Leroy Napoleon “Jack” McQuesten (1836 - 1909)
	
Jack McQuesten was born in Litchfield, New Hampshire and travelled with his father, brother Varnam, and two cousins, William and Henry Wingate McQuesten, to California in 1856.  He left his relatives there and travelled to Oregon where he fought with Capt. Benjamin Hayden during the indigenous uprising of 1857.((//Fairbanks Weekly Times,// 23 October 1909; //Seward Gateway,// 1 September 1909; Clarence L. Andrews, //Alaska Life,// October 1943.))
	
McQuesten was working at Port Gamble Mill in 1858 when he heard of the gold discovery on the Fraser River. He went there in April and mined until 1863. He was at the Forks of Quesnelle when the miners heard that George Cary had found diggings on the Peace River. About 100 men went up the Fraser to Stewart Lake and portaged to the headwaters of the Peace and the diggings at the mouth of the Finlay River. It was not as good as expected so they all returned except for Mike Shannon and Jack McQuesten. They continued down the Peace River to winter at Fort St. John. In the fall they worked a gravel bar eighty miles below the fort and made $5 a day each. In the spring of 1864, they started down the river in canoes. Shannon stayed on the bar they had worked in the fall and McQuesten continued down the river to Fort Chipewyan, prospecting but finding little. He returned that fall to Smokey River expecting to winter there, but Shannon was gone to Fort Edmunds, so McQuesten returned to Fort Vermillion and wintered there. He trapped all winter and killed 200 martins, a few lynx, and some fox. In the spring of 1865, he went to Manitoba in the Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) boats, in the company of Al Mayo. They traded and trapped in different parts of the country until 1871 when they were at Great Slave Lake. They went up Hay River 350 miles and wintered. There they heard about the transfer of Alaska to the United States and decided to go to the Yukon River drainage and look for gold. They left in the spring of 1872 and went down Hay River to Great Slave Lake and from there down the Mackenzie to Fort Simpson. In June 1872, Al Mayo, James McKniff, and Jack McQuesten started for the Yukon from Hay River, a tributary of Great Slave Lake. They went up the Delyore [Liard] River and wintered at the mouth of the Nelson River. They intended to go up to Frances Lake and over to the Pelly River and down the Yukon.((Leroy McQuesten letter to Albert McKay dated 1 July 1905. 11pp, Alaska State Library, MS 13, Box 5, #5 AHC)) 
	
About the first of November, three HBC men arrived to prevent the McQuesten party from trading in furs. They built a cabin nearby and were quite pleasant. One of them, Sibistone, had been over on the Yukon several years and gave them a lot of information. He was at Fort Yukon when Captain Raymond of the US Army took command of the fort in the summer of 1869. They came in a small steamboat, the //Yukon//, the first steamer on the river. He said one of the officers on the boat washed out a jar of dirt near Fort Yukon and found a teaspoon of gold. He threw it away in case the crew decided to leave the steamer to prospect. Chief Factor McDougall arrived at the mouth of the Nelson later and he confirmed all that Sibistone had said.((James A McQuiston, //Captain Jack McQuesten: Father of the Yukon.// Denver: Outskirts Press, Inc. 2007: 49-50, 53-56.))
	
During the winter, McQuesten and Mayo arranged with James McDougall, agent for the HBC, to go by boat by way of the Peel River. In the spring when the river cleared of ice, A. Harper, F. Hart, G. Finch, and A. Gensler came down the Nelson in a dugout canoe. They came from Fort St. John on the Peace River and sledded their provisions across the mountains to the headwaters of the Nelson. They had intended to prospect the Delyore [Liard] that summer but decided to go with McQuesten's party to the Yukon. They all went down the river to Fort Simpson. Harper and party went down the Mackenzie and Mayo and McQuesten left the party to go to Fort Resolution on business. They came back to Fort Simpson in a month and went down the Mackenzie to arrive at the Peel River Post [Fort McPherson] in July. George Nicholson went with them. He had been prospecting in the district for over two years and found only traces of gold. They left their canoe and packed across the mountains to the headwaters of the Porcupine River about seventy-five miles beyond Fort McPherson. They arrived at Fort Yukon in August. Harper and his party had gone up the Yukon River two weeks before. Moses Mercier was the agent for the Alaska Commercial Co. (ACCo) at Fort Yukon and he gave them fifty pounds of flour, a treat they had not had for five years. They went down the Yukon to Beaver Creek, Alaska and built a cabin, killed four moose and two bears and had plenty of meat for the winter. They found gold on Beaver Creek but not enough to pay wages. In the spring, they went to Fort Yukon on the ice. On 10 May, the ice began to move, and the river was clear in three days. The HBC had a boat that would carry about ten tons, so they put the furs aboard and started for St. Michael. They stopped at Tanana Station for about two weeks, as the First Nation trappers had not traded their furs. Harper and party arrived during this time. They had wintered at the mouth of the White River and had about $500 in gold saved from their prospecting. They all went down to St. Michael, arriving there on 15 June. Frank Mercier was the agent there and he furnished supplies for those who wished to go prospecting. Mayo, F. Hart, and McQuesten went to work for the American trading company. A. Harper, G. Finch, and J. McKniff went back to Tanana station to prospect. G. Nicholson and A. Gutter went to San Francisco. They left St. Michael on 10 July on the steamer //Yukon// with four barges in tow, loaded with ten tons each of goods for the fur trade. They left one barge at Anvick, one at Nulato, and one at Tanana, and arrived at Fort Yukon on 10 August. Cateah, the chief of the Tr’ondëk people, was here and he insisted on the agent building a station near his house, as was the plan when McQuesten left St. Michaels to go up either the Porcupine or the Yukon rivers. On 18 August, they started up the Yukon. It was slow work as the river was low and it was the first time the steamer //Yukon// had been above Fort Yukon. On 27 August 1874, they arrived five miles below the present town of Dawson; the goods were landed, and the steamer returned to St. Michael. McQuesten was in charge with a young man, F. Bernfield [Barnfield].((Leroy McQuesten letter to Albert McKay dated 1 July 1905. 11pp, Alaska State Library, MS 13, Box 5, #5 AHC)) This was the establishment of Fort Reliance in 1874.
	
McQuesten employed some Tr’ondëk men to carry building logs and some went out hunting. Before it froze up, they had the house and the store completed and the hunters had brought in plenty of dried meat to last the winter. McQuesten sold all of the goods they had for furs. When he got back to St. Michael, he found that there had been a change. Mr. Newman was appointed agent and the Stations were to be let out to the traders on percentage. A. Mayo, Harper, and McQuesten got Fort Yukon and the upper river. Harper and Mayo went to Ft. Reliance and McQuesten went to Ft. Yukon. Mayo and Harper stayed at Fort Reliance for three years. They came down in a boat every spring and the little steamer would tow them back up in the summer. Harper would go out prospecting in the fall and he found gold on the Sixtymile River that he thought would pay. The traders sent out for a tank of quicksilver as it was quite fine dust from the gravel bars. That spring, Harper and Mayo did not want to go back to Fort Reliance as they had had some trouble with Tr’ondëk people. McQuesten had abandoned Fort Yukon and was at Tanana Station. Another company came into the country as far as Tanana Station in 1877. They were paying such prices for furs that there was not much room for percentage.((Leroy McQuesten letter to Albert McKay dated 1 July 1905. 11pp, Alaska State Library, MS 13, Box 5, #5 AHC))
	
In 1877, McQuesten decided to try Fort Reliance again. He hired a Russian creole interpreter named Warink. They were met at Charley's Camp with the news that three women at Fort Reliance had died from eating poison. Mayo had mixed some arsenic in with the grease to kill mice and the old women ate it. Chief Charley advised McQuesten not to go there as the Tr’ondëk people were quite angry. A man named Shimanthy, who came down to Charley's Camp from Fort Reliance, said it would be all right to go up as Chief Charley was talking for his own interest in having the station moved to his area. McQuesten decided to go on because it would cost a lot to build another station and he wanted to prospect in the Sixtymile area. McQuesten was relieved to be greeting by friendly rifle fire when he approached Fort Reliance. The interpreter and the first nations people travelling with McQuesten had been opposed to going on to the camp. Before landing the goods, McQuesten had a talk with the Tr’ondëk people about the goods stolen from Mayo. Chief Catsah had taken charge of the goods, received pay for them and turned the furs over to McQuesten, so "that part was settled." As to the poison, they had to break the lock to get into the store. One blind girl, about sixteen, had been poisoned and her father said she was a big help to her mother. He had taken one of the partner's dogs as payment and McQuesten then let him keep the dog to settle that matter. The Tr’ondëk trappers had a large amount of furs and they traded them without trouble. McQuesten went over to Sixtymile that fall to prospect and found gold in all the bars in small quantities. In March, McQuesten fell out of the store loft and broke a rib. There were three bands of first nations within a day’s journey of Fort Reliance: David's, Charley's and Nandik. They all sent a message to say they were making medicine to make him well. They were afraid that if he died, they would be blamed. That spring, Mercier was in charge of a station near the Tanana for the opposition.((Leroy McQuesten letter to Albert McKay dated 1 July 1905. 11pp, Alaska State Library, MS 13, Box 5, #5 AHC))
	
McQuesten was the only trader at Fort Reliance from 1877 to 1882 and he took the furs down in the spring and returned by steamer in the fall. Twelve miners, including Joe Ladue, came into the country over the Chilkoot Pass in the spring of 1882. They remained all winter and branched out to prospect in the spring. Only Ladue and Charles Powell remained in the country in the fall. The Poplin party tried to stay at Fort Reliance in the fall of 1883, but the //New Racket// was broken down and there were no supplies.((The Snow Papers referenced in Linda E.T. MacDonald and Lynette R. Bleiler, //Gold & Galena.// Mayo Historical Society, 1990: 17-24.))
	
McQuesten and Company had been trading for the Alaska Commercial Company since 1974. In 1883, they told the company that either their commissions had to increase, or other arrangements would be made. Their request was denied, so the partners decided to operate as independents in direct competition with the company. Their first move was to acquire the //New Racket// from Edward Schieffelin for a lower price than it would have cost in San Francisco. The company, realizing their mistake, offered better terms. Starting in that season, McQuesten and Company sold furs to the Alaska Commercial Company at market prices and purchased trade goods delivered to St. Michael at 25% above San Francisco wholesale. They also had to pay freight charges. The costs were high, but they could establish the value of the trade goods. This agreement made the partners immense profit for many years.((Ed and Star Jones, //All That Glitters: The Life and Times of Joe Ladue, Founder of Dawson City.// Whitehorse: Wolf Creek Books. 2005: 72.))
	
McQuesten went outside to bring in miner's equipment in the summer of 1884. Sixteen men spent the cold winter of 1884/85 on the Stewart or near Fort Reliance. Thomas Boswell, John Fraser and J. Chapman were three that wintered at Fort Reliance and prospected and mined on the Stewart in 1885. Chapman had come in that spring with Charles Powell. They mined successfully on Chapman's Bar, 90 miles up the Stewart. In early August, Boswell went to Ft. Reliance to get provisions and McQuesten landed 30 tons of miner's supplies at the fort on August 20. He also brought Ladue, Howard Franklin, H. [Henry] Madison, Thomas Williams, and Mike Hess who had been prospecting on the Yukon. Boswell bought supplies for six men for a year. McQuesten took Williams, Ladue and Hess up to Ft. Selkirk when he went on his fur buying trip and afterward took Boswell up the Stewart as far as his steamer would go. Boswell then told McQuesten that there were men up the Stewart making good money. Twelve miles up the Stewart they met Frank Densmore, John Hughes, Ike Powers, Steven Custer, and the brothers Al and H. Day who were rocking on a bar and not making very much. McQuesten gave them a ride for their help on the //New Racket.// Boswell and McQuesten left the //New Racket// after another fifteen miles and continued in a canoe to Steamboat Bar where McQuesten worked for five days and recovered $250. News of the gold on the Stewart River reached the outside in 1885 and 75 men came in over the Pass. McQuesten took most of them to the mouth of the McQuesten in the steamboat.((The Snow Papers referenced in Linda E.T. MacDonald and Lynette R. Bleiler, //Gold & Galena.// Mayo Historical Society, 1990: 17-24.))
	
In 1886, Harper, McQuesten and Co. established a post at Stewart River [called Fort Nelson] to meet the demands of the miners. They did not anticipate the rush to the country that took place that year and they were all on the verge of staving for some months. Scurvy broke out in the camp and there was much suffering. Harper joined McQuesten [and Mayo?] in a partnership in and they continued to trade in partnership until 1889.((William Ogilvie, //The Klondike Official Guide.// Toronto: The Hunter Rose Co. Ltd. 1898: 78, 86))
	
During the winter of 1886/87 McQuesten left for San Francisco to get supplies.((The Snow Papers referenced in Linda E.T. MacDonald and Lynette R. Bleiler, //Gold & Galena.// Mayo Historical Society, 1990: 17-24.)) Soon after McQuesten left Fort Nelson in 1886, Howard Franklin and Henry Madison arrived for supplies to work their new claims on the Fortymile River. The gold they brought was coarse as chicken feed and new to the Yukon prospectors. Word of the strike spread and anyone who did not have good ground on the Stewart moved over to the Fortymile. Harper went as well, leaving Mayo in charge of the post.((James A McQuiston, //Captain Jack McQuesten: Father of the Yukon.// Denver: Outskirts Press, Inc. 2007: 166-167.)) In anticipation of a greater rush in the spring, a letter was sent to McQuesten who was wintering in San Francisco. They asked for an increased shipment in anticipation of an increased demand for goods. George [Tomas] Williams, a riverboat captain, died delivering the letter.((Harold B. Goodrich, "History and Conditions of the Yukon Gold District to 1897" in Josiah Edward Spurr, ed., //Geology of the Yukon Gold District, Alaska.// Washington: Government Printing Office, 1897: 115, 118.))
	 
Mayo helped moved the store to Forty Mile in the next year. It was reported that the first store was a packing crate, used to conduct business, on the deck of a barge. Eventually a log building was constructed to house the McQuesten & Co. store.((James A McQuiston, //Captain Jack McQuesten: Father of the Yukon.// Denver: Outskirts Press, Inc. 2007: 166-167.)) During the winter of 1887-88, they did business at both posts; Harper and McQuesten at Forty Mile and Mayo at Stewart. The latter post was kept open principally for the fur trade although if there had been no miners they probably would have closed it. Their sales to the miners in 1887 was probably around $60,000.((William Ogilvie, //The Klondike Official Guide.// Toronto: The Hunter Rose Co. Ltd. 1898: 78, 86.))
	
Harper withdrew from his partnership with McQuesten in 1889 and established a post at Fort Selkirk and Ogilvie Island.((Harold Innis, "Settlement and the Mining Frontier" in A.R.M. Lower's //Settlement and the Forest Frontier in Eastern Canada.// Toronto: Macmillan, 1936: 181.))
	
When gold was discovered [at Pitka’s Bar] on Birch Creek, Alaska in 1893, many Fortymile miners could not afford an outfit. McQuesten offered what was in his Forty Mile storeroom to those who wanted to go, and eighty men took him up on the offer. They settled the town of Circle City.((Harold B. Goodrich, "History and Conditions of the Yukon Gold District to 1897" in Josiah Edward Spurr, ed., //Geology of the Yukon Gold District, Alaska.// Washington: Government Printing Office, 1897: 115, 118.)) Circle City became the distribution centre for the Birch Creek mines and was known as the best built town in Alaska with 300 comfortable cabins and several two-story buildings. McQuesten established a trading post in Circle in the fall of 1894 and they dubbed him "Father of the Yukon" for his benevolence. Much of the development of the Yukon gold fields is attributed to McQuesten's farsighted faith in the miners. Circle became known as "the Paris of Alaska."((Warren Yeend, //Gold Placers of the Circle District, Alaska - Past, Present and Future.// US Geological Survey Bulletin 1943, 1991: 2-5.)) McQuesten was president of the Forty Mile Lodge and an active member of the Circle City Lodge. In 1896, the lodges combined to present him with a gold watch worth $500.((Andrew Baird, //Sixty Years on the Klondike.// Vancouver: Gordon Black Publications, 1965: 99-101.)) In 1896, McQuesten's store at Circle still ran trust accounts for the miners and prospectors. There was a custom there of having the First Nation women annually toss each of the white men in a moose skin blanket and the men then contributed to a potlatch. McQuesten was, as usual, the first to be tossed. He was allowed to escape and was then brought to bay by them and forced into a blanket after a mock battle.((Thomas Stone, “Miner's Justice: Migration, Law and order on the Alaska-Yukon Frontier, 1873-1902.” //American University Studies Series XI,// Vol. 34, New York: Peter Lang, 1988: 112.))
	
A miner had obtained an outfit on credit with the agreement that he would pay back the debt at cleanup. When the time came, the miner had only $500 to pay on the $700 debt and complained that he had not had his spree or year-end party.  After the spree, the miner had nothing left and McQuesten agreed to provide a new outfit and carry the debt.((Andrew Baird, "An Outstanding Pioneer of the Yukon." //Sixty Years on the Klondike.// Vancouver: Gordon Black Pub., 1965.))
	
McQuesten was still at Circle City when the Klondike discovery was made but he grubstaked others and bought an interest in some claims on Bonanza and Eldorado. He made $10,000 from the sale of a claim in 1898. He left the Yukon in late 1898 with over $200,000 and built a large house in Berkeley, California for his wife and children. He invested successfully in mining interests in California and the west. He was appointed the official representative of the Yukon at the Alaska-Yukon Pacific Exposition in Seattle in 1909. After an operation for bunions, he contracted blood-poisoning and died at the age of seventy-three. Mrs. McQuesten managed his estate after his death. Jack McQuesten was honest, intelligent, and highly regarded during his lifetime.((Linda E.T. MacDonald and Lynette R. Bleiler, //Gold & Galena.// Mayo Historical Society, 1990: 424-25.)) Much of the development of the Yukon gold fields is attributed to McQuesten's farsighted faith in the miners.((Warren Yeend, //Gold Placers of the Circle District, Alaska - Past, Present and Future.// US Geological Survey Bulletin 1943, 1991: 2-5.)) The surviving children of Jack and Kate McQuesten were Richard (1881 – 1918), Mary Louise (1884-1916), Crystal (1891 – 1992), Julia “June” (1894 – 1959), Elizabeth (1896 – 2001), Leroy Jr. (1898 – 1939) and Walter (1899 – 1965).((James A McQuiston, //Captain Jack McQuesten: Father of the Yukon.// Denver: Outskirts Press, Inc. 2007: 74-77.))
	
A plaque to honour Jack McQuesten was created and paid for by members of the Clan Uisdean, an American association dedicated to the McQuesten family in all of its various spellings (McCuistion, McCuiston, McQuesten, McQuestion, McQuistian, McQuistion, McQuiston and McChristian). The Dawson City mayor proclaimed 11 August to be Jack McQuesten Day. Ed and Star Jones were fundamental in organizing this event. Jack's grandson, Walter, was present for the event and led the fifty or so people present in a big fellowship circle and moment of silence.((Dan Davidson, "Father of the Yukon" celebrated with a plaque in Dawson City." //Whitehorse Star// (Whitehorse), 17 August 2007.))