Digital Bob Archive

The trail to the Yukon country for a majority of the hundreds of prospectors who went there from Juneau and Douglas between 1882 and 1898 was via Dyea and the Chilkoot Pass. The White Pass and the Dalton Trail route over Chilkat Pass were not much used until the Klondike Rush started in 1897, while the Taku route got little attention until the rush to Atlin started in 1899.

Although Indians from the Atlin area knew about the Taku route and made some use of it, no early reports of its use by white men have been found. It was the explorer, Lieutenant Frederick Schwatka, who first brought the Taku country and its potential as a travel route to public attention.

In 1883 Schwatka had explored the entire length of the Yukon River and had published a couple of books about the journey. On May 21, 1891, he arrived in Juneau, again enroute to the Yukon and this time was accompanied by Dr. C. Willard Hayes of the U.S. Geological Survey. Hayes wrote later, in the National Geographic Magazine, \"The original plan was to go over Chilkoot pass and down the Lewes, following the regular miners' route to the interior; but on reaching Juneau, at the request of the citizens, backed up by their substantial assistance, it was decided to go in by way of Taku River, with a view to determining whether a trail for pack-animals could be constructed over that route.\"

The party left Juneau for the mouth of the Taku River on May 25 and just a month later the Juneau City Mining Record published a letter from Schwatka, written at \"Great Lake,\" which was either Lake Atlin or Lake Teslin, on June 16. He said they had been a week on the river and two weeks on the trail.

\"As to the river,\" he wrote, \"It is 38 miles from the mouth to the forks and four from there to the head of canoe navigation. I feel fairly sure a powerful river steamer can make the Forks at the stage of water we saw. A good trail leads from the forks to the head of canoe navigation.

\"As to the trail, it is 79 miles across and I feel sure a pack train route could be readily constructed. The greatest obstacle is not mountains but swampy valleys and mosquitoes, there being enough of the latter to kill ordinary mules, I believe.

\"The country is open enough to construct a wagon road or even a railroad if the traffic justified. From here and on to the big lake a river steamer can reach the Yukon.

\"I have no doubt that you can get stuff in cheaper by the trail than by Chilkat if enough of it can be had to justify establishing a pack train. The citizens of Juneau must judge that part of it.\"

The citizens of Juneau apparently decided such a project was not justified.
The route via Chilkoot Pass was familiar and well established and there seemed no good reason at that time to open a new one. That would have to await a future gold discovery.