Herman A. Darms 

Herman Darms was born to Swiss immigrant parents Baldazar and Elizabeth Darms. He lived in Yountville, California before coming to the Yukon in 1898. He established the Darms Printing Company on Third Street in Dawson in 1901.((David Mattison, //Camera workers: the British Columbia, Alaska & Yukon photographic directory, 1858-1950// - D - Volume 1 (1858-1900). http://www.members.shaw.ca/bchistorian/cw1-d-names.html.)) The business was located in the Alaska Commercial Company building.((“H.A. Darms” Yukon Archives, Personal Name Authority website: Yukon Archives: Darms, H.A. (minisisinc.com)) In 1902, Dawson businessmen hired him to take photographs of their businesses and they posed in front of their establishments.((Dawson City Museum, “Yukon Photographers: The Gold Rush Era, 1897-1900. The State of the Art in 1898.” 2019 website:  http://www.virtualmuseum.ca/edu/ViewLoitLo.do?method=preview&lang=EN&id=8093)) Many of these photographs are held at the Dawson City Museum.

Darms may have learned his photography skills from Lorenze E. Robertson whose photographs he published in 1903. In the spring of 1904, Darms toured Yukon mining claims and an account of the trip was published in the //Daily Evening Star// (Whitehorse). He published //The Yukon// souvenir booklet in January 1905. It was intended to be a weekly publication and several versions were published in 1905. In July, Darms travelled with the American Institute of Mining Engineers to some mining sites. In the same month he visited the North American Transportation and Trading (NAT&T) operations on Miller and Glacier creeks.((David Mattison, //Camera workers: the British Columbia, Alaska & Yukon photographic directory, 1858-1950// - D - Volume 1 (1858-1900). http://www.members.shaw.ca/bchistorian/cw1-d-names.html.)) The Yukon Archives has a collection of Darms’ panoramic photos of the Klondike goldfields.