Robert “Bobby” Dickson Auston (1916 – 1962)
Bobby Auston was the son of Tom and Louise Dickson. Annie and Arthur Auston married late and Annie’s two children with Dawson Charlie died before he did in 1909. Arthur Auston and Tom Dickson were friends, and the family allowed the Austons to adopt Bobby, one of Tom and Louise’s thirteen children. After Dawson Charlie died, the Caribou Hotel in Carcross went to Annie and she leased it to the Gideons, and after that to Louise Dawson and her son and wife, Harold and Grace Corby. The Dawsons and Corbys managed the hotel until 1938 when they terminated their lease. Annie shut down the hotel and after she died, a few months later, her son Bobby Austin inherited the Caribou Hotel. At that time, Bobby and his wife Dora were living at Pennington, a railroad station south of Carcross. They moved into the hotel in late 1938 and re-opened the business. Their eldest daughter Annie was just learning to walk at the time.1)
Bobby enlisted to serve in the Second World War in 1939 [post 1940] and he and Dora leased the hotel to Jack and Adele McMurphy later that year.2) Carcross people were very aware of the war and a number of Carcross boys volunteered: George Sidney Jr. and his brother Peter Sidney, Alexander [Sandy] MacLeod and [brother] Malcolm MacLeod, and Edward Good. Harry Davies and Charlie Isaac volunteered from Dawson and Elijah Smith from Whitehorse. A few were turned down for medical reasons. Dick Johnson (Carcross) and Sandy Wallis and Harry Davis (Dawson) did not survive.3) Geologist Hugh Bostock talked to Robert Auston in September 1940 when he came to move the surveyors beyond Becker Creek in the Wheaton River mining district.4)
Bobby returned from the war in 1946. His marriage had not survived the separation and he and Dora parted ways. They sold the Caribou Hotel to Florence May Robson and Bobby left Carcross.5)
Bobby Austin, with his wife Frances, was the first outfitter to set up business on the Dempster Highway.6) His game area was in the Hart River country. In the winter he drove for White pass and was a familiar figure throughout the territory. Bobby disappeared in the spring of 1942. In July, his body was found at the south end of Lake Laberge by fishermen Willy Broeren, his young son, and Glen Grady. It was presumed Auston fell through the Yukon River ice.7)
After his death, Bobby’s wife, now Frances Woosley, operated as an outfitter for a few years before selling out to Pete Jensen. Frances was the second woman to operate a big game hunting business in the Yukon. Belle Desrosier was the first.8)