Tanana Valley Gold

The gold deposit found in 1902 north of present-day Fairbanks proved to be the richest in Alaska. Prospector Felix Pedro and trader E.T. Barnette played key roles in the discovery and initial rush. A second strike the following summer catapulted a temporary trading post into the largest city in the territory. Felix Pedro, an Italian immigrant, claimed he made a rich gold strike in 1898 in the Tanana Valley foothills. While trying to find it again in 1901, he purchased supplies from E.T. Barnette’s temporary trading post on the Chena River, nearly a hundred miles from the nearest trail or gold strike. Barnette had been left there by the riverboat captain he had hired to take him to the upper Tanana River. Pedro returned to Barnette’s post on July 28, 1902, to announce a new gold discovery, and Barnette sent word to nearby gold camps, exaggerating its richness. Seven hundred people then stampeded to the Tanana Valley, but they found the nearby creeks already staked, few claims being worked, and Barnette charging high prices for supplies. With no money and no jobs, the stampeders camped near Barnette’s trading post and in January 1903 convened a miners’ meeting where they considered hanging the promoters of the new camp, until Barnette agreed to lower his prices. In the fall of 1903, miners on Cleary, Fairbanks, and Ester creeks in the Tanana foothills announced rich gold discoveries. Another rush followed, and 1,500 people were mining in the area by Christmas. The camp Barnette named Fairbanks grew into a city of saloons and two-story buildings. The amount of gold mined increased from $40,000 in 1903 to $9.6 million in 1909, and within a few years Fairbanks became the territory’s largest city.

Harding-Birch Lakes, Alaska · United States