Year: 2010

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Bishop William Ridley

William Ridley was born on this day, July 22, 1836 in Devonshire, England.
In 1896 Bishop Ridley (of the Anglican Diocese of Caledonia – the area of Northern British Columbia, Canada) arrived after his travels up the Stikine River with the first miners on their way to the Klondyke. After he returned he looked for someone to carry out missionary work with the miners and Tahltans. Ridley translated the catechism into the Tsimshian language, in collaboration Odille Morison, a Tsimshian. This became the so-called “Ridley orthography,” the language’s first practical spelling system.

Previous to coming to the Klondyke he had been working in India. He was Bishop of Lake Bennett, Tagish, and Carcross 1898, but retired to England where he died in 1911.
Ridley Island, now an industrial site near Prince Rupert, British Columbia, is named for him, as are numerous Tsimshian extended families with the Ridley surname in Metlakatla, Alaska, and in Hartley Bay and Kitkatla, British Columbia.

Yukon genealogy; “From sea to sea the Dominion” by Tucker; Wikipedia

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Walter Monastes

Walter, 17 years old was a steward on the sternwheeler steamboat Florance S in July 1900. The Florance S, a 100 ton 75 foot ship, was built in 1898 and was originally owned by Seattle-Yukon Transportation Company. It was sold to Captain Sydney Charles Barrington in 1900. When it rolled over at a corner and foundered in the “Thirtymile” section of the Yukon River, Walter, and passengers Mrs. Stewart, and her daughter Ada all drowned there. (Various sources also say that the ship rolled on July 25 or July 29, 1900). The boat was sidelined for a few months and then converted to a barge in 1901. It was resold to Captain Wallace Langley in 1905. It was owned by George S. Black by 1939.

Although Captain Barrington was the captain of this ship, a man named Jordan was at the wheel at the time of the accident, and was arrested for manslaughter.

Young Walter Monastes was from Skagway, and his body was shipped here and buried in the Gold Rush Cemetery.

Dawson Funeral Index; NWMP report; Wikipedia; ExploreNorth

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George Herbert Kingswell

“Over six feet tall with a mighty stutter and matching temper.”

George Herbert Kingswell was born on this day, July 20, in 1867, the last of ten children, in Kew, Invercargill, New Zealand. His father was both a very successful sheep farmer and equally successful business man with interests in fellomongery, local rail, and property development. But George was a wanderer and traveled the world (Australia, Hong Kong, San Francisco, Alaska and South Africa) as a reporter for various newspapers. His life is so extensive that books have been written about him.

As a freelance mining correspondent for the Australian Press he went chasing the gold rush in Klondyke Alaska. Reaching Dyea Alaska in August 1897. To support himself as a journalist he took to trading fur coats. By mid-1898 he was back as editor of the Coolgardie Miner in Western Australia. He died in 1931 in Capetown South Africa. The picture above was taken in 1915 of his family in South Africa.

austenfamily.org; Kingswell, War Correspondent the biography of George Herbert Kingswell, written by his daughter Elma Kingswell; The Dictionary of South African biography.

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Frank H. Reid

The famous or infamous Frank Reid died on this day July 19, 1898, having been shot in the groin by Soapy Smith on July 8, 1898. He was born in either 1850 or 1844, but it was 1850 in the 1880 Linn County census with his brother, D.V.S. Reid. Both were born in Illinois. His grand-neice came to Skagway and said that the H. in his name stood for Harold.

Frank was a graduate engineer and a teacher in Linn County, Oregon District 29 in the 1870’s. In 1898 he came to Skagway and created the Map of Skagway which was adopted on March 6, 1898 by the City. He had worked with W. Thibaudeau to plat the streets.
Earlier, he had been a Lt. in Mart Brown’s Company of Oregon Volunteers.

Klondike Stampeders Register p80; Mission Klondike, Sinclair; phot above – Eloise Short and Kathryn Baker (right) stand by grand uncle Frank H. Reid’s monument during a visit to the Gold Rush Cemetery in 1990. Photo by Jeff Brady

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“Little Egypt”


Known by her stage name of “Little Egypt”, Fahruda Manzar Spyropoulos born in Syria in 1871 became famous for her belly dancing at the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893. She apparently danced in Skagway and went to the Klondike. Much later, in 1933 she danced in the Chicago World of Progress Fair and then drifted into obscurity.

YA National Museum Of Canada Collection #816; Wikipedia

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Ida Shonkwiler Kirmse

The first Mrs. Herman Kirmse was born in Oregon in February 1869, and came to Skagway with the family in August 1898. She died on this day, July 15, 1900 of convulsions in Skagway, but was buried in Seattle.

Herman then remarried in September of 1900, to Hazel Cleveland. They lived here for a couple of years, but then Herman accidentally drowned in Ketchikan after he fell off the dock there in 1912. The rest of the family stayed only a few years and were gone by the next census in 1920.

The Kirmse’s curio store has recently seen a revival with antique displays and other antiques for sale (corner of 5th and Broadway).
Coincidentally, today a man came in and asked about the “Kirmse Clock” on the mountainside. He was amazed that a clock could have been taken up there over a hundred years ago. Despite being told that the clock is just painted on the rock, he still chose to believe it is a real clock. Alas, we did not argue with him, he went off happy.

Skagway Death Record; census; correct spelling of Shonkwiler from descendent (wrong in Skagway death record)

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Robert M. Parkins

Mr. Parkins, born about 1867 died on this day, July 14, 1901 in Skagway and was buried in the Gold Rush Cemetery by the Skagway Fire Department.

Skagway Death Record. Parkins coat of arms above.

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Joseph H. Brooks


Mr. Brooks came to Skagway in 1897 from Vancouver. He was a merchant and wrangler. His company “J.H. Brooks, Packer and Freight” was headquartered in the St. James Hotel.
He is famous for taking 15 mules over the Chilkoot Pass and later took 335 mules over. He claimed that he and a Mr. Turner had first blazed the trail. He returned to Skagway in 1934 to collect information for his book and died on this day, July 13, 1934 on the Chilkoot Trail. He was born about 1867 and was about 67 years old when he died and was buried in the Pioneer Cemetery. Pictured above is the St. James Hotel where it now sits behind the Hardware Store on 4th Avenue.

Dahl book; photo of his card on p.25 of Skagway, District of Alaska 1884-1912 by Robert L.S. Spude,; Minter; Pennington

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Daniel George Cock


The Reverend Daniel Cock was the Presbyterian minister in Skagway from 1899 until 1901 for Reverend Dickey.
Rev. Cock was born in Truro, Nova Scotia on this day July 12, 1874 where his forefathers had been Presbyterian ministers since 1770.
This Reverend Daniel George Cock died on April 20, 1958 in Canada.

Above is a headstone from the cemetery in Truro of the first Daniel George Cock (grandfather probably):
“Rev. Daniel Cock the first minister of this township He was a native of Clydesdale Scotland and was ordained to the office of the holy ministry at Greenock where he held a charge a number of years. In 1772 he accepted a call from the People of Truro where he continued to discharge the duties of his office until disabled by the infirmaties of age. He died on the 17th day of March 1805 aged 88”

Mills p 29, 69; Yukon site; Ulster-Scot History site online; findagrave.com

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Skookum Jim Mason

Tagish-Tlingit packer Jim Mason or Keish which meant “Lone Wolf”, was also known as “Skookum (the Chinook term for strong) Jim” for his feat of carrying 156 pounds of bacon over the pass in a single trip. As a young man he worked as a packer, carrying the equipment and supplies of early prospectors over the mountain passes from the seacoast to the headwaters of the Yukon river. It was while doing this that he met Carmack, and the two formed a partnership that included Dawson Charlie as well.

Skookum Jim, his sister Kate Carmack and her husband George Carmack as well as Dawson Charley discovered gold at Bonanza Creek in the Yukon. This eventually led to THE GOLD RUSH which affected the entire world.

Jim was part of the Carcross Tagish band born in either Carcross or Dyea about 1856. He died on this day, July 11, 1916 in Carcross of a kidney ailment or Bright’s disease at the age of 60.

Johnson book: Canadianmysteries.ca; Gates; Yukon Archives 1087#8