in eighteen-ninety-seven.
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VOICE TWO:
By the end of winter, the area around Lake Bennett was a hugetemporary town of more than ten-thousand people. They were allwaiting for the ice to melt so they could continue on to the goldfields. On May twenty-eighth, eighteen-ninety-eight, the Yukon Rivercould again hold boats. The ice was melting. That day, more thanseven-thousand boats began the trip to Dawson.
Many of these gold seekers did not survive the trip on the YukonRiver. All of the boats had to pass through an area called the WhiteHorse Rapids. The water there was fast and dangerous. Many boatsturned over. Many of the gold seekers died.
VOICE ONE:
At last, the remaining gold seekers reached the city of Dawson.Dawson had been a small village before the discovery of gold. Itbecame a big city within a short time. Stores and hotels werequickly built. The price of everything increased.
One man named Miller brought a cow to Dawson. He sold the milkfor thirty dollars for a little less than four liters. For the restof his life he was known as “Cow Miller.” He did not get richseeking gold. But he made a great deal of money selling milk.
Many people did the same thing. They bought supplies in theUnited States and moved them to Dawson. Then they sold everything atextremely high prices.
VOICE TWO:
The gold seekers quickly learned that most of the valuable areasof land had already been claimed by others. Many gave up and wenthome. Some gold seekers searched in other areas. Others went to workfor people who had found gold.
Experts say about four-thousand people became rich during thegreat Klondike gold rush. Groups of men formed large companies andbegan buying land in the area. The large companies used hugemachines to dig for gold. One of these companies continued to make aprofit digging gold until nineteen-sixty-six. History records saythat in only four years the area around Dawson produced more thanfifty-one-million dollars in gold. This would be worth more thanone-thousand-million dollars today.
VOICE ONE:
The great Yukon gold rush was over by the end ofeighteen-ninety-nine. As many of the gold seekers began to leave,news spread of another huge discovery of gold. Gold had been foundin Nome, Alaska. Gold was later discovered in another part of Alaskain nineteen-oh-two.
Today, people visiting the area of the great Klondike gold rushcan still find very small amounts of gold. The amount of gold is notmuch. But it is enough to feel the excitement of those gold seekersmore than one-hundred years ago.
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VOICE TWO:
This program was written by Paul Thompson. It was produced byMario Ritter. This is Phoebe Zimmermann.
VOICE ONE:
And this is Bob Doughty. Join us again next week for anotherEXPLORATIONS program in Special English on the Voice of America.