Griff Yarnell
GRIFF YARNELL is one of the pioneers and successful miners of the Kougarok District. He came to Nome from Dawson in 1900, and immediately went to the Kougarok region. He arrived in Nome during the month of April, and his first trip to this great interior district was made over the snow. He staked mining property on Dahl and Quartz Creeks. In the following season, 1901, he began mining operations on Dahl Creek. When he arrived in this country he was without means, and first began work with a rocker, living on the miners fare of bacon and beans. In 1902 he put in a line of sluice-boxes and was able to hire a force of from five to ten men. The following year the force was augmented, and he became interested in ditch construction. And thus his business of mining has grown from its modest inception to extensive and successful operations. Two hundred dollars the pan has been taken from his Dahl Creek claim. The prospects of the gold production of his properties, with water supplied from ditches,
very encouraging.
Mr. Yarnell was born in Center County, Pennsylvania, in 1869. His early life was devoted to hard work, and he has fought the battle of life single-handed and
unaided since boyhood.
He went to Dawson in 1 898 to try his luck at mining in the northern gold fields.
He was not one of the fortunate men, and in the winter of 1899-1900 he traveled down
the Yukon over the snow and ice, arriving at Nome as before stated in April. Mr.
Yarnell. in the language of the West, is a hustler. The good fortune that has come
to him in the Nome country is the result of his great capacity for work and his willingness
to try to do that which seemed best, regardless of difficulties or obstacles. He is
genial and honorable, and a highly esteemed citizen of Seward Peninsula.
Source: Nome and Seward Peninsula by R. S.
Harrison. Seattle: The Metropolitan Press, 1905.
|