Dawson City Attractions

Administrative unit: Yukon Territory

Dawson City lies in the west of the Yukon Territory, roughly 100 km (60 mi.) from the Canadian frontier at the confluence of the Klondike and Yukon Rivers.

Dawson City was founded and flourished during the time of the gold-rush along the Klondike and Yukon Rivers. A few months after George Washington Carmack found gold-nuggets the size of his fist in Bonanza Creek in 1896 thousands of gold-seekers streamed into the Yukon and Klondike region hoping to stumble on equally rich veins. Dawson City grew up in the middle of it all.

Most of the early gold-seekers came ill-equipped with provisions. Later Canada did pass a law making it a rule that every person had to bring with him clothing and food for at least one year, but at the end of 1897 Dawson City already had 3500 inhabitants who were not adequately provided for. When ships were unable to get through with stocks of provisions before the onset of winter a large proportion of the townspeople were evacuated to an outpost 350 miles away, but in spite of these measures many did not live to see the spring, when the longed-for wagons finally got through with supplies. A number of traders were then able to make their fortune selling food on Dawson City market.

Gold-seekers arriving in the summer of 1898 soon realized that all the profitable claims had been staked long before. The uncrowned "Kings of the Klondike" subsequently turned the town into the "San Francisco of the North" and used their gold to finance the building of luxurious albeit dubious hotels and acquired a number of shipping companies. The ships brought in the finest Paris fashions, Persian carpets, expensive furniture and delicacies to Dawson City. One of the Klondike's best-known adventurers was "Big Alex" McDonald, owner of numerous claims to gold and who at one time made 5500 dollars a day and amassed a fortune of seven million dollars. "Big Alex" became so famous that he even earned a private audience with the Pope in Rome. For most of the gold-seekers however Dawson City meant a daily struggle for survival with only very faint hopes of stumbling on a rich find, and many ended up working in the large mines for men like Big Alex. No sooner were gold nuggets found or wages earned than they were spent. After an initial "Wild West" era posts of the North West Mounted Police were set up to guarantee law and order and to control the border with Alaska. When new gold finds were reported near Nome in Alaska in August 1899 the first 8000 gold-seekers returned west, soon to be followed by further people from Dawson City, so that by the 1930s the town had a population of only about 4000. Dawson City retained its position as capital of the Yukon Territory until 1953, when it had to cede it to the up-and-coming Whitehorse.

Today Dawson City has the appearance of a Wild West scene from a Hollywood film, the only difference being that here everything is genuine. Since the 1960s over thirty buildings have been restored by the Canadian Office for the Preservation of Historical Monuments and more wooden houses have been built in the style of the turn of the century. In the early 1980s the whole town was declared an historical area and is now visited every summer by tourists wishing to see can-can shows, visit the old goldfields and savor the atmosphere of days gone by, when the glamour and the misery of the gold-rush left their stamp on the town.

A trip along the Yukon River will be found most rewarding. These trips take in the "cemetery" of the old paddle-steamers.

All around the town are many sites where prospectors used to sift and pan for gold. Anyone wishing to follow in the footsteps of George Carmack can visit the spot by Bonanza Creek where he made his discovery claim. The Visitor Reception Center in Dawson City will provide information about tours to the gold-fields and mines in Bonanza Creek and Guggieville, the massive machines of which were still being used to quarry gold deposits until 1966.