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Roadway to the Arctic
In all of North America, across the vast wilderness of northern Canada and Alaska, only one year-round public highway
crosses the Arctic Circle, the Dempster Highway.
The Dempster Highway is located in the Yukon and Northwest Territories. The road starts approximately 25 miles
east of Dawson City and continues north northeast 736 km (457 miles) to Inuvik.
Before the arrival of European fur traders, the Dempster Highway region north of Dawson was inhabited by the Kutchin people, part of the Athabaskan family. They hunted caribou and moose and fished in the rivers to provide their winter food. Europeans came to this harsh country with the fur trade and established Fort McPherson as a Hudson's Bay Company outpost.
With the traders came the North West Mounted Police. According to Onroute Travel Source, the early trail was
primitive and difficult to pass in winter. In the early days, the Mounties sent a yearly dog-sled patrol along
the trail between Dawson and Fort McPherson. In 1911, four men and fifteen dogs set out for the winter patrol from
Fort McPherson, only to be swallowed up by the bitter cold, deep snow, and raging winds. The members of the "Lost
Patrol" were found dead, after enduring 53 days of hardship on the trail, located only 40 kilometers from
their starting point.
Alaska Gold!
It was at Bonanza Creek, just outside Dawson that Skookum Jim Mason, George Washington Carmack and Tagish Charley
had struck it rich in August 1896, starting off the Klondike Gold Rush that eventually caused thousands to come
north in search of gold.
After the Klondike Gold Rush, prospectors looked for paydirt in the Ogilvie Mountains, but weather and travel difficulties
hampered prospecting.
In the 1950s a potential for oil was discovered on the Eagle Plains, a settlement just south of the Arctic Circle
and a gravel bed road was developed in the mid and late 50s.
Try This!
Locate Fort McPherson and follow the road south 40 km (25 miles). What geographical features might have caused
wind and accumulated deep snow on the fateful trip in 1911?
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