Jospeh Samuel Baron (b. 1863)
Joseph Barron, known as J.S., was born in Kiev and emigrated to Canada in 1880. He and wife, Elizabeth, and their two sons were living in Winnipeg when he caught gold fever. He joined the Klondike stampede and travelled over the White Pass with a stock of merchandise. He opened one of the first mercantile stores located on First Avenue in Dawson. His store burned three time, twice in 1898 and once in 1901, but each time he restocked and started over. Elizabeth and the children came to the Yukon in 1902, arriving by train and sternwheeler. The boys, J.B. and Abraham, finished high school at the new Dawson school and then completed their education in Chicago where they studied law. Elizabeth supported her sons by sewing and cooking for vaudeville and Yiddish theatre actors. She travelled back to the Yukon and they both left the territory in 1915 to join their children in Calgary. J.B. Barron was the first Jewish lawyer in Calgary to be admitted to the bar in 1915 and his brother followed him in 1919. J.S. Barron did not make his fortune in the Klondike but was proud to say that he left Dawson with no debt owed.1)