Maria “Mickey” Lammers, nee Stoel (b. 1923)

Mickey Stoel was born in Arnhem, Holland. Her family moved to Sumatra, Indonesia during the depression in the 1930s where Mickey’s father worked for Shell Oil as a finishing carpenter. Mickey attended school in Indonesia until she was eleven and then she returned to Holland to finish her education and become a nurse. In 1948, Mickey and her husband John Lammers and their son Hans moved to Cardston, Alberta and then to Ontario, where their second son Bill was born. In 1953, they drove to the Yukon and John worked at several jobs before starting with Canadian National Telegraph in 1954. The family moved to John’s Alaska Highway posts at Coal River, Brooks Brook, Koidern, Canyon, and Whitehorse. Mickey drew the wildflowers that she later put into a book, Wildflowers of the Yukon (1979). In 1960, the Lammers bought a lot in Crestview when there were only a few people living there, and one of them was Gunnar Nilsson. After Hans finished high school, the Lammers built Stepping Stone, a tourist camp on the Pelly River. Mickey was often alone at the camp as John travelled on business.¹⁾

In 1969/70, Mickey and new partner Gunnar Nilsson located a spot for a mill on the Yukon River near the Yukon River Bridge. Gunnar had some experience with milling when he and Hector Lang were building bridges along the Alaska Highway. The mill’s first squared logs were sold to General Enterprises in 1970. They built a small cabin near the mill in 1973, and then a larger multi-storied place in 1985. They purchased a Pendu resaw in 1980 and were the only producers of dimensional lumber. Then they purchased planners and could produce different styles of siding and tongue and groove boards for interior walls. Two other sawmills at Marsh Lake could not produce finished lumber. Mickey worked in the sawmill and staked surveying stakes on pallets ready for delivery. The squared logs used in the construction of the Alpine Bakery in Whitehorse were milled at Gunnar’s mill, called Sloughmill. By the early 1990s, the five-acre mill was too busy, employing up to five people. Gunnar moved the planers to McCrae and Bill Lammers took over that part of business. Gunnar stopped doing his own logging, but instead purchased logs to mill. Gunnar’s health deteriorated in 1999 and they closed the mill.²⁾ The Gunnar Nilsson Mickey Lammers Research Forest on the North Klondike Highway was named in their honour.