Here it comes, I’ll take you back in time…… Gold discoveries brought Alaska and the Yukon area to the attention of the world. A series of stampedes occurred over more than three decades. Drawn by dreams of gold, men and women from many places participated in an adventure that would change their lives. Only a few would become wealthy.

The first significant gold discovery was in Juneau in 1880. This discovery encouraged others to look throughout Yukon area (Canada & Alaska). After the Klondike in Canada many people tried to look for more in Alaska. The Nome, Fairbanks and Iditarod gold field were the largest, but between 1896 and 1914 gold was found in hundreds of places around Alaska. Mining changed Alaska. Many trails were blazed, one of them is a trail for sled dogs, wagons and a rail road from Seward to Nome. This became the famous Iditarod trail. This trail was used to transport goods and people. The trail’s use declined when in the 1920’s the introduction of airplanes came. The first running of the 1049-mile Iditarod sled dog race from Anchorage to Nome in 1973 rekindled interest in this route.

The Independence Mine historical park was a successful mining industry that was active for 10 years. First it ran for 5 years and was a brooming town. The aroma of fresh-baked bread from the mess hall, children playing ball outside while on the background you could hear crunch sounds of smashing gold and feeling the ground vibrating from the four-ton engine rolls out of the tunnel entrance to dump its load . This was just a normal day. After a work day the miners and their families went to the town’s for dinner and afterwards went to bed. But all of this came to an abrupt end during World War II. The Independence mine was shut down in 1943 after gold mining was classified as nonessential by law. Although the order was lifted after the war, internal struggles, rising production costs and the fixed price of gold ($35 an ounce) kept the Independence mine from achieving its former status. After 5 years everybody left and it became a ghost town.

There was a text at the museum what I think is a nice tribute to the miners that I would like to share:  “Those holes in the mountain will stay there, and that’s the only monument that the miners will ever have – because they just kind of wander off the face of the earth. They’ll go back into the ground just like the buildings at the Independence – ashes to ashes, dust to dust, I guess. The miners, the buildings, and the whole darn thing. The only thing that will be left is the holes in the mountain that were burrowed in by various people. The names won’t be inscribed anywhere, but the hole will be there. It will be there for as long as that mountain lasts.”