Yukon who is who

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Alex Van Bibber (1916 – 2014)
	
Alex Van Bibber was born to parents Eliza and Ira Van Bibber. He grew up in the Pelly Crossing area and went to school at Dawson in 1924. He returned home during the holidays to help his father with the gardening and other chores. He attended school until about grade 5 and then went to work on the gold dredges where he put in about eight seasons.((Alex Van Bibber interview with Helen Dobrowolsky in Champagne, 25 September 1991. Yukon Archives, 92/14 SR 131-9))
	
In the early 1930s, Alex worked on Dredge # 2 at Bear Creek near Dawson. He used to get his motorcycle repaired at Franklin’s Garage in Dawson. Alex was late for work one morning and was speeding on the rough road across Jackson's Tailings. He wrecked his bike and ended up three days in the hospital. He sold the bike where it lay to Snoose Bensen, a mechanic at Franklin’s.((Jim Robb, "The Colourful Five Per Cent: The Franklin Garage was in Dawson City." //Yukon News// (Whitehorse), 25 June 2007.)) Alex and Mary Davis were married in 1941 but later divorced.((Yukon Archives, Alex Van Bibber biographical sketch.))
	
In 1942, Van Bibber heard about the boom economy in Whitehorse and he and several other young men from Dawson moved south. He went to Champagne and hired on as a packer with a bunch of horses and four other guys to go into the Ross River area on the railway survey. They worked from Frances Lake to the mouth of Little Salmon until late August. He delivered the horses to Whitehorse and then was sent to Tagish to pick up seven horses purchased by the American army from Johnny Johns. He and Johnny Johns’ brother, Peter Johns, moved the horses to Johnson Crossing. They crossed the river on a flat ferry with the soldiers holding hands around the edges to keep the horses contained. That fall, Alex started to make a reconnaissance with the horses and the head engineer ahead of the survey party. They would go ten or twenty miles ahead and then got back and nurse the survey party through with their accompanying bulldozers. The bulldozers were cutting line for them. Right behind the bulldozers came a regiment of soldiers with equipment to finish the roads and install camps. They did that until they reached the summit going towards Quiet Lake.((Alex Van Bibber interview with Helene Dobrowolsky in Champagne, 25 September 1991. Yukon Archives, 92/14 SR 131-9))  

The bulldozers were having difficulty with muskeg, even when they moved the road nearer the hills. So, Van Bibber and Lieutenant Hammond were called back to Whitehorse and told to find an alternative route. Alex set up a ground reconnaissance from Mayo to Norman Wells and the army put in three supply caches along the way. They did the trip in December and there was bad weather in the mountains. The trip took forty-two days on the trail with thirty-two of them travelling days. They had to shoot game along the way. By the time Van Bibber’s party flew to Edmonton to report, the army had decided to stick with the southern route. The party included Kaiser Mervin, Norman “Dinky” Mervin, Albert Pelland, Lonnie Johnny, and Lieutenant Hammond.  After that, Alex moved on to Whitehorse where he worked with the security group checking all the vehicles and workers travelling the highway.((Alex Van Bibber interview with Helene Dobrowolsky in Champagne, 25 September 1991. Yukon Archives, 92/14 SR 131-9))  
	
In 1943, Alex started big-game guiding for Carl Chambers.((“Legend Award 2005: Legend Alex Van Bibber.” Grand Slam Club / OVIS, 2020 website: https://www.slamquest.org/grand-slam-legends-details-info.php?Legend-Alex-Van-Bibber-1.)) From 1944 to 1946, he was enlisted in service during the Second Word War. His call had been extended for a year so he could work on war projects in the Yukon, and then he was stationed in Halifax and Debert, Nova Scotia. He did not make it overseas before the Second World ended.((Alex Van Bibber interview with Helene Dobrowolsky in Champagne, 25 September 1991. Yukon Archives, 92/14 SR 131-9))   
	
In 1946, Alex and Sue Chambers (nee Dickson) were married and Alex worked on hydraulic crews for the federal government.((Yukon Archives, Alex Van Bibber biographical sketch.)) He and Sue started and ran their own outfitting company from 1948 to 1968. During the first year, a client got a ram that still ranks #10 in the all-time B&C record book.((“Legend Award 2005: Legend Alex Van Bibber.” Grand Slam Club / OVIS, 2020 website: https://www.slamquest.org/grand-slam-legends-details-info.php?Legend-Alex-Van-Bibber-1.)) 
	
Life was not all outfitting. Van Bibber prospected in the Firth River area in 1948.((Yukon Archives, Alex Van Bibber biographical sketch.)) In 1977, he began consulting for the Yukon Government and NWT Renewable Resources. Alex was in the movie //Mad Trapper// and he climbed Mount Kennedy with Robert Kennedy.((Yukon Archives, Alex Van Bibber biographical sketch.))
	
A 1954 calendar promoted Alex Ban Bibber’s Big Game Hunting – Guide and Outfitter business and includes a photo of the world’s record white Dall sheep.((Yukon Archives pamphlet, P-70.)) In August 1956, Alex took famed bow hunter Fred Bear on a grizzly hunt. Bear wrote about the hunt in his "Field Notes" publication. That same year, Alex looked after some journalists at the Mount Kennedy base camp when Robert Kennedy climbed the mountain. In 1968, Alex shot a true albino moose with white hair and pink eyes, lips and hooves. It was mounted and displayed in downtown Whitehorse. Alex sold the business in 1968, and then for many years helped his daughter and son-in-law run Ruby Range Rams. He worked for various other outfitters and in 1991 went to work for his granddaughter’s Arctic Red River Outfitters. Sometime later, an official questioned Alex’s application for a guiding license as he thought there was an error on Alex’s birthdate. It was thought that no one born in 1916 could still be guiding. At age eighty-nine, Alex was planning on another season with Arctic Red. Alex Van Bibber won the Grand Slam Club Legend Award in 2005.((“Legend Award 2005: Legend Alex Van Bibber.” Grand Slam Club / OVIS, 2020 website: https://www.slamquest.org/grand-slam-legends-details-info.php?Legend-Alex-Van-Bibber-1.))
	
Alex Van Bibber became a member of the Order of Canada in 1992, he won the Yukon Fish & Game Association Sportsman of the Year Award in 1995, the Canadian Wildlife Federation Roland Michener Award in 1996, and received many other national and local awards that recognize contributions and commitment to education in the hunting and trapping industry.((“Legend Award 2005: Legend Alex Van Bibber.” Grand Slam Club / OVIS, 2020 website: https://www.slamquest.org/grand-slam-legends-details-info.php?Legend-Alex-Van-Bibber-1.))
	
The Yukon Archives Alex Van Bibber fonds includes photographs of his expedition over the Mackenzie Mountain in 1943, the 1948 Firth River Stampede, and family scenes in the Yukon.