Harry Gordon-Cooper (1912 - 2001)
Harry Gordon-Cooper was born in Calgary. He went to sea for two years and then left to get some education and find employment in Hong Kong. It was the depression, and his plans went awry. He was four years as a physical-education teacher and gymnastic instructor, and then four years as a dancer. When the Second World War broke out, he joined the RCAF and finished the war as a Flight Lieutenant with a mention in Dispatches. Harry came to the Yukon in 1947 and worked primarily as a bush pilot, although he also did jobs as a hydrometric surveyor, camp cook, horse wrangler, prospector, and clerk of the Police Magistrate's Court.1)
In 1947/48, Harry sold his plane to Yukon Airways and became a partner in the firm. 2) Whitehorse Flying Service amalgamated with Yukon Airways in 1949 and now the partners included Bud Harbottle, Clyde Wann, Harry Gordon-Cooper, Ronnie Greenslade and Norm Hartnell. Mining exploration was booming but government contracts brought in more money.3) Harry was busy flying to Mayo and Dawson as the Klondike Highway North had yet to be built.4) There was a topographical survey project north of Mayo, and the company was thinking of adding a helicopter in 1954 when pilot Milne was killed in one of the Beavers. The partners sold the company to Pacific Western Airlines.5)
Harry and his wife Clara lived in Vancouver from 1953 to 1955. When they returned to the Yukon with daughter Carol (11) and son Derek (3), Harry worked for the government, first with Forestry and then with Water Resources. Around 1956, Hugo Seaholm, and Bonner and Ed Kunze sold the Takhini hot springs to the Gordon-Coopers.6)
Harry sold some of the land surrounding the springs to Danny Nowlan in the late 1960s for a tape recorder and $30. This land became the Yukon Wildlife preserve. Before Danny developed it, it was mainly marsh. 7) Harry loved stories and story-tellers. He sat with four or five in Danny Nowlan’s front room at the Game Farm and participated in swapping true stories and lies.8)