Three towns sprang from nothing in 1896, created by Skookum Jim and his partners. They created them from a distance, from Dawson up on the Klondike. But, fittingly, Skagway, Carcross and Whitehorse sprang up in Jim’s old stomping ground.
First the town of Skagway.
A boom town of mythic proportions sprouted on the precarious strip at the mouth of the Skagway River, the boundary between the towering mountains of the coastal range and the water of the Lynn Canal.
When the gold rush ended, as suddenly as it had begun, the saloons and brothels emptied and the little city almost, but not quite, disappeared. The detritus of the boom remained—empty buildings, some of them only shacks, scattered across the little bit of flat land at the edge of the fjord.
The gold rush left Skagway with a harbor, a narrow-gauge railway to the Yukon interior, an enduring place in the legend of the rush—and a few people who, for a variety of individual reasons, chose to remain.
Freight into the Yukon came through Skagway and up to Carcross and Whitehorse on the railroad. Tourists came in the summer to explore the legendary country of the great Gold Rush. The railroad had to have engineers and brakemen and conductors and mechanics and management and it took people to keep the docks open. The WP&YT headquartered in Skagway, so its employees lived there.
Harriett Pullen had originally brought her three young sons to Skagway with the miners, making a living by selling pies. She remained behind when they left and opened a hotel.
Joseph and Theresa Rapuzzi had originally migrated from Italy to Seattle. When Joseph went to try his luck in the Klondike, Theresa remained behind with their five children. Joseph didn’t strike it rich, but he found a home for his family in Skagway. Theresa, ‘Ma’, Rappuzzi, ran the Washington Fruit Store.
Their son, Charlie, drove trains over the pass. Their daughter, Della was secretary to the General Manager of the railroad. Son George worked for the WP&YT as a machinist. And son Louis became Federal Deputy Marshall for Skagway and the surrounding area in 1930.