C Ihe Ladies c cu. V'VVAN - History and Classics, Department of

To Fort Yukon 165The Burke Famify at FortYukon. Left to right:Grafton Burke Jr, ClaraHeintzBurke, HudsonBurke, and Dr Grafton RussBurke. c. 1924. FrederickB. Drane Collection,Archives, Alaska and PolarRegions Dept, Elmer E.Rasmuson Library,Universi!JI of AlaskaFairbanks, 91-o46-53N.into the settlement. The highlight of that portage was our discovery of a lovelyscarlet Chenopodium.So often had that happened in our travels. Some beautiful flower wouldappear as if on purpose to cheer us over a difficult stretch of land or water. Whenwe talked about this, we sometimes felt, in our nasty, superior English fashionperhaps, a genuine pity for those who travel in a country without noticing its wildflowers.On our arrival at Fort Yukon, we went straight to Harry Anthony the trader,and he sent his gas boat off, with our guide on board, to bring in the canoe. Welooked about us and felt like insects dazzled in lamplight. Fort Yukon was so verylarge. It was more like a town than a village, but one does not speak of towns andvillages in the North, every inhabited place is either a settlement, or a camp, orin the case of a solitary hut, a cabin. Fort Yukon had a much more settled atmosphereand seemed to be more prosperous than any of the Mackenzie River ports.Yet actually, as we found out in due course, it had a large proportion of floatingpopulation, for in the summer months many lone trappers would come in torepair their boats and to take in stores for the winter. There were neat palings, abig wireless station, a hospital, a church and many other signs of permanenthabitation, whereas the other settlements had seemed like swallows' nests, as theystood precariously clustered together or lined out, on the banks of the Mackenziewhich was their life -line.