Andrew James “Andy” Hooper (1900 - 1991)
Andy Hooper was born in Guelph, Ontario. He came to the Yukon in 1942 as a machinist with the American Army during the construction of the Alaska Highway. When the Americans left, Hooper started moving army buildings of many sizes, including the Quonset huts. His first job was to move a small house owned by the American from the airport to Whiskey Flats. The next year he dismantled the sider web that was the American Hospital. What he didn’t move he demolished. His skill grew, and in the 1950s, he moved a 50’ x 50’ steel warehouse with no floor.1)
In the 1960s, Pete Sudeyko purchased a house at the airport that the Queen slept in during her visit around 1959. The Department of Transport sold the house and the Annex next door, but they had to be moved. Pete wanted the steam-heated house in Porter Creek but there was no water or sewer in the subdivision at that time. He sold the house to George Krautschneider who got Hooper to move it to 611 Alexander Street. Jim Vautour and his wife purchased the house from George in 1989.2)
Hooper bought a lot in McCrae in the 1960s and moved a little house and some other buildings from behind Hougen’s department store when the land was cleared for a parking lot. Andy used his house more like a shop than a house - there was a workshop behind a beautiful old Quebec cookstove – but it worked like a house when he was raising two children singlehandedly.3)
Andy Hooper’s skill in moving buildings is well-deserved. He jacked up the Od Log Church Museum when it’s foundation was crumbling away. He moved the George Johnson Museum in Teslin, and relocated the Bank Of Montreal from Main Street to Jarvis Street in Whitehorse. In this case, a firm had been hired from outside, but they had the wrong equipment and Hooper had his men had to take charge of the job. The heaviest building was the Bamboo Lounge, a 30-metre-long building on a basement. A Kenworth couldn’t budge it and so a grader was put in front of the truck but still no luck until Hooper’s big winch truck joined the parade. The Kenworth was then able to move the hotel to a new lot where it became an apartment building. He moved at least eight houses, shops, log buildings or mobile homes every year between the mid-1940s and 1990.4) Hooper was with Chuck Morgan when the sternwheeler SS Klondike was relocated.5)
Andy Hooper received a Commissioner’s Award [in 1988] for his contribution to the Yukon.6) National Transportation Week annually recognises people from across the country. A partnership between the Yukon Transportation Association, the Yukon Transportation Museum, and the Yukon government started the Transportation Hall of Fame in Whitehorse in 1996.7) The first Transportation Hall of Fame event was dedicated to Andy Hooper. He exemplified the spirit of the Yukon in that he was resourceful, tenacious and always got the job done. He, and the men and women who worked with him, created and maintained Yukon's transportation system. Hooper was able to relocate buildings and homes with his old army truck.8) Andy Hooper’s famous truck is now located at the Yukon Transportation Museum.