Ira Van Bibber (1877 - 1965)

Ira Van Bibber was born in West Virginia. He and his brother Theodore came to the Yukon during the Klondike gold rush. They worked on the Chilkoot Pass carrying supplies.¹⁾ In 1898, Black Sullivan had a cabin at Bennett Lake in a little bay near the community. He ran a saloon and roadhouse in his cabin and sold drinks and off-sale liquor. Ira Van Bibber and his brother packed $50,000 worth of liquor over the White Pass and on to Dawson for “Whiskey” Sullivan.²⁾ In Dawson, the brothers found that riches and jobs were scarce. Theodore continued on to Alaska where his wife and daughter joined him.³⁾ Ira built a pole boat and went up the Yukon to trap at Fort Selkirk and Coffee Creek where he met his future wife, Eliza. They trapped all over the country, and settled at Mica Creek, near present-day Pelly Crossing, in 1911. They raised a family of twelve surviving children.⁴⁾ They lived off the land, did some farming, and Ira ran a big game hunting business.⁵⁾ In 1912, Ira was working on the dredges near Dawson when he met Sullivan again.⁶⁾

There is a story that Del van Gorder, a fur trader at Pelly Lakes, and Ira van Bibber were friends and partners but political enemies. After they almost came to blows at Fort Selkirk, Rev. Cecil Swanson mediated by declaring that each should name the others’ first-born child. Republican van Gorder named van Bibber’s child Abraham after Abraham Lincoln, and Democrat Van Bibber named van Gorder’s child Jefferson.⁷⁾

One winter, Ira partnered with George Steel, originally from Missouri. They trapped at the headwaters of the Pelly River, and were trapping on Willow Creek, across the Pelly River from their winter headquarters, when Steel accidentally shot himself in the gut and wrist. Van Bibber put on a poultice of soft spruce tree gum and that kept the wound open to drain. It took three days to pull Steel in a sleigh over the bare ground thirty miles downriver. They spent the night in a cabin and borrowed a boat the next day to ran down the dangerous river full of ice. They froze into an ice jam, but the ice was too soft to walk on. Ira tore some boards off the boat and walked to shore on them. He built a bridge with brush out to the boat and George crawled to shore. They made a camp, and the next day Ira travelled down river to Henry Braden's cabin. Van Bibber and Braden brought Steel down to the cabin with a dog sled. It took twelve days for the river to set and then they hauled Steel to Fort Selkirk on the ice, and then sent him to Dawson on the winter stage. Steel lived, and the next season he and Ira travelled up the Pelly and trapped around Frances Lake.⁸⁾

In 1911, Ira and Eliza established a homestead near the current community of Pelly Crossing, at Mica Creek. A new government road was under construction by 1912 and was completed by 1915. The Van Bibbers operated their roadhouse here until 1921 when the lease was turned over to the Schaeffers.⁹⁾

In 1921, Joe Horsfall helped Ira Van Bibber fish, pulling nets. Horsfall had a team of horses, and he would haul the fish in and ship them to Dawson and Mayo. Dan Van Bibber remembers fishing with two sleighs. One sleigh had a stove, and the other was for the fish. Ira had poles frozen into the ice around the holes and they would put a wind break around the hole and put in a stove. The fish would freeze right away out on the ice. The ling cod would come back to life after they thawed out. They used to sack the fish before Joe Horsfall came out.¹⁰⁾

Around 1922, four of the Van Bibber children (Helen, Pat, Kathleen and George) were at school in Dawson, living at St. Paul’s Hostel. Four of the students living at the hostel contracted TB and died, and Helen was really sick. The hostel manager didn’t notify Ira, but a Mountie named Cronkite made a detour from his patrol to Mica Creek to tell Helen’s father. Ira hitched up his dogs and took the older boys with him to Dawson. Cronkite and another constable travelled with them as the Mountie was worried about Ira being so angry. They loaded Helen onto the sled and carried her back to Mica Creek where they kept her in a tent away from the others. She died in the spring of 1923. None of the kids went back to school after that, and Ira's son Alex home-schooled the young ones.¹¹⁾