Henry Nicodet (b. 1847)
Henry Nicodet arrived in Dawson in June 1898. He signed his application to join the Yukon Order of Pioneers when he was living at Granville in the Klondike goldfields.1) A Dawson newspaper reported in 1900 that Henry Nicodet found an ancient coin when he and his companions were digging a shaft at Big Skookum Gulch.2)
Folchat and Nicodet were the proprietors of a ranch formerly known as the Pee Pate farm, on two islands in the Klondike River near the upper ferry. In 1901, they grew or experimented with nearly every variety of vegetable known, and Dawson’s The Semi-Weekly Klondike Nugget newspaper described the farm in detail. Their main garden was on the lower end of the island and was about two and a half acres in size. One of the most successful experiments was in growing strawberries and a ten square foot plot held fifty plants and yielded fifteen boxes of berries selling for a dollar per box. Huge cabbages covered a quarter of an acre. There was a bed of celery yak, the root of which was a French delicacy. Their chicory tops were used as spinach and the roots were dried as a coffee substitute.
Foichart and Nicodet built a large storehouse with a frost proof cellar and plant to store between twenty-five and thirty tons of vegetables for the winter. Mr. Nicodet had twenty years’ experience with horticulture and, in 1901, he experimented with flowers. He successfully grew La France, Jacquinot and Apolinario roses in the open air and his carnations thrived.3)
For more on Yukon agriculture, see Sally Robinson, “Humble Dreams: An Historical Perspective on Yukon Agriculture Since 1846.” The Northern Review, 32 (Spring 2010): 135 – 167.