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Album: Seattle, Washington 2007
Image: 463 / 545
Date: 2007-09-03 10:22:42
Tags: Seattle

Mining the Miners

The despair of the depression was replaced with energy and purpose as Seattle responded to the needs of thousands of stampeders flooding through the city. As with many gold rushes, it was generally not the miners who struck it rich, but those who stepped forward to meet the miners' needs.

Everything You Need

Seattle had a number of attributes that enabled it to meet the demand created by the Chamber's successful advertising campaign. Seattle was a young, energetic city with a good transportation network. Local industries and nearby farmlands could support large numbers of stampeders. Seattle companies made blankets, clothings, and boots. Others processed abundant local crops and canned salmon from teeming local fish runs. Nearby coal mines provided cheap and plentiful fuel. Transcontinental trains brought in other needed supplies from wholesalers in the East and Midwest.

There was something else about Seattle: the young, energetic city had a sense of purpose and optimism. The "Seattle Spirit," which had been dampened by the depression, was reawakened by the Klondike Gold Rush.

Seattle Profits

Seattle newspapers were filled with large illustrated advertisements promoting a wide variety of "Klondike" goods. Some were practical and others were scams. Arctic underwear and insect proof masks, air-tight stoves and Klondike bicycles, tents and portable houses, were just a few of the myriad items for sale to hopeful stampeders.

Some spent as much as $1,000 (equivalent to $22,000 in 2005) for supplies and transportation. So profitable was the Klondike trade that by 1900 the amount of money changing hands daily in Seattle had quadrupled.

I See by Your Outfit ...

The "outfit" - the gear and food miners took on their journey - was critical. Klondike guidebooks usually included a list of goods making up a typical outfit. Some Seattle companies advertised that they could outfit miners in a single stop. Although the Seattle Chamber of Commerce discouraged women from joining the stampede, its women's department offered advice on purchasing supplies.

During the winter of 1897-1898, the Northwest Mounted Police began requiring that each miner entering Canada have sufficient provisions to last a year. The food, clothing, shelter, and tools entailed could weigh 2,000 pounds or more. This became known as the "one-ton rule" and helped ensure that miners were prepared.