Category: Alaska

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Sarah Elizabeth Eldred Baker

Although Sarah never came to Skagway, millions of people have wondered about the lighthouse which bears her name, Eldred Rock Lighthouse. The lighthouse, seen above was first lit in 1905.
In 1883 William Healey Dall voyaged up the Alaskan coast and wrote a book called the Alaska Coast Pilot – it describes the coast with measurements, drawings and maps for pilots who are going up the coast of Alaska. Along with him on this voyage was Marcus Baker, a cartographer and it was he who named various points along the coast after his wife, Sarah Eldred.
Sarah was born in Climax, Michigan on September 2, 1846 and married Marcus in Kalamazoo on December 13, 1874. She died on December 19, 1897 during the gold rush, but presumably never having left Michigan.

Lighthouse Friends; wikipedia entries

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Marshal Alfred James Daly


Marshal Daly was the Special Marshal appointed to Skagway after Marshal Rowan was murdered in February 1898. Daly was here in April, May and June 1898 and prosecuted Soapy Smith in an assault case in June.

Daly achieved some notoriety in 1897 when U.S. Deputy Marshal William C. Watts was shot and killed on Admiralty Island on September 1, 1897 whiled serving a warrant, (he was the first lawman killed in the line of duty in Alaska).
Hiram Schell and William “Slim” Birch, the murderers, wounded three other lawmen. They escaped but were apprehended soon after with the help of the U.S. Marines and a bunch of outraged volunteers.
The Assistant District Attorney who prosecuted the case was our Alfred J. Daly. Despite his good efforts in that case, the jury found the men not guilty saying the Marshals had not adequately identified themselves before the attempted arrest. Governor John Brady was horrified and compared the decision to let them go to the outrageous things happening in Skagway with the Soapy Smith gang. Perhaps that is why he sent Daly to Skagway.

Alfred James Daly, died on this day, August 6, 1912 in Tanana Alaska, he was 39 years old. His remains were taken to Nome for interment. Pictured above is Tanana around the turn of the century.

Alaska Library; Skagway Museum Record; News account list NPS library; The Daily Alaska Dispatch, 1912-08-29; Sitka Daily Alaskan various dates in 1897; Forgotten Heroes of Alaska by Wilbanks.

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Alexander Andreyevich Baranof


Happy Birthday to Alexander Baranof born April 16. 1747 in Kargopol, in St. Petersburg Governorate of the Russian Empire. Alexander ran away from home at the age of fifteen. He became a successful merchant in Irkutsk, Siberia. He was the Chief Manager of the Russian-American Company, headquartered in Sitka, serving as Alaska’s first Russian Governor from 1790 until his forced retirement in 1818. Although he never came to Skagway, he should have!

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Wilford Bacon Hoggatt


Governor Hoggatt was born in 1865 in Paoli Indiana. Maybe his parents thought that giving him a name that brings up visions of a pig would make people smile. He graduated from the United States Naval Academy in 1884 and remained in the Navy for 18 years, including service during the Spanish-American War.
Hoggatt was a member of the Arctic Brotherhood and became Governor of Alaska from 1906 to 1909. During his term Hoggatt was responsible for relocating Alaska’s government from Sitka to Juneau, where it has remained ever since. In 1925 he moved to New York City, where he lived in retirement.

He died on this day, November 26, 1938 in the Bronx, New York. I am tempted to say he choked on a ham sandwich, but no, just complications of old age.

Explore North Chief Exec of AK; 1909 AB book; Wikipedia

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James Mark Rowan


February 1 is a momentous day in Skagway History. On the night before, January 31, 1898 U.S. Marshal James Mark Rowan was called away from his wife’s bed where she was having a baby. The Marshal went to the People’s Bar on 6th Street (then Holly Street), (where Sgt Preston’s is now), and as he entered the bar Harry Lamont, Marshal Rowan and Andy McGrath were shot by Ed Fay, the bartender. Apparently McGrath died instantly but Rowan staggered across Broadway and died. Ed Fay, although arrested was later acquitted in Sitka.
Mrs. Bernie Rowan and son, also James Mark Rowan lived in Alaska for awhile before moving to Seattle where both passed away, she in 1943 and he in 1975. It was said that James Mark Rowan was the first white baby born in Skagway (see last blog for a possible competitor to that title).
Marshal Rowan was buried in the Gold Rush Cemetery and this summer, on the 4th of July, his great grand-daughter along with the U.S. Marshal’s Service plan to re-dedicate his grave with a new marker. Plans are afoot to have the family in the parade and honor the heroes of Skagway’s both past and present.

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Jack Dalton


Jack Dalton had a very long and very interesting life. He was described by a woman in Haines as “a dapper, well-dressed, ladies man”. He is best known for opening up the “Dalton Trail” out of Haines.
He ran a hotel in Haines in 1896 and later arrested Jack Wade for murder, but also was himself jailed for shooting a shopkeeper McGinnis. He was later acquitted.
He was mentioned in the 1903 AK Boundary Tribunal by Don-a-wak, chief of the Chilkat Indians. In 1886, Jack signed on as roustabout and camp cook with the Schwatka-New York Times expedition to climb Mt. St. Elias. The party began their ascent at tidewater in Icy Bay on July 17, 1886. They traversed rugged terrain for twenty-five to thirty days, crossed fast coastal rivers, and reached an elevation of about 5,700-feet before Schwatka’s health failed, which terminated the first recorded attempt on the difficult mountain.
Dalton is featured in the Alaska Mining Hall of Fame Foundation website.
Born in 1856 in Michigan, he died in San Francisco on December 15, 1944.