Salty Dawg Saloon a reminder of Homer’s earliest days
The Salty Dawg Saloon has been a Homer Spit landmark for more than 60 years. Part of the structure dates to the end of the 19th century, when the Spit was an on again,...
Category: mining history
Seward’s Brown & Hawkins Store still standing after 117 years
Charles E. Brown and Thomas William “T.W.” Hawkins both came to Alaska in 1898. Brown entered the territory via the route pioneered by the Hudson’s Bay Company – the McKenzie, Rat and Porcupine rivers,...
P&H dragline at Pioneer Park represents early 1900s industrial innovation
When gold was discovered in Alaska at the end of the 19th century, it was individual miners who initially exploited the resource using picks and shovels and other rudimentary equipment. As easy diggings disappeared,...
Marge Gull painting of Casey’s Roadhouse (McKinley’s Roadhouse)
James Casey set up a primitive roadhouse (just a few tents and tarps) along the Delta River, possibly as early as 1901. It was located at what would become Mile 212.5 of the Valdez-Fairbanks...
Moose Creek near Sutton used to be a busy coal-mining area
The face shovel shown in the drawing is a World War II-era Buckeye “Clipper,” built by the Buckeye Traction Digger Company of Findlay, Ohio. It was used at the Premier coal mine on Moose...
Deadwood Cemetery burials tell the history of Central area in Interior Alaska
Turning on to Circle Hot Springs Road at Central and driving about 3/4 mile, you come to Cemetery Road just before crossing Graveyard Creek. About 1/2 mile along Cemetery Road lies a small burial...
Jualpa Camp give glimpse of Alaska-Juneau Mine’s glory days
The buildings shown in the drawing, part of Jualpa Mine Camp, are in Last Chance Basin, located along Gold Creek a mile above Juneau. They are a remnant of the Alaska Juneau Mine (AJ),...
Engine No. 52 in Skagway helped build the White Pass & Yukon Route Railway
Engine No. 52 was the first locomotive on the White Pass and Yukon Route Railway. The drawing shows No. 52 as it looked in 2011, sitting on a siding in the Skagway train...
Hope is only surviving gold camp from Upper Kenai Peninsula gold rush
Downtown Hope in 2014 According to the 1915 U.S.G.S. report, Geology and Mineral Resources of Kenai Peninsula, Alaska, the only recorded instances of Russian gold exploration in Alaska occurred between 1848 and 1851, when...
Navy gambled on Chickaloon coal and lost
Chickaloon bunkhouse at Alpine Historical Park Chickaloon is a small community located just off the Glenn Highway, about 75 miles northeast of Anchorage. Prior to Western contact the area was occupied by...
