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Emily in the Yukon
Earthy and Robust With a Lingering Richness

Emily thought that to witness with her own eyes the tide of greed invading what was soon to become Canada's Yukon Territory would provide exceptional fodder for her writing. She also planned to beat her nemesis Quentin Farkmee to writing a travel guide about the territory, but in fact, it was William Seymour Edwards who got to the press before she had a chance to pen even her first word.

Her career as a playwright essentially snuffed before it was begun following the infamous "Safe Bet" riot of January 1898, and flush with cash from the success of her Uncle's Systematic Anti-Autointoxication Device, Chesley left town again under a cloud of controversy.

Before venturing off to South Africa where she wrote her breakthrough novel, the Afrikaans of East Nissouri, Chesley first went on a brief but remarkable adventure to Northwestern Canada to check out the Klondike gold rush.

Emily was a scholar of some repute concerning the California gold rush of 1849, and she thought that to witness with her own eyes the tide of greed invading what was soon to become Canada's Yukon Territory would provide exceptional fodder for her writing.

In fact, gold-rush fever was a phenomenon of such fascination for Chesley she had begun keeping press clippings on July 17, 1897, when the Seattle Post-lntelligencer reported the steamship Portland had sailed into Seattle from Yukon carrying 68 miners and "more than a ton of gold." The Seattle newsmen had chartered a tug to meet the Portland before it docked at the end of its golden voyage from St.Michael, so the scoop was out on the streets before the passengers disembarked with their cargo of $700,000 worth of gold. The Seattle headlines swept across the country, around the world and, yes, even to London, Ontario.

Chesley was enthralled when she read the tales of George Washington Carmack and his Native friends, Skookum Jim and Tagish Charlie, who found gold in quantities never before seen in the Yukon, tipping the first domino of the great rush.

Emily surveys Dawson City from above, before descending on the earthy and robust town like a sweet zephry in seal skins.

Later that year, journalist Annie Hall Strong wrote in the Skagway News: "delicate women have no right attempting the trip.. those who love luxury, comfort and ease would better remain at home." Chesley took umbrage with Hall's notion, packed her bags and headed north.

Over 100,000 people from around the globe were drawn to the mysterious north, propelled by dreams of riches and adventure. But it was the thousands of miles of wilderness, the murderous rapids and avalanches, mind-numbing cold, starvation, cannabilism, and frontier gunslinging that stopped so many dead in their tracks which drew Chesley to Dawson City.

Dawson City's ragged streets and rowdy saloons swirled at the vortex of greed that was the Klondike Gold Rush. In 1898, fortunes were won and lost as dancehall girls high-kicked in the frontier town's raunchiest establishments, such as the Monte Carlo, the Opera House, and the Palace Grand.

It was in Dawson City that Emily met characters such as Dick Lowe, who owned the richest claim per square foot ever staked in the Yukon. In classic Klondike style, Lowe to married a dance-hall girl, became an alcoholic, blew his fortune and died penniless years later in San Francisco. And then there was Diamond Tooth Gertie (aka Gertrude Lovejoy), a Yukon dance hall queen known for the sparkling diamond she had wedged between her two front teeth, not to mention the fortune she made unloading the miners of their gold nuggets.

It was in the Yukon that Emily learned the art of dog sled driving that was to serve her so well in the Bi-Polar Years (1908-1913).

And even Alaska's Territorial Governor, John Brady, who complained to Washington that "gamblers, thugs and lewd women" were coming up the Lynn Canal and taking control of Skagway and Dyea. Washington was receiving complaints of boundary and customs violations in the White Pass area. At the end of February, 1898, soldiers of the 14th Infantry arrived in Skagway to maintain order.

Chesley was in her element. In fact, her brief time with the 14^th infantry left an indelible mark on Governor Brady who remarked in his journal ".Emily is an earthy, robust woman, the likes of whom I have never had the pleasure of spending such intimate company. the scent of her seal-skin skivvies has a lingering richness which I fear will haunt me for the rest of my days."

Clearly, her time in the Yukon inspired a number of poems and at least two of her short-fiction works published by the London Home Companion - The Fantastic Adventure of Emma Lou Chelsea and The Glort.

--"Scholarship" by Foothills