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The White Pass or Skagway Trail wandered 45 miles from Skagway to Lake Bennett and was one of the two passes that opened up the interior of the Yukon. It had been named by William Ogilvie, the Canadian government surveyor, after Thomas White, the Canadian Minister of the Interior.
Although it was lower in elevation than Chilkoot Pass and stock animals could be used to pack supplies, the trail turned into a nightmare of death and horror for those who used it. The route crossed swamps, bogs, high mountains, deep canyons, dense forests and areas of large boulders. Hundreds of streams and creeks had to be crossed, many flooding after heavy rains. With the thousands of pack animals and prospectors tramping down the trail it soon became deeply rutted and muddy and was difficult for animals to walk over. It was so narrow that two animals had trouble passing each other.
At times, because of flooding, snow slides or dead animals, the trail became blocked for days and people and animals were backed up clear to Skagway. Nothing was more pitiful than the plight of the horses used to pack supplies over the trail to Lake Bennett. Many were in bad shape before being brought to the trail from the West Coast, and the packers had no idea how to handle them. Their only concern was to get to Lake Bennett the fastest way possible.
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Most of the 3,000 animals used on the trail died in Dead Horse Canyon, and the heaps of carcasses left travelers with a sight they never forgot. It is no wonder that the Chilkoot Trail was more popular with the stampeders.The early dream of Captain Moore for a railroad crossing the mountains was about to come true. A meeting in Skagway between Sir Thomas Tancrede, Representing a group of British investors, and Mike Heney, a railroad contractor, resulted in the formation of the White Pass and Yukon Railroad Company in April 1898. Serious doubts were raised as to the feasibility of building a railroad through the steep mountains, but Heney insisted he could do it. Construction began on May 27th, 1898. Brackett's Wagon Road was bought out, as the road would be put out of business upon completion of the railroad. Part of the route of the railroad follows the old wagon road. To save construction costs a three-foot narrow gauge line was decided on. This reduced the roadbed from 15 feet to 10 feet, an important factor in this mountainous terrain.
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The track reached the summit of White Pass on February 18, 1899, but was stopped by the Canadian authorities at the international border. It took some persuasion, a bottle of scotch and a little trickery before work could proceed past the border. The tracks were completed to Lake Bennett on July 6, 1899.The only tools the workers had were picks, shovels and blasting powder. The construction continued all through the winter months with high winds, cold and blizzards making work extremely difficult. Many of the workers stayed only long enough to earn a grub stake and then joined the endless procession of stampeders heading for Dawson or the new gold discovery at Atlin, British Columbia. Construction had also started from the northern terminus at Whitehorse, and the tracks met at Carcross, Yukon Territory, on July 29, 1900.With the completion of the route (at a cost of about $10,000,000) the mountains were no longer a barrier to people wishing to enter the interior of the Yukon. The railroad also operated river boats to Dawson in the summer and a stage line in the winter.
In 21 miles to the summit, the railroad climbs 2,885 feet with an average grade of 2.6 percent. It consists of 20 miles in Alaska, 32 miles in British Columbia and 58 miles in the Yukon for a total of 110 miles. With the decline in gold production in mid century, the railroad came upon hard times. During World War II the U.S. Army took it over and the line served a vital role in hauling supplies for the construction of the Alaska Highway. In 1982 economic conditions and the closing of mining activity in the Yukon forced the railroad to close. As of this writing the railroad still runs from Skagway to the summit with future plans to reopen the route to Carcross and then eventually Whitehorse.
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The need for a more efficient method of crossing the passes of the St. Elias Range from tidewater in Alaska to Lake Bennett in British Columbia became evident at the height of the Gold Rush in 1897. The White Pass Trail had become increasingly difficult to traverse, and both it and the Chilkoot Trail further west were clogged with stampeders trying to get to the Klondike gold fields as quickly as possible. Many improvements were undertaken on both trails in 1897 and 1898. Several aerial tramways were built over the Chilkoot, and a number of attempts were made to improve the White Pass.
George Brackett, an ex-mayor of Minneapolis and a former engineer on the Northern Pacific Railroad, was one of the first to try to improve the White Pass Trail. He helped organize the Skagway and Yukon Transportation and Improvement Company to build a wagon road. Capital stock was established at $300,000 and work on the wagon road began in November 1897, under Brackett's direction. From the start, construction was hampered by insufficient funds and lack of an adequate survey of the proposed route. The incorporators failed to raise the needed capital, and Brackett was able to complete only eight miles of his road before he ran out of money in December 1897. He had to leave for the outside to raise more.
When he returned in June 1898, he had more money, and he started charging tolls for use of the road. Fees for the eight miles were $10 for a wagon, $1 for a foot traveler and $1 for each animal. The stampeders refused to pay, and Brackett, using his influence in Washington, had the U.S. Army send troops from Dyea to maintain order and keep the road open. With the east fork of the Skagway River bridged, the eight-mile road provided an easier way for the thousands of people to use the White Pass Trail. Still, something better was needed.
The idea for the railroad was born in the early part of 1898 at a meeting of two men who would eventually push the rails over the pass. One of them, Sir Thomas Tancrede, was a representative of a group of British financiers (Close Brothers). The other, Michael J. Heney, was a former Canadian railroad contractor who had helped build the Canadian Pacific. Both men had come North with the idea of building a railroad over the mountains to get the men and materials to the gold fields. Tanerede, who had come North with Samuel H. Graves of Chicago and E.C. Hawkins of Seattle, surveyed the mountains and concluded that because of the rugged terrain a railroad was not feasible. Heney (who was known as "Big Mike" or "The Irish Prince") thought differently. He had viewed the mountains and had no qualms about building a railroad there. After a night of talking in Skagway's St. James Hotel bar, he got Tancrede to agree to begin the project with financing from British backers. It would be an expensive undertaking that would require tons of equipment, thousands of men and reasonably good weather. All three items were lacking from the start.
The White Pass and Yukon Railroad Company was organized in April 1898. The portion through Alaska was incorporated in the state of West Virginia as the Pacific and Arctic Railway and Navigation Company. The British backers also obtained charters for the right-of-way in British Columbia and the Yukon. The railroad in British Columbia was formed as the British Columbia Yukon Railway Company and in the Yukon as the British Yukon Railway Company. Samuel Graves was named president of the railroad, and construction began in April 1898. Brackett, who was still having trouble raising funds was facing mounting difficulties with the American and Canadian governments, sold his right-of-way to the railroad for $50,000. He had invested $185,000 of his own money in the project.
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The railroad men realized from the start that a standard gauge (4'8-1/2") railway across the mountains would be too costly, so they settled on a three-foot narrow-gauge. Since no accurate maps were available, several parties were sent out to survey possible routes to Lake Bennett, 40 miles from Skagway. Five surveys were brought back. The route chosen was the one over the original White Pass, discovered years before by Capt. William Moore, the founder of Skagway. Construction problems were encountered immediately. The railroad had to compete for ship cargo space with stampeders coming North from the West Coast. Thousands of workers were needed, but the prospectors had neither time nor inclination to work for wages with all that gold just waiting to be found in the Klondike.
A dispute arose over the location of the international border. The Canadians thought the border was at tidewater at Skagway; the Americans thought it was at Log Cabin, just beyond the White Pass summit. When the White Pass was finally agreed upon, considerable diplomacy was required to get Canada to permit the railroad to cross the border. Also, there was interference from a gang of outlaws operating out of Skagway under the direction of Jefferson Randolph Smith, better known as "Soapy Smith." The gang robbed new arrivals at Skagway, usually by confidence tricks, and caused trouble at the railroad work camps. But the problem disappeared abruptly on July 9, 1898. Soapy's gang had robbed a prospector of his gold two days before, and the anger of Skagway's citizens reached the flash point. Vigilantes organized, and one of them, Frank Reid, shot it out with Soapy on the Skagway waterfront wharf. Both men were killed. After Soapy's demise, his gang dispersed and the railroad crew and citizens of Skagway were no longer bothered by outlaws.
Enough material had arrived by April 1898, for rail lines to be laid down on Broadway Street, Skagway, to start the 40-mile route to Lake Bennett. Heney was the chief of construction and has as assistants John Hislop, and chief surveyor, and E.C. Hawkins, the chief engineer. An engineer named Brydon Jack was hired by the British backers to watch over their interests. Jack soon died of pneumonia, however, and the Britons put Hawkins on their payroll to replace him. Since the major bases of supply for heavy equipment were Seattle and Vancouver, 1,000 miles away, the construction crews had to tackle the job of building a roadbed with the available picks and shovels until more sophisticated equipment could be shipped North.
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The construction crews were composed of men from around the world and from many different environments. Many highly educated people, some of them professional men, swung picks and wielded shovels for a few dollars a day. All had come North to mine the gold in the Klondike, but for one reason or another, were stuck in Skagway, and worked for the railroad to earn enough money to get to the gold fields or to return home. The number of men varied day by day from 2,000 to 700. A major gold strike or even a rumor of one was enough to deplete the ranks.
Construction did proceed, however, and the summit of White Pass was reached on Feb. 20, 1899. Rails had been scheduled to be at the summit by Christmas 1898, but were delayed by poor weather and lack of manpower. The roadbed had to be blasted out of solid rock, and a 250-foot tunnel was blasted and dug out by hand through a solid granite mountainside. This was the only tunnel on the 110-mile route. In the 21 miles to the summit, the roadbed climbed from sea level at Skagway to 2,885 feet. The railroad seemed to hang on the mountainside for most of the way to the summit. Several wooden trestles were built along the mountainside, one of the longest crossing Glacier George. A spectacular steel cantilever bridge was built across Dead Horse Gulch below the summit. It arched 215 feet above the gulch and at one time was the highest railroad bridge in the world. It took until 1901 to complete this engineering feat. A switchback was used to get around the gulch until the bridge was completed.
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Once the summit was crossed, construction became easier, and the shore of Lake Bennett was reached on July 6, 1899. Winter construction was very difficult in this country. The solid granite, rubbed smooth by ancient glaciers, provided no footholds for the workers. The winter wind was strong and the men had to be roped together. Temperatures fell from 30 degrees to 60 degrees below zero By October 1898, the roadbed reached above timberline and the weather got worse. Deep snow drifts produced hazardous working conditions.
Since the railroad was being cut into solid rock to the summit, no gravel for the roadbed was available along the way. It had to be hauled either from the bed of the Skagway River or from Fraser, beyond the summit. But the construction men were well cared for. There were few serious accidents, little sickness, and plenty of food. Heney did not allow liquor at the camps, and this had a lot to do with the work attitude of the men. The pay The first train ran the 40 miles from Skagway to Lake Bennett on July 6, 1899. The next 27 miles lay along the lake, and crews were sent by water to establish work camps at intervals along the shore. Other crews started working south from Whitehorse in the summer of 1899. The Lake Bennett portion was hard to build because rock work was extensive and the underlying permafrost caused great problems with roadbed construction.
Freight could now be sent by train to Lake Bennett, put on lake steamers to Caribou Crossing (now Carcross) 27 miles away on the north end of the lake and then hauled to Whitehorse on wagons or by rail as the roadbed construction progressed. The railroad connected Carcross and Whitehorse in June 1900, and the entire line was completed on July 29, 1900, with a golden spike celebration at Carcross, Yukon Territory. Many Canadian and American dignitaries were in attendance that day. A real golden spike was placed on a rail and many attempts were made to drive it in. But to no avail. The spike ended up a twisted piece of gold.
It had taken 27 months to build a 110-mile rail line. A long time for a short distance, perhaps, but considering the terrain, weather, manpower and machinery problems that the builders had to contend with, it is a tribute to their persistence and dedication that the railroad was completed at all.
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