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EPISODE 680 SOAPY SMITH OF SKAGWAY…CON MAN SHOT DEAD
EPISODE 680 SOAPY SMITH OF SKAGWAY…CON MAN SHOT DEAD

alan skeoch

November 18, 2022

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SOAPY SMITH – BUNKO ARTIST OF SKAGWAY

“Pay attention….you could be the lucky man.”

“Who is that speaking.”

“Oh, that’s Sloapy Smith…watch what happens.”

“I am wrapping a $100 dollar bill in one of these bars of shaving soap.

You ould be the lucky man who gets that $100 … Now I will shuffle

the bars of soap. Mix Them up. Try and keep your eyes on the

$100 bar…it could be yours in a moment.”

“How?”

“For $5…just a fiver. This is your chance right now. Who has a five dollar bill

and will get the hundred dollar bill? Just five dollars.”

“And there is a winner. Your name , sir? Show everyone the hundred dollar bill.

No tricks….no slieght of hand. A winner for five dollars,

Now here is how Soapy Smith got the nickname Soapy. He never let on

that the winner of the soap shuffle was a good friend of his. The hundred

dollar bill went back into Soapy/s pocket along with all the five dollar

bills he fleeced from the crowd. Soapy loved to work boom towns…mining

towns for instance…where he was not known. But he did not worry if he

was known because he always had a gang of ruthless hoodlums on his side.

He was a bunko man. Had all sorts of ways to get money from innocent but

greedy newcomers.

Soapy needed towns where law and order were absent. Mining boom towns

always presented good pickings. Skagway was the perfect place for a bunko

man. There was no law and order in the gold rush yeas. Scams were many.

Soapy took slamming seriously. He gathered a gang of like minded criminals.

Tough guys who welcomed the steamships full of gold seekers each of whom

had a grubstake to get him to the gold fields of the Klondike,

Soapy Smith had no intention of climbing the Chilkoot Trail. He had no

intention of beating a horse to death trying to get a ton of food and tools up

the slippery slopes of the mountains behind Skagway. Why do that

when the gold would eventually be brought back through Skagway where

he could get it with little effort.

BUNKO SCAMS

Stories of Soapy Smith vary somwhat but the kernel of truth is present. For instance

I rely on the excellent article by Gen Walton, published February 28, 1011.

Soapy’s most famous scam was the hidden money in the shaving soap caper. Some sources

say he hid a hundred dollar bill in the soap wrapper, Gen Walton says he hid five, ten

and fifty dollar bills. No matter All the bars of soap were won by his associates….

his gang members.

He had a whole suitcase full of scams.

1) Sleight of hand scams were favourites because they were easy to set up and paid off immediately. i.e. the soap scam

2) Gambling in all its forms, except no winners. None.

3) fake stock market scams…sold stock of companies that did no exist

4) real estates scams…gold mines with no gold

5) fake watch and diamond auctions

6) rigged poker games

7) Three card monte (Must find out how to play….see post script)

There is a tendency to regard bunko artists and con men just as non violent thieves stealing money

from greedy customers. Soapy was violent. He gathered gangs of violent men around him. Dealing

with Soapy was no joke. Before he went north to Skagway he ran a gangland empire in Denver,

Colorago. The newspaper editor ran an article exposing Soapy’s criminal activities. How did

Soapy react? With vicious violence. For instance:

“Smith did not want his criminal activities highlighted and he hated the News’allegations against him. He decided to get revenge on Arkins (*editor) and took a friend, “Banjo” Parker, with him. The men hid in the shadows and when Arkins emerged from the newspaper building, Smith struck him over the left temple with a loaded cane fracturing his skull and knocking him to the pavement senseless. Smith then pummeled, kicked, and beat Arkins as Parker stood guard and when Smith was finished with “his brutal work,” both men casually walked away.”

Soapy presided over a criminal gang empire before he ever went to Skagway but,once there, he took control of the town. His gang members greeted newcomers prtetendimg to be journalists or Christian ministers or

other sal of the earth people. Many of the thousands of men arriving in Skagway had money. At least enough to finance the two thousand pound survival package needed to prove to Canadian officials they could survive in the Canadian wildernes Soapy and his men fleeced many gold seekers many of whom would never get beyond Skagway. Violently if necessary. What did Skagway politicians and police do to stop Soapy?

Not much since Soapy’s men were often the various town officials expected to keep the peace. For a while Skagway was Soapy’s town.

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SOAPY SMITH’S GANG IN FRONT OF THEIR HANGOUT, SKAGWAY.

Then one day Soapy’s criminal empire collapsed when he confronted a group of indignant citizens calling themselves

the Committee of 101

“… on 7 July 1898 John Douglas Stewart, a Klondike miner, returned to Skagway carrying a sack of gold dust valued at $2,700. Three of Smith’s gang members learned of his treasure and convinced him to play three-card monte. Unfortunately, Stewart did, and he lost. When he refused to pay the three men grabbed his sack of gold dust and fled.

Stewart reported the theft and as news broke about the robbery broke in Skagway, city-wide indignation grew. Most citizens believed it was Smith’s gang that had committed the crime. Hubbub over the robbery reached fever pitch the following day and that is when the Committee of 101 demanded that Smith return the gold. He refused and claimed that Stewart had lost fairly. The Salt Lake Herald provided a summary of what happened next:

“Soapy got drunk and went out to fight them all. Arriving at the place where an indignation meeting was being held, Soapy found five men guarding the entrance. He rapped Frank Reid, the city engineer, over the head with a rifle. Reid snapped his pistol at Soapy and Soapy shot him in the groin. Standing on one foot Reid put three bullets into Soapy, killing him instantly.”[5]

ABOVE The funeral for Frank Reid , the man who shot Soapy Smith who was, in turn killed

by Soapy Smith before he died.

HOW I REMEMBER SKAGWAY IN 1961

DATELIE SEPT 15, 1961 When I got off the largely empty train in Skagway …coming from the north…a large cruise ship

was docking at the south end of town and a great number tourists flooded Skagway. I had never paid much attention to

the criminal career of Soapy Smith but noticed Skagway’s main street seemed to feature his exploits. Sort of like Chicago’s

misplaced glorification of Al Capne. The drunkenness, and gang centred lawlessness. All really imaginary 1961…tourist lore.Skagway was

a living movie set for the tourists to enjoy. Without the toursits the town was quiet…almost empty. I was lucky. Skagway had

come alive.. Seemed there were a lot of girls dressed in flouncy

dresses reminiscent of the dance hall girls of the 1890’s. There might even have been summer students imitating Soapy Smith

…the bunko side of him. Nice to be a part of the crowd. Met quite a few people who thought I was a local resident.. Must have been my

full beard

“Do you live here in Skagway?”

“Nope, just arrived like you..came down through White Pass on the train.”

“Where are you heading?”

“To Juneau…..have flight booked to Seattle.”

“How will you get to Juneau?”

“Bus, I guess.”

“No roads out of Skagway except ferry and road north to Anchorage.”

“You must be kidding.”

“Why don’t we smuggle you aboard the cruise ship…good food

and nice cruise. We could do it….or try.”

“Sorry….got to get to Juneau. There must be a way.”

“Only the water taxi.”

“Water taxi?”

“Small passenger boat….holds about 10 people tops. Need to reserve.”

Lucky. Got a seat on the water taxi. Quite a thrilling ride south past places where a large glacier was calving

huge chunks of ancient ice into the channel. The water taxi got a lot closer to the

glacier than the cruise ship. Every one on board seemed to take the

trip for granted. Except for me. So excited but tried to hide it.

I’ve often thought would my life be different if I got smuggled aboard that tourist ship.

If I had done that I would miss all the connections….would arrive in Toronto who

knows when. I am not sure if I even spent the night in Skagway. I do remember a feeling

of relief when I paid for the water taxi. I had to leave Skagway as fast as possible.

alanskeoch

THREE CARD MONTE

Three-card Monte – also known as Find the Lady and Three-card Trick – is a confidence game in which the victims, or “marks”, are tricked into betting a sum of money, on the assumption that they can find the “money card” among three face-down playing cards.

Definition: BUNCO ARTIST What does bunco mean in police terms?

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The word bunco comes from the Spanish word “banco,” which means bank, and the term is used by law enforcement to describe several criminal swindles. According to the National Association of Bunco Investigators (NABI), these schemes are also called confidence, or con, games.
November 19, 2022
EPISODE 679 ESCAPING THE YUKON PART 6: HORSES …HORSES DIED LIKE MOSQUITOES S IN THE FIRST FROST (JACK LONDON)

EPISODE 679 ESCAPING THE YUKON PART 6: HORSES …HORSES DIED LIKE MOSQUITOES IN THE FIRST FROST (JACK LONDON)

alan skeoch

Nov. 16, 2022

The White Pass Railway passed over Dead Horse Gulch. A chilling place where an estimated 3,000 hoses are remembered.

Mot all died in tis hellhole . There were other gruesome deaths. Some gold seekers never even fed their horses . Couldn’t afford

to pay imported cost of hay. And there was nothing for the horse to eat even if it managed to reach White Pass.

These horses appear to be carrying imported hay. Sold at high prices to the few

men who tried to take their horses on to Dawson City.

The terrible deaths of 3,000 horses by men who should have cared for these helpless

animals is one of the big stains on the whole Gold Rush adventure. The horses were overloaded

and some simply fell over backwards as they scaled the White Pass.. At night the loads were left

on the horses making their lives even more miserable. No food for the horses. No care at all. Those that

survived the climb to White Pass were often abandoned to starve to death.

The treatment of these poor animals is documented below. Many of their bleaching bones remain in

DEAD HORSE GULCH as a reminder of neglect and gold fever.

3,000 animals die along the White Pass Trail giving it the nickname “the Dead Horse Trail.”

Alaska State Library, Case & Draper Photo Collection, P125-018.

The Trail Turns Deadly

“When the trail was opened by Captain William Moore it was designed for lightly loaded horses and experienced horsemen. It was not designed for the hordes of gold seekers who were bombarding the trail. Within one year of the discovery of gold in the Klondike thousands of people had attempted to cross the trail. Animals were brought up to Skagway on the same steamships that carried people and freight. Ship conditions were very harsh for everyone. Some animals were forced to stand for two weeks straight and did not get the luxury of food and water. If they did not die on their way to the Skagway they were killed in accidents, shipwrecks, or on the trails. Horses, mules, oxen, sheep, and dogs were loaded down, forced to wait in long lines, and exhausted by the trail leading over the pass. It was not uncommon for the trail to be blocked by a fallen horse.There were often long periods of waiting in lines on the trail. Stampeders refused to unload their horses that were weighed down with hundreds of goods as to not waste time reloading them.”

“I must admit that I was as brutal as the rest but we were all mad-mad for gold, and we did things that we live to regret.” -Jack Newman, packer on the White Pass Trail, ca.1897

“At times the trail became impassable due to harsh weather conditions, rain, and mud. Many stampeders retreated leaving their outfits strewn along 40 miles of trail. Horses were not equipped with the constant physical demands, boggy mud holes, and slippery rocks. No one knows the exact amount of animals that took the two trails but it is estimated that 3,000 horses died in a one year period on the White Pass Trail, earning it the nickname “Dead Horse Trail.” It was a brutal journey for man and beast alike. “

“The horses died like mosquitoes in the first frost and from Skagway to Bennett they rotted in heaps. They died at the rocks, they were poisoned at the summit, and they were starved at the lakes; they fell off the trail, what there was of it, and they went through it; in the river they drowned under their loads or were smashed to peices against the boulders; they snapped their legs in the crevices and broke their backs falling backwards with their packs; in the sloughs they sank from fright or smothered in the slime; and they were disemboweled in the bogs where the corduroy logs turned end up in the mud; men shot them, worked them to death and when they were gone, went back to the beach and bought more. Some did not bother to shoot them, stripping the saddles off and the shoes and leaving them where they fell. Their hearts turned to stone- those which did not break- and they became the beasts, the men on the Dead Horse Trail.” -Jack London, Journalist. The God of His Fathers, Doubleday Page & Co., New York, 1914, p. 70-80

Jack London … horrific description of inhumane horse treatment

November 16, 2022
EPISODE 678 ESCAPE FROM YUKON PART 5 DYNAMITE AND SNOOSE… WHITE PASS AND YUKON RAILWAY

EPISODE 678 ESCAPE FROM YUKON PART 5 DYNAMITE AND SNOOSE… WHITE PASS AND YUKON RAILWAY

alan skeoch

Nov. 11, 2022

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November 15, 2022
EPISODE 677 ESCAPING THE YUKON ON A HIGH JACKED PUBLIC BUS in 1961 — CONSIDER THIS EPISODE AN APOLOGY

EPISODE 677 ESCAPING THE YUKON

alan skeoch

Nov. 11, 2022

My planned exit from the Yukon was not as easy as planned.

First crisis was the bus. Big time crisis for me. Given the same situation what

would you have done? Dumb is as dumb does.

I am not sure what the bus looked like. Perhaps like this one but not coloured

like a school bus. The trip began sometime around 1 a.m. In the dark so no

pictures are available.

Mayo Landing was not as glorious as this sign indicates. At least not so in 1961

Stewart Crossing was a postage stamp sized place. Empty. A wilderness bust stop.

I AM SITTING in front of my coputer trying to decide whether this actually happened. Maybe I invented

the story…or exaggerated the story. It has been more than 70 years since I stole that public bus

on that cold Yukon night. Did it really happen? Have I been telling a lie for decades. A big lie,

like ex President Donald Trump I have told the lie so many times to so many

people that I may have come to believe the lie myself.

“On my last nigh in Mayo Landing in the tiny hours of September 13, 1962, I stole a public bus

and drove it …along with passengers ….from Mayo to Stewart Crossing.”

Yes,, it happened and is recorded in my Diary. Just one short sentence. “I took the May bus with

passengers and drove to Stewart Crossing. Had do it.”

So my memory has served me well and this is my chance to unload the events of that evening.

My last evening in Mayo Landing was spent drinking beer with my mining friends. Miners are nomadic.

They meet for a short time…get to know each other…have a few beers together. Then, if they are lucky

they have job for a few months or years until the ore runs out and they have to look for another

pace to hand their hats. Nomads.

And this is more true for geophysical prospectors. Jobs last a few weeks or occasionally

for a whole summer like our Yukon job. When the work is over the men take off for parts unknown…

a kind of diaspora.

We celebrated our friendship that bitter Yukon night. Sept. 12, 1961. Not a crybaby kind of evening. Just last

meeting of people we would never see again. Bill was there and Peter the Biblical scholar and Gilroy

the staker….and Moses Lord representing the native population. Most of them would get very drunk.

I faked it a bit. Only drank a few.,, felt safe doing so for I could sleep on the bus ride

to Stewart Crossing.

The bus was supposed to leave at 1 a.m. or thereabouts. So at 12.30 I shook hands wirh

the boys whose ages ranged from 21 to 61 or older. We had shared a lot of adventures some

of which were recounted in an earlier episode. We had lived and worked rough. We would

never see each other again. And we know it.

“Where the hell is the bus?”

“Looks to be a bit late.”

There were five or six of us waiting in the darkness for the bus. But the bus never

came.

“Happens all the time, the driver is sleeping it off at home. May not show up”

“But I have to be in Stewart Crossing by 6 a.m.”

“You can try to wake him. His cabin is not far. You’ll see the bus.”

“Got to wake him up Will he be drunk?”

“Hard to say.”

“I’ll go get him.”

“Careful of his dogs mind you.”

“Dogs?”

“He has a few huskies … dog team kind. Might not take

kindly to a stranger like you”

If I missed the bus coming down from Dawson City to Whitehorse then

my elaborate plant would collapse. And I did not know what I would

do. pay for a fight from May to Toronto?….with a whole bunch of flight

connections. Would cost a fortune. Worse would be the crashing of my big

plan. I really wanted to find Dead Horse Gulch, the Childoot Pass, Lake

Bennet , Skagway , the ghostly Treadwell Mine, and the

landlocked mysterious city of Juneau where the Tlingit people once lived.

“If the driver does not wake up and the dogs scare the shit out of you, there is

another way.”

“Take the bus.”

“I can’t drive a bus….and certainly don’t want to steal one anyway.”

“Happens all the time…”

“What happens?”

“A passenger takes the bus. Keys are in the ignition.”

Crisis. What to do? Seemed a bit off the wall to try and take the bus. But if I did not do that

then all my plans would fall flat. I remember tentatively entering the bus. Door was open

as if I was expected. Long metal arm did the opening and closing. I pulled the arm and

the door closed. Key was in ignition and when turned the motor rumbled into life. But no

sign the rumble awakened the driver.

I cannot remember whether it was stick shift or automatic. Seems to me there was a floor

shift which I slipped into first gear and the bus was on the move. At the Mayo Hotel I stopped.

May as well take the passengers with me Five or six of them. Local indigenous relatives of

Moses Loord no doubt. They did not bat an eye. Flopped into seats as if this was a normal

situation.

The thought of insurance risk popped into my head. Was i risking the lives of these people.

The thought popped out just as fast. I had other things to consider. Like lights. Road gear.

Pitch black highway. I took it slow. Only 33 miles to Stewart Crossing . Lots of time as the Dawson

southbound bus was not expected until dawn.

What can go wrong? Gas! Was the bus gassed cup. Seemed so. I got more confident as the

miles rolled by. Traffic in the early hours of Sept. 13 was nil. All I had to do was keep the moving

and scan he road for moose. Did I have high or low beams? No idea and not much chance

to check. Confidence increased.

Was the road gravel or tarmac? Try to keep to centre. Test brakes gingerly but keep moving.

What if I stopped and could not start again? Keep cool.

Population of Stewart Crossing is ten. Ten people with most of those ten living

in lonely cabins hidden away in the wilderness.

We reached Stewart Crossing and rolled to stop on the gravel. I had expected A small village.

instead I found about the loneliest place on earth. One tiny white wood clad place with a sign

reminding drivers this was the last place to get gas before Dawson City one way and Whiteouse

the other.

Not open. So we sat in the bus until the Dawson us rolled to stop at 6 a..M

And that was the end of Mayo Landing adventure and the beginning of another.

When I write these episodes I try to be self-deprecating. No one wants to read a puffed up ego. I doubt there would be many

readers of that kind of episode. The bus episode is different. Seems a little too self centred… Seems to have a load self-glorification. Sorry about that.

For that I apologize . It was a big event in my life. Fondly remembered.

alan skeoch

Nov. 109, 2022

November 11, 2022
EPISODE 675 ESCAPE FROM THE YUKON PART 2

Note: This episode may offend. I am trying to draw an accurate picture of our Yukon job in 1961which

stood out in sharp contrast to the summer of 1960 in Ireland. My Irish readers will be amused I imagine.

This is a long read…next will be shorter. Of course some of you only look at the

pictures anyway.

Episode 675 The Great Escape — Part 2 Leaving the Yukon

alan skeoch

nov. 4, 2022

Page from my diary and picture of Bill D in front of one of our cabin campsites.

Another campsite…less lusxurious..messy…

There was a thin skim of ice cross the Yukon swampland around Wernecke, a tiny mountain top mine town near Keno City. Hardly a City

Keno may have had a population of 50, likely less, today 20l. In its glory days it accommodated a clutch of hookers

who had arrived to exploit the sexual fantasies of the Wernecke Miners. Their presence only offended Mr Wernecke himself.

The arrival of the girls confirmed the comment I had first

heard at Elliot Lake.

“You can always tell if a mine is going to be successful.”

“How?”

“If the hookers arrive.”

“No hookers now…Keno is almost a ghost town.”

“They came here when Dawson City lost its stone pockets full of gold dust.

“Yukon Lill and her clutch of similar minded girls”

“One of those girls returns every summer…rents a house in Mayo Landing.

Real nice lady who will lend a few bucks for beer or an O.P. if she likes you.”

Lots of local colour in the Yukon. We were working around Wermekle, now long abandoned. The nearby Elsa mine

was booming. Silver Ore by the ton was being blasted and sacked. The year was

1961 and Dr. Paterson had sent me to the Yukon for s summer of geophysical

exploration. Simply put, Listening to beeps on his rand new Ronka invention….a machine that could

detect conductors beneath the ground….deep down. The 1950’s and 1960’s were heady

years for mining exploration.

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This is Mayo Landing in boom times…a thousand or more sacks of silver ore waiting for the arrival of a steamboat to take the raw ore from Elsa halfway across North America to be refined. You probably did not

see the sacks of ore at first. Mayo Landing was not much of a town even in boom times. That’s Luigis greasy spoon restaurant on raw the left…attached to the Mayo Landing hotel neither of which buildings

are stunning. We spent a lot of time in that hotel as did most of the village .

The grey buidling is the Mayo Landing Hotel…..centre of town…only place to get beer

or a double OP. Or bacon and eggs at Luigi’s tiny restaurant. Spartan living.

This was our Dodge Power Wagon…looks good but that good appearance did not last when one of the boys rolled the truck off a mountain road. Rolled

like a bowling ball ending up vertical and able to claw its way back up to the road which was really a track. Hard to kill a Power Wagon.

I was just a kid really. Twenty one years old. Fresh grad from University of Toronto, History grad

although I kept that fact quiet . “Pretend you are a geologist..or a geophysicist…no one will know”

For almost a decade I spent my summers in the Canadian wilderness. Punching my way through

the immense boreal forest called Canada. Black flies, sow belly, oatmeal raw, gmn rubbers with holes

wet socks and feet boiled and pock marked from the water turned to tepid slop by my own bloodstream.

This was tough work. Doubt many of my friends would want to be Instrument Men. Most quit. The pay was

four hundred dollars a month which included room and board. Room and board! That’s a laugh. Rooms

were tents. Nondescript tents ripped and rotten from being backpacked across the wilderness. Beds were wire

strung pics of canvas that soon collapsed and were no longer. The alternative was pine boughs. Not soft, lumpy

and prickly. Food was bad most of the time. On one job we had to slice off a half inch from

a slab of the sowbelly every morning. Burned it in the fire. Why? Bsude the blow flies lay their eggs in it. Given a short

time and the sowbelly began to move on its own. Wormy. Maggots. Sowbelly? Yes, complete with the sow’s tits.

Smoked sowbelly did not spoil fast as long as kept in a slab. Just the end attracted the blow flies. At least

I liked to think that was true. I suppose a worm or two would not hurt me.

Now That paints a worse possible scenario. The other extreme also occurred. Motels, hotels. prepared meals,

warm beds, Sometimes even luxurious living conditions as on the Irish job in 1960.

That’s the setting for anyone reading this recollection. Why write it? This is November, 2022. My Yukon adventure was

hte summer of 1961. A long time ago. But the memory of my escape from the Yukon is as fresh as the rain water in

a moose track in spongy moss. Swamp? Canada has miles and miles of swamps. Matched by

miles and miles of exposed rock. A lot of land that nobody wants…swamp and rock. Both have their terrors. One summer day

I was parched…saliva as dry as popcorn from slogging across rounded rock intrusions and was overjoyed to find a swamp. Flopped down on

hands and knees and sunk my lips into a patch of that water where a moose had passed by. Closed my eyes. Our bodies are 90% water.

We cannot get along without it. Delicious cool water slaked my thirst. How did I know a moose had passed by before me? I opened my eyes to discover

a moose had taken a shit in the same small pool. Pile of turds the size of shotgun shells.,,beige and grassy in a neat pile of 20 or so.

How did I know that? Because moose left these little piles as evidence of their presence.

God, the Yukon stories are as numerous as the stars in the sky. Take the assayer Gerald Preist who lived in a company

cabin with his wife and two little girls. Lovely family. True. Were it not for the fact Gerald was’ high grading’ (stealing)

tons of galena and hiding it in an abandoned part of the mine. Later he was caught. He hired trucks to haul the stollen

galena … planned to claim he had his own secret mine. He got caught when one of his truckers stopped in Elsa for

a coffee and a nosy mine executive sliced open a sack. All happening while we were there. Unknown to us. (Now a

book written by his daughter titled A ROCK FELL ON THE MOON. Should be a movie.

Gerald Priest on the right…squatting on the doorstep of a typical abandoned Yukon cabin.

Just a sample …The Yukon was more than an adventure. It was an education.

PLANNED ESCAPE

I loved the job. Even when conditions were terrible there was the exultation … the sense of victory over nature.

Victory over the worst human nature could pitch. Survival; Hard to describe this feeling unless personally experienced.

Sadly there was not much for people to do in the Yukon…normal social life absent. What to do on those long winter

nights in the land of the summer midnight sun and winter darkness? Drink booze…alcohol was available not matter what the season.

Acceptance of rampant alcoholism in the Land of the Midnight sun. Acceptance that there was nothing much I could do to mend the broken

lives of those with whom I worked. Joy shared by men who found small joy in a case of beer or larger joy in a glass of over proofed rum.

Overproof rum? The is rum the contains more that 50% alcohol. Some over 60% Common in Yukon in 1960’s and in gold rush days.

Dr. Aho, one of our contractors Dr. Aho’s loved treating newcomers to ‘double OP’s’ in the Mayo Landing bar. A good joke…falling down

drunk on one drink. Just enough to make the world topsy turvy fast. Little wonder that so many half ton trucks were bashed up.

We bought a GMC power wagon that had been rolled more than an eight pin bowling ball. We lost a man one day and had to backtrack down a stream bed

since there was no tracks to our camp other than the rock strewn river. We found him and the GMC Power Wagon stranded mid stream

where he had run out of gas. He was falling down drunk…sleeping it off in the sure knowledge we would find him and there would be

no consequences other than a good story shared by miners in the bar at Mayo Landing. I cannot mention his name because his kin

still live in Mayo. Dr. Aho baptized me with a double OP and I was glad there was a wall to hand on to. One was enough. Well, maybe

two just to prove I was one of the gang. Best to fit in.

No body died on the job. Being drunk was a kind of twisted badge of courage. Like Taking a leak wherever convenient, alcohol was de rigour.

We only had one death on that job. Our pilot’s wife, Yvonne, committed suicide. She had two delightful

little girls who took a shine to me whenever I arrived in Mayo. Her death saddened me when I heard about it. Yvonne did not drink.

She was a wonderful mother…gregarious and warm hearted…French Canadian. I suppose it happened this way. She was

  Surrounded in the darkness of the Yukon winter by men and a few

women who were quite content to spend the star studded blackness of the winter months boozing it up using the Northern Lights

as street lamps to their cars and trucks. Or, more likely, living in the Spartan rooms in the Mayo Landing Hotel. Upstairs from the bar.

Tragic. Yvonne’s death puts too much of a shadow on my Yukon days. there were so many good times that summer.

Good times as defined by a 21 year old quasi adolescent male making his way in an

world filled with unusual adults. Like Pete who had memorized the Holy Bible just so he could argue with religious people

who likely had never opened the holy book. Funny guy. Must have been over 60 years old…really too old for bush

work but he had no other choice.

PLANNED ESCAPE

The job ended early that September. Cold and rain…even ice and snow began to blanket the Yukon. No more work to do other

than crate up the equipment and ship it to Toronto by truck in the sure and certain belief it would arrive. Not so sure, really. My company, Hunting

Technical and Exploration Services, expected me to fly home about the same time. I had no plan to do so. I had a planned escape of

my own. So I cashed in my flight ticket then plotted my escape from the Yukon.

Mammoth tooth…this kind was found in Dublin Gulch

Caribou Antleers, wind scoured logs of Yukon Spruce…better than any sculptor could do…done by fire and wind.,

Three Mayo kids playing in an ancient truck. Beside them is the Stewart River. Moses Lord eating his lunch from

a can of peaches gave me the idea of a diet of cold pork and beans.

The things I shipped home by cartage company were a joke in camp. Three wind scoured trees hollowed out after

a forest fire swept through years ago. Pretty to me. And a large set of caribou antlers that a local aboriginal said I could have

if I wanted them. And a large tooth of an ancient hairy mammoth washed outl by an hydraulic hose in Dublin Gulch.

Could have bought some gold nuggets at $35 an ounce but didn’t want to waste my escape money. Gold? I had already sent

Marjorie sprinklings of gold dust stuck on black electrical tape. Gold dust gleaned from abandoned barrels of concentrate panned

in evenings with Bill D. (best to not give his full name, he may be alive … may be a priest or Sunday school teacher and would not

like to be reminded of his past)

Bill D. Let me tell you a bit about him. He was about my age and became a good friend in spite of his misdemeanours. We each had women

in our lives. Marjorie sent me big boxes of home made cookies…

crumbs by the time they reached Mayo Landing post office. And lots of love letters. Bill did not get letters or cookies. For good reason. No love letters.

“She does not even know where I am….and I bet she does not give a sweet goddamn anyway. Can’t say as I blame her.”

This is his story which could be true even though it sounds fabricated. He came from Peterborough, Ontario, arriving in the Yukon in early June, 1961.

About the same time I arrived. Similar? Not at all.

“The night before my wedding, my friends got me really drunk and drove me to Toronto … booked me

on a flight to Edmonton on my wedding day”

“What about your wedding?”

“Don’t know…never checked.”

“Left her at the altar?”

“She’s better off without me.”

The story is a little hard to believe. Perhaps Bill just left the poor girl at the altar…bad enough.

Bill D. and Alan Skeoch doing a little rafting

Was this true? Sounds fictional. Who booked and paid for the flight to Edmonton…then on

to Whitehorse? An expensive and insensitive practical joke. Perhaps exaggerated with

a kernel of truth. Over the summer Bill got into a lot of trouble. He took the drinking culture

seriously and sometimes did not show up for work. That was hard to take but Bill was not

alone; If men were sent to town, i.e Mayo, I was never sure they would get back. But Bill aways came

back. He was a joy to have around. Lots of stories. Outlandish. For instance he got in serious difficulty

with a local Mayo girl.

“It was dark in their house but we still managed to roll around on the floor. Mind you the term

Roll around on the floor is just a figure of speech.”

“I get it.”

“When I woke up the whole family were sleeping in the room…scared the bejabbers out of me.

They must have been there all night while we were rolling around “

“Serious affair, Bill?”

“Not by me but she thought so. Took a knife to me in the truck one night.”

“Hard to believe.”

“True. We had been drinking and for some goddamn reason she hauled out a knife

and tried to cut me up. Too drunk to do any serious damage.”

“What happened after that?”

“I got the hell away … not going back.”

So many Yukon stories, they have bounced around my brain for more than 60 years.

Never will be able to get them out of my head. Never want to.

But this is a story about my escape from the Yukon. Not the Yukon job which is the subject of

other episodes l I made detailed plans of my escape all that summer.

I would not leave the Yukon by air as Huntech and Dr. Paterson expected. When the job was

over I would make my exit slowly. There were places I wanted to see.I had a bit of cash stashed

but most of my escape money would come from cashing in my return air fair. No one would

get upset. The job was over and the money was mine. I figured no one really cared whether

I got back to the Huntech office on a Monday or a Thursday, Job was over.

ALONE

I would be alone. Travelling alone is not pleasant. Goddamn lonely…and sometimes frightening

when the sun goes down. I do not recommend lonely travel. Sometimes though it is the best

way to meet people. And the fastest way to get to places.

A LITTLE MORE MONEY WAS WELCOME

“Alan, you might need some extra cash. Your escape will cost more than that air ticket.”. said Bob Gilroy, one night in the hotel bar.

“I know that. Figure to save money by not eating much…few cans of cold pork and beans.”

“How will you cook them up?”

“I won’t . Cold cans of pork snd beans have already been cooked. So all I need is a can opener

and a fork. No dishes. No costs.”

‘How would you like to spend a couple of days tagging climate…give you some extra cash.”

“Never staked claims before.”

“No staking involved…just put fresh tags on the old claims….easy.”

“Count me in.”

Tsgging claims was not as easy as it sounds. First it was necessary to find the old claim posts

by blazes barely visible… made years ago.. Not easy to do. And if the blazes were not found then the

claims posts would not be found and I would spend my last two days circling and circling. Lost getting in…worse, lost

getting out. And I was alone.

Our earth is so heavily populated today that most people have never

got lost in a boreal forest. Never had that sinking feeling of being absolutely alone.

A thin layer of ice covered the swampy land. Not enough to hold my weight so that each step the ice shattered like

window glass and the shards marked my pathway in and might help me get back out.

. After three months of trekking back and forth in our surveys my gum

rubbers were worn thin. No longer waterproof so the cold water got sucked into my boots whereupon my bl00d

and friction heated my wet socks ‘… a dirty soup. My feet were boiled every day with the result that they looked

like London after a Hitlerian bomber raid. Pock marked, blanched and pealing. I should never have taken this

extra job. Needed a man with good boots and dry socks. A better man than me.

Then there is the creeping fear when alone in the bush. Hard to tell where you are unless the blazes line up correctly.

The sure and certain presence of bears had to be considered. Hopefully the pebbles in the tin can around my

waiste would alert wild creatures of my my presence. Peter, the Bible reader, shot a grizzly bear near this very swamp… a pointless

act of violence.

Let me conclude this long but of memory with three pictures

1) All our gang of six for seven men took a two day week end holiday and drove in a

half ton ruck to Dawson City….a long haul from Mayo. “Bunch of the boys were hooping

it jus” as RpovertService said . Remember sleeping in a bathtub in a two bit hotel.

We had fun….juvenile fun with new found friends. There of us had to like in

raw back of the truck.

2) Panning for gold dust in the evenings when we discovered several 45 gallon drums

of concentrates abandoned in the bush. Gold pans had to be burned to incinerate any grease.

3) And then there were the flies. Billions of them. Summer along the Stewart River is not

pleasant unless a strong wind blows. I gave lots of blood that summer. Enough for a Red

Cross blood bank.

Enough! See pis below.

November 7, 2022