Alaska’s Chilkoot Trail
Gold! Gold! Gold! the headline goaded. A listless nation heeded, trading its financial doldrums for its well-worn frontier spirit. From all corners of North America, ordinary people turned toward the cold, dark, remote land that held the stuff of their dreams. Flatlanders mostly, they were in for a surprise when they reached the snowy granitic rampart called Chilkoot Pass.
By Camille Cusumano
It was the Gay Nineties. Scott Joplin coaxed ragtime tunes from pianos, Carry Nation preached temperance as Little Egypt rolled her hips, Mark Twain penned satire, and the Gibson Girl smiled fashionably. But the working class was not smiling. A financial crisis erupted on May 4, 1893. The New York Stock Exchange went into convulsions. Stocks plummeted, foreign trade declined, and 18 percent of the workforce got its walking papers.