George Whitfield Cameron “Whit” Mackintosh (1877 - 1939)
George Mackintosh was born in Charlottetown, PEI to father Charles C. Mackintosh.1) He trained as a butcher.2) In 1900, he joined the North-West Mounted Police (NWMP) after his Mi’kmaq wife died.3)
Mackintosh came to Whitehorse with the first contingent of NWMP.4) He was stationed for two years at the Five Fingers police post located three kilometres downriver from Five Finger Rapids on the Yukon River. He took his discharge at the end of July 1902 and stayed in the area for a time. In 1903, he had a commercial fishing license and fished in the lakes southeast of the Five Fingers post. By 1905, he was gold mining in the Kluane region and in November he left Whitehorse with a winter outfit. He planned to stockpile paydirt on Fourth of July Creek. He remained mining in the district for the twenty to twenty-five years. He married Jennie Hoochie, sister to Hutchi Jackson. She died at age thirty in 1927 and is buried at Champagne.5)
In 1930, Whit moved to California, where his mother and four brothers lived, and worked as a butcher. He married Dorothy May McFarlane before he moved back to the Yukon in 1935. His health had started to deteriorate and he thought he would fare better in the north. He bought the old Bear Creek Roadhouse buildings thinking he had purchased the property as well.6) Dorothy came in to join him and they staked 160 acres at Bear Creek in the spring of 1936. He expected the United States government to put a road through to Alaska by Aishihik or Bear Creek and his property would be valuable. They spent four years clearing land and building fences. George fell ill and died before the Alaska Highway was constructed.7)
George had some form of cancer. In June 1938, George’s doctor from California visited him in the Yukon. In November, the Mackintoshes went to California for four months and a caretaker looked after the trading post. They returned in the spring of 1939 and then returned to California in August. Mackintosh died in November at Huntington Beach, California and is buried at Westminster Memorial Park.8)
The name MacIntosh Creek, named to Honour George Mackintosh, was adopted in August 1958 and the spelling was changed to Mackintosh Creek in April 1966. The NWMP advised that the man signed his papers using the spellings McIntosh and MacIntosh. Mrs. Mackintosh sent in a letter signed by his father, Charles C. Mackintosh.9)