George Ryder (1894 - 1950)
George Ryder came to the Yukon to be with his father Roland Ryder in 1907. They operated a dray business delivering water and wood by horse-drawn sled and wagon. George used the skills he learned as a young boy to become a “skinner,” or stagecoach driver, on the Overland Trail between Whitehorse and Dawson. George served with the Canadian Expeditionary Forces in Europe during the First World War. After the war, he started Ryder’s Fuel Service, cutting cordwood near town and delivering it first by horse-drawn wagon and then by truck to Whitehorse homes.1) George Ryder took delivery of his new model Graham truck in July 1928. The one- and three-quarter ton truck had six cylinders and Ryder planned to use it in his business.2)
At the end of October 1924, the Whitehorse Star newspaper reported that the Whitehorse firefighting equipment was in good repair and a fire meeting was well attended. George Ryder was the unanimous choice for fire chief for the next two years.3)
George Ryder was one of the four aldermen when the first Whitehorse mayor and city council was elected in August 1950. The council faced run-down schools, dirt streets full of potholes, a needed transition from “honey buckets” to a sewer and water system, and very little in the budget. There was no city hall, and mayor and council met in vacant stores and offices over the first few years.4)
George Ryder died four months after he was elected to the Whitehorse council.5) He was a member of the local Masonic Lodge and the Canadian Legion.6)