Elijah Andrews
Elijah Andrews was born in the mountains north of Dawson following the caribou. He lived in town for a while, working at washing dishes now and then. He walked the “Gwich'in Trail,” which became the Dempster Highway, back and forth between Fort McPherson and Dawson. Andrew's daughter, Mabel English, is an Inuvik Elder originally from Fort McPherson. Her grandparents started walking the Gwich'in Trail in the 1890s. Her father carried on the tradition into the 1920s. People would usually start their walk from Fort McPherson in March or April. It would take a month or two. Pack dogs would carry food, supplies like kettles. The dogs sometimes ran away so nothing important was put on them. They travelled on the ridges because there were bears and bugs in the valleys. Hats from caribou skins with tassels hanging down in front helped with the bugs. They lived off the trail. All kinds of berries, Labrador tea, wild rhubarb, chopped up and boiled with some flour for what ailed you. Spruce gum for healing cuts and bug bites. Geese, caribou, and moose were hunted along the trail. Dry meat was stored in caches for the walk back. Near Rock River there is a mountain where you got red ochre at a sacred place. You had to leave something to replace what you took. Horseshoe Bend, where the highway bends around a valley near Eagle Plains was another sacred place where the caribou always crossed. Joe Henry's camp was near Engineer Creek. When they travelled in the winter, they could use a dog team and they would use the Peel, Hart and Blackstone rivers. You could take the kids in the winter but not in the spring. People always stopped at Moosehide and left the pack dogs there before going into Dawson to sell their crafts. They traded for enamel cups, bowls, bread pans, cloth, sugar, flour, tea and other groceries. The food was usually gone before they got back to McPherson.1)