John “Sandy” MacPherson (1861 – 1944)
John MacPherson was born in Inverness, Scotland and became a blacksmith by trade. He visited his sister and her husband in Kansas and heard about the Klondike gold rush. He travelled over the Chilkoot Pass to mine and do various jobs in Dawson for the next ten years. In 1909, he returned to Scotland and married Isabelle Cameron. They returned to the Yukon and bought a house on Strickland Street in Whitehorse where they raised their three daughters, Charlotte (Williams), Frances (Walin), and Isabelle (Scott). Sandy worked as a blacksmith for White Pass & Yukon Route and then opened a farrier shop behind the house to shoe horses.1) The Mail Service stopped using horses in 1921 and MacPherson started a blacksmith shop on Front Street.2)
The MacPherson subdivision on the North Klondike Highway was designed in 1976 and named for Sandy MacPherson.3)