{"id":7377,"date":"2021-01-22T21:54:33","date_gmt":"2021-01-23T02:54:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/?p=7377"},"modified":"2021-01-22T22:00:38","modified_gmt":"2021-01-23T03:00:38","slug":"episode-233-yukon-diary-yukon-cabin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/?p=7377","title":{"rendered":"EPISODE 233 YUKON DIARY YUKON CABIN"},"content":{"rendered":"
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EPISODE 233     YUKON DIARY      YUKON CABIN<\/div>\n

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alan skeoch\u2019<\/div>\n
Jan 2021<\/div>\n

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Today is a day for thought.  While  surveying in the Yukon we often came  across<\/div>\n
old log cabins that had been abandoned decades earlier.  Most often they had collapsed but<\/div>\n
A few were habitable.  One of those we lived  in for a time.  Dr. Aho\u2019s book speculates<\/div>\n
on the contents.  Remember the  buildings were small, maybe the size of your living room<\/div>\n
or Your garage.  What was considered  necessary? <\/div>\n

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Our cabin had the luxury of a linoleum floor.  1962.  What else would<\/div>\n
have been there in 1930?  1920?<\/div>\n

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What colour is my nightshirt?<\/div>\n

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Answer <\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The cabins that gold miners built were not large\u2026 about the size of a garage\u2026some bigger, most smaller.<\/div>\n
Dr. Aho speculated on what the interior of these cabins contained.  He  knew.  Dr. Aho spent a lot<\/div>\n
of time looking at these cabins. And talking to the men who lived in them.<\/div>\n

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\u201cThe cabins were rough and unpainted with moss-chinked walls\u2026one or at most two rooms\u2026small four paned windows\u2026.<\/div>\n
doors rough slabs. Furnished with only the bare necessities\u2026.shelves stacked with groceries, tobacco, ore samples,<\/div>\n
gold scales, lanterns, cans, boxes, reading material, candles and ammunition.   In the corners or hung on the walls<\/div>\n
were boots, clothes, dog harness, picks, axes, cobblers’ kits, tools, boxes of junk, pack sacks, moccasins, socks, <\/div>\n
rifles snd moose horns.  On spruce  pole cots were  eider down or fur sleeping bags snd clothes.   A small stove<\/div>\n
firewood, kindling, paper,  water barrel, wash basin and soap in one corner\u2026.small kitchen with utensils\u2026hand made<\/div>\n
table and  chairs.  Brooms from spruce boughs..\u201d (Hills of Silver, The Yukon\u2019s Mighty Keno Hill Mine by Dr. Aaro E. Aho)<\/div>\n

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How did the  cabin smell?  Fishy (cheap, easy to get but rotted fast)\u2026also smell of tobacco\u2026perhaps the odd skin or two being scraped.. foul smell.  And the smell<\/div>\n
of human beings.  Latrine was never far away from the cabin.  Sometimes  very close as \u2018on the back porch\u2019<\/div>\n
This  was  a very rough way to live.<\/div>\n

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Add to all this a 45 gallon oil drum converted into a  kind of furnace with iron legs resting on a bed of rocks.<\/div>\n
Any person staying around Keno City or the mines faced cruel winter temperatures.  Mayo Landing<\/div>\n
is the coldest place to live in North America.   That 45 gallon drum had to be converted into a furnace<\/div>\n
\u2026fed every two hours from a pile of cordwood stacked close by.<\/div>\n
local supplies were soon consumed. Firewood more and more expensive as trees were consumed. Sleep interrupted by need to feed the fire every two hours.<\/div>\n

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Some placer miners  like Jack Acheson shut everything down when freeze up arrived and headed south.<\/div>\n
Over wintering in Keno was something to avoid    But people did stay the winter\u2026still do. Some kept dog teams for winter transportation.  Dogs<\/div>\n
had to eat.   One such person said he would need between 30 to 60 moose just to feed  his dogs.<\/div>\n
Terrible cost on the wild population.<\/div>\n

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Our cabin was pure luxury\u2026we  had a  linoleum floor and a screen door<\/div>\n
On the right side of Bill Dunn is a 45 gallon drum\u2026the winter furnace.  Imagine<\/div>\n
how much of the floor space that hand  made furnace would need Imagine the<\/div>\n
danger if the cordwood and  kindling got just a little too close to the hot drum.<\/div>\n

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Picture of a corner in this  cabin where the miners are panning gold from concentrate.<\/div>\n
Why do this  finishing inside the cabin?  Because the cold outside is  a  killer cold.<\/div>\n
Take a look at the log walls. Lots  of room for mice, perhaps  rats,  to squeeze their<\/div>\n
way inside.<\/div>\n

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This cabin  we found on one of our trails.  Barely big enough to fit a toy car.  Now imagine all<\/div>\n
those items quoted by Aho fitted into this place.  No room to move.<\/div>\n
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This was once the horse stable on Keno Hill\u2019s Wernecke Mine.  There were 98 horses used.   The stable could  not<\/div>\n
possible hold them all.  Half would be stabled in Mayo Landing.  That leaves 48 horses here or nearby.  Tough animals.<\/div>\n
Some still existed in 1962.  Maybe even today in 2021.<\/div>\n

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Log cabins  in Keno City\u2026some big, most small.<\/div>\n

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This is the interior of s cabin we used in Algoma.  Quite spacious.  Big stove.  Marjorie joined  us  on that job.  NO roads. Marjoire<\/div>\n
arrived by train\u2026the ACR\u2026Algoma Central Railwsy.  She brought our cat, Presque Neige, and her electric sewing machine.<\/div>\n
Gave us  all a laugh.  We had wolves  howling at night so the cat became house bound.  And we had  no electricity.  We  still have that<\/div>\n
feather lined  sleeping  bag\u2026comfy.,,fits two people\u2026warm.  Few of the protectors were married (which is understandable).  Mine<\/div>\n
owners provided good company  houses for families.  But small by today\u2019s standards.  When the mine At Elss closed in<\/div>\n
1989 the houses were sold off and trucked to god knows where.  <\/div>\n

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Here is another abandoned\u2026tiny\u2026log cabin.<\/div>\n

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On the Yukon job I packed everything in my rucksack and my brief case.  Packed for three months… everything needed had to<\/div>\n
be in those two bags.  Glad I packed Pierre Berton\u2019s Klondike and Robert Services’ poems. Wish they had been paperbacks.<\/div>\n

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Challenge:  Imagine you have to paick for three months but only have one rucksack.  What would you take?<\/div>\n
\u2026remember to take lots of heavy socks.  Forget your computer and iPhone\u2026useless.  One shirt?  Two pairs<\/div>\n
of pants, 2 underwear\u2026etc. etc.  Camera?  A luxury item but worth taking.. Film?  Hard to get.<\/div>\n

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alan skeoch<\/div>\n
Jan. 2021<\/div>\n

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EPISODE 233     YUKON DIARY      YUKON CABIN alan skeoch\u2019 Jan 2021 Today is a day for thought.  While  surveying in the Yukon we often came  across old log cabins that had been abandoned decades earlier.  Most often they had collapsed but A few were habitable.  One of those we lived  in for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7377","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7377","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7377"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7377\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7377"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7377"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7377"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}