Digital Bob Archive

The mineral potential of the Taku region long interested prospectors from Gastineau Channel, but records of their work are scanty and most of their claim notices, when they filed any, are buried in Canadian archives. It is known that in 1922 local residents J.O. Kirkham, Carl Carlson, Glenn Kirkham, G.L. Johnson and A.W. Smith staked a group of claims on gold lodes about a mile up the Tulsequah River, a stream that enters the Taku a short distance above the boundary.

The Kirkham-Carlson-Smith property, as the claims became known, was examined by Superintendent L.H. Metzgar of the Alaska Juneau mine in 1923 and upon his recommendation the Treadwell Company bonded the claims. Apparently little was done on the claims until 1928 when development work began under the direction of Dan Williams who was also in charge of the Hirst-Chichagof mine on Chichagof Island. That activity may have triggered the stampede that followed in 1929.

One of the discoveries reported in 1929 was the Bull Moose group on the Taku a short distance above the mouth of the Tulsequah. They were located by Victor Manville for himself and a number of Juneau residents including Charles Goldstein, Isadore Goldstein, Dr. Robert Simpson, A. Hendrickson, Minard Mill, Mrs. Carol Goldstein and Miss Minnie Goldstein. I. Goldstein was quoted as saying that they had rejected an offer of a million dollars from one company and that several others were after the property.

That is the kind of talk that is common during mining stampedes, and it does nothing to quench the fever. But the Bull Moose group evidently did have some merit because the Alaska Juneau Company took an option on it and on five other claims known as the Sparling group. These had been discovered by E.B. \"Buck\" Sparling. Associated with him were Dave Housel, William Strong, C.F. Wyller, Fred Teidt, F. Schwartz and Glen Neitzeit, all of Juneau.

Another claim, the Tulsequah Chief, was being developed in 1929 by the United Eastern Mining Company, with John B. Stapler, a California mining man, in charge of the work.

There were predictions during the winter of 1929-30 that as many as a thousand men might invade the Taku country in the summer of 1930, and the Juneau Chamber of Commerce grew apprehensive. The Mining Committee of the Chamber was instructed \"to prepare figures on the cost of a season's prospecting in the Taku District and assemble other data about the district.\" Said the newspaper headline on February 13, 1930, \"CHAMBER OF COMMERCE WILL TAKE STEPS TO GUARD AGAINST UNDERFINANCED PROSPECTING.\"

The Chamber's fears appear to have been unwarranted; the big influx of prospectors, either broke or well-heeled, failed to materialize. However, there was some further prospecting and some development work in 1930. The Alaska Juneau Company in particular put men and machinery to work on both the Big Bull and the Sparling groups of claims.