The discovery of this rich placer region was made in the
autumn of 1896 by an Illinois man named George McCormick,
who, in the intervals of salmon fishing, tried his hand at
prospecting, and on Bonanzo Creek, a tributary of the
Klondike, was surprised and overjoyed to find gold in a
profusion never before dreamed of in the Alaskan region. The
news of the find spread rapidly through Alaska and before
winter set in the old diggings were largely deserted, a
swarm of eager miners poured into the Klondike region, and
the frozen earth was torn and rent in their eagerness to
reach its yellow treasures.
The news of the discovery spread as far and fast as the
telegraph could carry it. The richness of the find surpassed
anything ever before found and the whole country was agog.
The stories of wonderful fortunes made by miners were
testified to by a display of nuggets and sacks of shining
gold in stores and hotels, the find of one man being shown
in a San Francisco shop window in the shape of one hundred
and thirty thousand dollars worth of gold.
The old gold-fever broke out again as an epidemic. Such a
stampede as took place had never before been seen. The
stream of picturesque humanity that poured through Seattle
and on to the golden north surpassed the palmy days of '49
when California opened its caves of Aladdin.
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