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1911 MURDER


Although I do not have the specifics on the murder in 1911, what we do know is that two native Tlingit men were arrested and sent to San Quentin. Thomas Jacob Phillips born on this day, March 21, 1890 in Killisnoo Alaska and “Skookum Joe” Wright born 1867 in Dyea were accused of the murder. According to a report in 1994 done for the Department of Interior and the Department of Agriculture by the Institute of Economic Research, University of Alaska Anchorage, Gorsuch, Colt, Smythe and Garber authors, the two Native men were falsely accused and imprisoned.
On page 13 of this paper, according to Salvation Army records, Joe Wright was “converted” around the turn of the century while he was working as a packer on the pass. After the trial, he was sent to San Quentin and there, he was recruited by the Salvation Army. He was released in 1912, returned to Haines and started the Salvation Army Church there. He started the Salvation Army band then and he continued to proselytize in Haines and Klukwan until his death. Tom Phillips, the other man accused of murder and sent to San Quentin went on to serve in World War 1. He died in 1941 in Sitka and is buried in the Sitka National Cemetery there.
Seen above is the Salvation Army band of Klukwan, although I do not have a date, my guess is that Joe Wright is pictured in it.

rootsweb; paper online: http://www.iser.uaa.alaska.edu/Publications/5southeast_cmnts/AppendixA.pdf
Thornton, 2004 page 93

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Orpha Loraine Stockard


Orpha Stockard was born in 1897 in Bois D’Arc, Missouri. She was somehow related to Virginia Alice Cottey who founded in 1884, the Cottey College for women in Nevada, Missouri. The College is currently owned and supported by the P.E.O. Sisterhood, a philanthropic women’s organization. Orpha followed in the footsteps of Virginia and became a teacher and taught here in Skagway in 1920 through at least 1929.
Orpha later acquired her doctorate and was president of Cottey College and wrote several books on education.
Seen above in 1940, she looks very prim. Orpha died on July 7, 1985 in Nevada, Missouri.

1920 and 1929 census; Social Security death index; cotter college site; wikipedia

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Worick’s bookstore


This photo of John H. Worick’s Bookstore in Dyea shows that he was also a real estate agent. The sign at the right says
“For Sale:
Lot with 2 tory house Price $1500-
Cor(ner) lot on Trail 50 X100 ft. $350-
Cor. lot on Main St 24 X 100 Price $250-
Lot with house on river $375-
Lot 25 X 100 on Main St $150 (?)
T.L 8 (?) Cookstove $15
Lot 50 X 100 on Main St. $1250
Lot 25 X 100 on Main St $600
20 DOGS for sale cheap
leave orders for freighting to Sheep Camp
Tent 18 X 60 (?) feet
Lot on River St 50 X 80 with log house
25 ft. lots (?)”
Presumably that is Mr. Worick standing to the left, slightly out of focus, no doubt ready to run to his next deal…..say, that house on the river for $375 sure sounds tempting….

John H. Worick was born February 18, 1846 in Stephenson, Illinois to a big family, he was one of 13 children. He stayed in Dyea into 1899 and then must have returned to the mid-west where he died January 25, 1911 in Greenleaf, Kansas.

Obituary of his father in 1903 in Monroe Weekly Times; rootsweb family information;

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Frank Clement

On this day, March 14, 1898 Frank Clement of Hillsboro, Oregon was shot and killed at Sheep Camp, on the Chilkoot Trail by Colby Gottlieb Schneider of Howard County Maryland. It was reported that a lynching was averted by the actions of the officers involved and that the prisoner was in custody. There was no other information on this case but a Gottleb Schneider died in Oregon in 1937.

reported in various newspapers including the New York Times

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Another true ghost story


This is a story never written before although it happened almost a hundred years ago. My grandfather, Miguel Vargas when he was young, around 1915, worked as a policeman. One night neighbors called the police and reported that they could hear screams from a woman next door that sounded like she was being beaten. My grandfather went there and looked in the window to see the woman being dragged around the room by her hair, but there was no one else there with her. He, being a religious man went to the neighbors and told them to call a priest. He had other stories of the old country but this is the only one that I remember now.

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Bridge Builders


This Barley photo shows the bridge builders enjoying lunch near the bridge and tunnel. Records show that John “Nels” Hansen, Carl Arthur Larson and James McDonald were bridge foremen then. Daniel McDougall, James Cavanaugh Sturgill (brother of Garland Sturgill) and George Brown were other bridge carpenters. They built the 19A bridge well, it survives to this day, but is not the bridge that the train crosses over now, that is a newer bridge.

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Chinese


This little news article appeared in the October 7, 1897 Victoria Daily Colonist. There is very little written about the Chinese gold Rushers. I wonder how their fortune affected the lives of them and their families back in China!

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Captain John Roberts


John Roberts was born in 1853 in England. He was the captain of the wooden Steamship Farallon which made trips in 1898 to Skagway. The ship ran aground in January 1910 on Black Reef on Lower Cook Inlet.
The ad above appeared on this day, March 12, 1898 in the Victoria Daily Colonist.

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True ghost story


Several years ago while researching my husband’s family I found this story of his many times great grandfather, John Champness Austin. Austin was born on March 27, 1690 in Pembury, Kent England and died in 1759 in Lunnenburg, Halifax County Virginia. How he came to live in Virginia is the story below related by Reed’s great great grand uncle, John Overton Austin (1819-1910):

“I write things that I remember, that my Grandfather and Uncle Wat [Walter] Austin told me, when I was a boy. What I write, I remember well, being 10 or 12 years old. My Great Grandfather was banished from England, to the Colonies, in America for killing a man. The circumstances were about this. The people of England were divided, in their opinion, about witches, hobgoblins, and other scary things that appeared after dark. Some believed there was such things others did not. Grandfather, made fun of those who believed such nonsence [sic].

“One man said he would bet $100.00 dollars that no man could cross a certain old bridge, built on a milldam, that was said to be haunted; that no man could cross that bridge, after dark that he would be scared back, by scary things.

“Now said he, ‘I will bet 100 dollars with any one, who will undertake it.’ Our Great Grandfather was then a young man, and was not afraid of anything. So he took their bet and the money was put up. When the day came there was a crowd on each side of the bridge, to see him cross. He was not allowed to have any weapons but a finger stone in each hand.

“When he got about midway the bridge he saw a white object rise up before him. He stopped near the hobgoblin. He spoke in a loud voice, ‘Who comes there 3 times.’ Not a word was said. The thing stood still. It looked like a man wrapped in a white sheet. It stood in his way. He stepped a few steps nearer, and stopped. Now said he, ‘Man or spirit, or whoever you are, get out of my way. I am going to cross this bridge.’ But the thing stood still. He threw a rock. They heard the rock strike the ghost, and Mr. Ghost fell dead, and young Austin walked by him across the bridge, and won the money.

“The next morning, they found the ghost to be a dead man, wrapped in a white sheet. It caused great excitement. A search was made, and they found, that a gang of men had a den in the old dam making counterfeit money. The discovery of this den, of counterfeiters, pleased the English people so much, that fearing that some of his enemies might seek his life, they put him on a ship and sent him to America, to the English Colonies for safety. ”

Seen above is Pembury England where it all began.