History & Museums
A boomtown frozen in its false fronts — the park, the railway, the saloon and the cemetery.
Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park
Free visitor center in the 1898 depot, the Gold Fever film and Gold Rush museum exhibits.
White Pass & Yukon Route Railway
A narrated narrow-gauge ride retracing the stampeders' route to the summit.
Red Onion Saloon & Brothel Museum
Guided tours of the ten rooms once run by the madam.
Liarsville Gold Rush Trail Camp
A recreated 1898 trail camp with gold panning and a salmon bake.
Gold Rush Cemetery
The graves of Frank Reid and "Soapy" Smith, killed in the same 1898 gunfight.
Walking map: the docks and downtown Skagway
The cruise docks sit at the south end of town. Broadway, the historic main street, runs north from the waterfront, and most shops, saloons and museums are within a few blocks of it.
3D walking map with times → · Park Service maps
Map: USGS elevation; streets and buildings © OpenStreetMap contributors.
Featured history articles
The best reading online about Skagway's past, from the Park Service, archives and historians. Each opens on the original site.
Captain William Moore, Founder of Skagway, Alaska
A profile of the former steamboat captain who claimed a homestead at Skagway in 1887, betting its harbor and pass would one day be the gateway to gold country. It follows how the 1897 stampede overran his land, his court fight to recover some of its value, and his final years in Victoria.
Read on explorenorth.com ↗
The Moore Homestead
Explains how the Moore family's cabin, the oldest building in Skagway, and their later house came to be, along with the wharf, sawmill and trail work they started before the rush. Also covers the family's struggles once the boom town grew up around them and how the park restored the site.
Read on nps.gov ↗
Soapy Smith's Showdown With the Vigilantes
Soapy Smith's great-grandnephew and biographer retells the July 1898 gunfight on Juneau Wharf in which Smith and Frank Reid shot each other. He argues that a second guard, Jesse Murphy, fired the fatal shot and that town leaders made Reid the hero to cover it up.
Read on historynet.com ↗
Con man "Soapy" Smith killed in Skagway, Alaska
A short This Day in History account of how Smith's swindles and gang drove Skagway citizens to organize, and how he died forcing his way toward their wharf meeting on July 8, 1898. It also covers city engineer Frank Reid, who was mortally wounded in the exchange and died 12 days later.
Read on history.com ↗
The Many Faces of Jeff. Smiths Parlor
Traces the many lives of the building where Soapy Smith ran his saloon, from bank to saloon, restaurant and fire station. It covers its 1916 move, Martin Itjen's 1935 museum, and the restoration that reopened it in 2016.
Read on nps.gov ↗
White Pass & Yukon Route
An overview of the narrow-gauge railway begun in 1898 to link Skagway with Whitehorse. It describes the blasting, tunneling and bridge work, the toll among workers, the February 1899 arrival at the summit, and the meeting of the two crews at Carcross in 1900.
Read on thecanadianencyclopedia.ca ↗
The Historic Chilkoot Trail
(In 2026 the border at the pass is closed, so hikers can't complete the route.) Follows the 33-mile route from Dyea to Lake Bennett, from its days as a Tlingit-guarded trade path to the stampede of 1897-98. Readers learn about the climb, the 1898 Palm Sunday avalanche, boat building at the lakes, and why the railroad ended the trail's heyday.
Read on nps.gov ↗
Dyea
The story of Dyea, from a Tlingit fishing camp and trade staging point to a gold rush boom town at the foot of the Chilkoot. It explains the Healy & Wilson trading post, the Tlingit packing business, and how the avalanche, Skagway's rise and the river nearly erased the town.
Read on nps.gov ↗
History - Chilkoot Trail National Historic Site
Describes the Chilkoot as a trade route owned by the Raven clan of Chilkoot village, where the Tlingit traded eulachon grease and dried fish for interior furs. It also explains the Tlingit and Tagish packing monopoly during the rush and how competition and the railway ended it.
Read on parks.canada.ca ↗
Women Who Went To The Klondike
Profiles women who found independence in the rush, led by Harriet Pullen, who went from baking pies and hauling freight in Skagway to running the Pullen House hotel. Nellie Cashman and Klondike millionaire Ethel Berry round out the stories.
Read on nps.gov ↗Roadtrippin' 2022: A tour of the Red Onion Saloon
A tour of the 1898 saloon and brothel on Broadway, told through its costumed madam. It explains how the upstairs rooms worked during the two short years of the rush and why the layered wallpaper is now the museum's biggest artifact.
Read on alaskasnewssource.com ↗Arctic Brotherhood Hall
Looks at the 1899 meeting hall of the Arctic Brotherhood, a fraternal order of gold seekers, and its famous facade covered in thousands of driftwood sticks. It notes that the building is among the most photographed in Alaska and now houses Skagway's visitor center.
Read on spacesarchives.org ↗Gold Rush Cemeteries
A guide to the burial grounds of Skagway and Dyea and what they reveal about the people of the rush. It covers the Gold Rush Cemetery, where Soapy Smith lies, and the Slide Cemetery holding victims of the 1898 Palm Sunday avalanche.
Read on nps.gov ↗
Frank La Roche, Skagway's first professional photographer
Skagway historian Karl Gurcke profiles the Seattle photographer thought to be the first professional to reach Skagway in 1897. It surveys his images of Skagway, Dyea and both trails and his later Alaska career.
Read on juneauempire.com ↗Hegg (Eric A.) Photographs of Alaska and the Klondike, 1897-1901
A searchable digital collection of about 730 photographs by Eric A. Hegg, the best-known photographer of the rush. Browse his views of Skagway, the trails, Dawson City and Nome.
Read on content.lib.washington.edu ↗
Skagway, District of Alaska, 1884-1912: A Historic Overview (Part I: The Golden Dream)
A detailed park history chapter on how Skagway grew from Moore's homestead into the main gateway to the Klondike, with its own architecture and elected government. It goes on to the land disputes, customs fights and 1907-09 panic that shrank the town before territorial status in 1912.
Read on npshistory.com ↗Summaries are ours. Archive photos: Library of Congress Prints & Photographs Division, 1897–1900, public domain.
Suggested Reads
The definitive narrative history of the stampede through Skagway and over the passes.
Find it on Amazon →Six people who went north in 1898, from a dance-hall star to a Mountie.
Find it on Amazon →The con man who ran Skagway, written by his great-grandson.
Find it on Amazon →The dance-hall performers, entrepreneurs and prospectors history often skipped.
Find it on Amazon →Amazon affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, Skagway Times earns from qualifying purchases. It costs you nothing extra. More Gold Rush books →
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