Erik A. Hegg (1867 – 1947)
Erik Hegg was born Erik Jonsson in Bollnäs, Haisingland, Sweden to crofters Jon Persson and Brita Ersdotter. The family, with eight children, immigrated to United States in 1881. In New York, they gave up their Swedish surnames and adopted a name related to their home in Sweden. They settled in Wisconsin where Erik apprenticed as a photographer. In 1888, Hegg settled in a Swedish community outside Bellingham, Washington.1) In 1889, Eric’s brother Peter had a photography studio in Fairhaven and Eric had a studio in Whatcom. Photographer Per E. Larss went to work with Peter in his studio and his portrait photo was taken by Eric in his studio.2)
Hearing about the Klondike gold strike, Eric went north in October 1897, travelling with a group of Bellingham Bay investors, and Peter took over the Whatcom and Fairfield studios. Eric’s party chartered a leaky old boat called the Skagit Chief that had to be towed up the Inside Passage to Dyea, Alaska at the head of the Lynn Canal. Eric set up a temporary studio using broken down scows for his building materials and erected a tent inside the structure to block out the light. Eric soon moved his studio to Skagway to photograph stampeders on the Chilkoot Pass and he hired Larss as a photographic assistant as soon as Larss arrived. He then sent Larss with brother Charlie Hegg and Peter Andersson (a logger) to freight supplies over the pass and start building boats at Bennett Lake.3)
Larss and Eric Hegg left Skagway for Bennett on 5 May 1898 and they stayed there where Andersson was building the boats until the ice broke on the lake on 3 June. Hegg set up a tent as a studio and he and Larss took iconic photos of the fleet of homemade boats heading for the Klondike. One of Hegg’s boats had a darkroom built in the bow so Hegg could continue taking and selling photos along the route to Dawson. Setting up a studio as a base of operations was a priority when they reached Dawson.4)
In early July 1898, Larss formed a partnership with Hegg and the studio changed its name to Hegg and Company. Hegg left Dawson on 28 September with a large collection of photographs for an exhibit in New York. He was back in Skagway in the early spring of 1899 and he and his wife Ella resumed business at the Skagway studio, waiting for the start of navigation on the Yukon River. He photographed the construction of the White Pass & Yukon Route railway and took a side trip to Atlin. When the ice broke, Eric left Ella in Skagway and went to Dawson. During his absence from Dawson, Larss had changed the studio name to Hegg and Larss. They dissolved their partnership, Hegg left to follow the new gold rush to Nome, and Larss found a new partner. Ella operated the Skagway studio and purchased the photographic supplies that Hegg needed, but the marriage deteriorated. She moved back to Seattle and the marriage was dissolved in 1900.5)
Erik opened his biggest studio so far in Nome. In 1902, the divorce was settled and Ella Hegg got the Skagway studio. She sold it and Hegg’s negatives and, as was the custom, the new owners removed his name from the plates. Hegg lived in Cordova before spending a brief time in Hawaii, and then returned to Bellingham to work with his brother at their old studio. The partnership broke up when Peter took up framing. Erik kept the business going until 1946. Hegg’s work was collected by Peter Anderson’s daughter and donated to the University of Washington. His images were widely sold and are among the most famous of those depicting the Klondike gold rush.6)