TRADE AND SUPPLY

A long time ago, Mr. Pitts (manager of Harper's trading post at Fort Selkirk) traded with square money. He cut up paper, something just like cardboard. He cut it and made money... That guy at Selkirk, he sold with paper. They couldn't use it anyplace else, just at the one store, that's all.
-David Silas in Part of the Land, Part of the Water

Yes it was Christmas holiday everybody comes to (Fort Selkirk) after they been out trapping all the first part of the year. When Christmas comes, there's just about half the winter gone, and everybody come in with their catch and sell their fur and they had spending money. No such thing as drinking. There were hardly anybody drinking them days.
-George Dawson (FSOHP, 1984, p. 269)

(Isaac) Taylor and Mr. Drury started a trading post store to sell stuff. That time you could buy dry meat, dry fish from T&D Store.
-Grace Johnson, 1994

1930, we went by dogteam. We got little bit of f supply from Nisling River about 60 miles from Lynx City. Charlie David_, Jack Allen and myself. We went there to sell fur, get supply, just trapping as we go. No Hudson's Bay that time, Zimmerlee & Schofield and T & D's store, that time
-Sam Williams, 1994

THE STORY

Before the arrival of Hudson's Bay traders, Northern Tutchone people traded with the coastal Tlingits at various locations including Minto and near Fort Selkirk. After the construction of Campbell's second post, Fort Selkirk became a destination for Northern Tutchone people and their neighbours for a few years. After the Chilkat traders sacked Fort Selkirk in 1852, however, it was nearly 40 years before another outside trader tried to do business here. When Frederick Schwatka stopped here in 1883, all that remained of the post were the two chimneys constructed of basalt rock.

Harper's Post

In 1889, the American trader Arthur Harper travelled to Fort Selkirk with his Han wife and family to set up a trading post near the site of the abandoned Hudson's Bay Co. operation. He built a store, a warehouse and a number of small cabins where First Nations traders could stay while they sold their furs and bought supplies. Our first photographs of Fort Selkirk date from the early 1890s and show the buildings of Harper's post. By the time of the Klondike Gold Rush, Harper had left the Yukon due to illness. His operation was taken over by a man called Harold Harris Pitts. "Buffalo" Pitts, as he was sometimes called, lived at Fort Selkirk until his death in 1913.

By this time, there were other stores at Fort Selkirk and the settlement was well established as a trading and supply centre for a large area extending up and down the Yukon River, as well as up the Pelly and South Macmillan Rivers. First Nations people as well as white prospectors and trappers travelled here to sell furs and buy provisions. Since there were always at least two stores, people had the opportunity to bargain and find out who was offering the better price for furs.

Dominion Hotel/Taylor & Drury Store

Sometime before 1902, the Dominion Hotel was constructed (Building 26 - the T&D Store), its first owner being a baker named Anton Klimesch. This building had rooms for rent, a general store and a bar (the 'Club Room' in the east extension), as well as various outbuildings. The store and hotel were later taken over by his nephew Frank Vodicka and his wife. Vodicka, in turn, sold the building to Taylor & Drury in the late 1910s or early 1920s.

The Taylor & Drury Store was a Fort Selkirk institution until some time in the 1940s. Taylor & Drury was a well-known partnership, based in Whitehorse, with branches throughout the Yukon. Over the years, the store managers included Bill Cathro, Joe Menzies, Archie McLennan, and Bill Houston. This is the last remaining building to depict commercial activity in the settlement.

Horsfall's Store

Early in the century, Joe Horsfall ran a hotel, bar, cafe and store at Fort Selkirk. The exact location is not known but it was somewhere on the edge of the terrace at the downriver end of the campground. In 1910, Joe Horsfall took over the liquor license of the Dominion Hotel.

That same year, the Horsfall's two year old son set the store on fire while playing with matches and died soon after from his bums. Not long after this tragedy, the family moved downriver to set up a farm.

Schofield & Zimmerlee Store

About 1919, William Schofield moved to Fort Selkirk from Dawson where he had been mining and working as a mining recorder. He teamed up with Art Zimmerlee and Alex Coward to take over the Pitt buildings (formerly Harper's Post) as a store. These buildings are no longer standing.

Alex Coward moved on to other endeavours, but the Schofield and Zimmerlee partnership lasted nearly 20 years. William Schofield lived in an apartment upstairs from the store and Art Zimmerlee and his family lived in one of the old Field Force buildings next door (bldg. #15 - now the Garage). Art Zimmerlee also ran a post on the South Macmillan River at Russell Creek.

The Hudson's Bay Company Returns

By the mid 1930s, the Hudson's Bay Company decided to move back into the Yukon. In 1938, they bought out the Schofield and Zimmerlee store. The store prospered sufficiently that they decided to erect new buildings in the mid 1940s. In 1946/47, the Hudson's Bay Co. built a substantial frame store and residence.

This proved to be poor timing as Fort Selkirk was in its last years as a trade and supply centre. After the building of the Alaska Highway, plans were made to construct all-weather roads to Mayo and Dawson. People moved to Minto to work on the new road and the sternwheeler era was coming to an end. In 1951, the Hudson's Bay Co. closed down its store and moved the two new buildings to Nelson Forks near Fort Nelson. All that remains are the cement foundations of the store and residence. The Hudson's Bay Company was the last commercial trader to operate at Fort Selkirk, and it closed nearly 100 years after the abandonment of Campbell's post.

Further Reading:

Appendix #3 - Fort Selkirk: The Historical Resources. Fort Selkirk Interpretive Manual.

H. Dobrowolsky, ed., 1985. Fort Selkirk Oral History Project, 1984; transcript of tapes. Government of Yukon, Heritage Branch.

H. Dobrowolsky, ed., 1986. Fort Selkirk Elders Oral History Project, 1985, transcript of tapes. Yukon Government, Heritage Branch.

R. Gotthardt, 1987. Selkirk Indian Band. Land Use and Culture Study.

Stewart, Loree. Fort Selkirk Building Synopses. Prepared for Heritage Branch in 1993. Heritage Branch. Building Research Files.

C. McLellan, 1987. Part of the Land, Part of the Water, pp. 63-70.