John Firth (b. ~1856)
	
John Firth was an Orkney Islander who came north when he was sixteen.((J. G. MacGregor, //The Klondike Rush Through Edmonton 1897-1898.// Toronto: McClelland and Stewart Ltd. 1970: 129.)) He came down the Mackenzie River in September 1872.((Fenley Hunter, “A Trip to the Western Arctic, 1928.” Pages 36, 75, 135.)) Firth worked for the Hudson’s Bay Company as a clerk and was in charge of La Pierre House for over four years before taking over Rampart House in 1884. He was promoted from Postmaster to Clerk and given a salary of $365 (or 75 pounds sterling) per year when he had been living in Gwich’in territory for over twelve years. He was the manager for the last nine years of Old Rampart House, Alaska and Rampart House in Yukon. In 1889, Firth was thirty-six and he, his wife, and four children were living at the post. The 1891 census was taken at the new Rampart House at Sunaghun Creek and Bishop Bompas and John Firth's family were the first people listed. Firth was based at Fort McPherson after the closure of the Porcupine River post. He threatened to cut off the mail to Hershel Island if the whalers did not stop trading furs. Firth visited Hershel in the early winter of 1896/97 and was satisfied that trade was discouraged.((Colin Beairsto, "Making Camp: Rampart House on the Porcupine River." Prepared for the Yukon Heritage Branch, March 1997:72, 76, 114, 125-126, 132.))
	
Fenley Hunter, a member of the Royal Geographical Society, met John Firth at Fort McPherson in 1928. Firth had only been out of the country once, to Winnipeg, since he arrived in 1872. Firth was then the second oldest employee of the Hudson’s Bay Co.((Fenley Hunter, “A Trip to the Western Arctic, 1928.” Manuscript, pages 36, 75, 135.))