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The Nugget Express
The Nugget Express is not a creation but a growth. Starting with small
beginnings to supply a creek demand, its ramifications, departments and offices
have in one year of growth covered the entire territory from the Klondike to
California. From November 1, 1898, to November 1, 1899, it has grown from
one man and a dog team delivering packages to half a hundred men handling
hundreds of tons of express matter.
Five thousand commissions have been executed by the Nugget Express in its one
year of life, without the loss of a single package.
Nine shipments of treasure have been made the past summer with an enviable
dispatch. When navigation opened in 1899 hundreds of men started for the
Outside. Let it be known that when they arrived in Seattle, Messenger W.
P. Allen was found already thee with the first treasure shipment from the
Klondike for that year. Starting from Dawson May 25th with the balance of
the outward-bound, by the courteous assistance of Major Woods, of the N. W. M.
P., he was enabled to break through the ice of lake Marsh and reach the outside
world ahead of all.
It is most interesting to note the development of the Nugget Express from one
department and one man to the present position of momentous importance and host
of employees. There are now the present departments: Nugget Express
regular service to every creek of the Klondike district, in conjunction with the
Nuggest Express purchasing department.
Nugget Express to Fortymile.
Nugget Express to the Outside.
Money order department.
Letter department.
Deposit department.
Commission department.
Telegraph department.
Passenger department.
Storage department.
Under the first head we may mention an office on dominion and at Grand Forks,
with the general office at Dawson. It was no unusual thing to see eight
and twelve laden Nugget Express dog teams leave Dawson in one day last winter,
the loads consisting of butter for Jones, sugar to Brown, fruit for Smith, there
being hardly a pup or gulch in the territory which was not reached. Miners
on their claims caught the passing express messengers, gave their orders and the
following day the goods had been purchased and were delivered without the loss
of a moment's time to the miner, and at the lowest Dawson prices which could be
obtained.
Under the second head of "Nugget Express to the Outside," we may mention
agents at Whitehorse, Miles canyon, Bennett, Skagway, Juneau, and a large
general office at 112 Yesler way, Seattle. The ability of the express
company to push matter through a freight blockade, which has left nearly a
million dollars of merchandise stranded on the upper river for the winter, is
demonstrated by the fact that the last pound of upwards of 50 tons of express
matter has arrived safely in Dawson, much off it leaving the Outside long after
freight companies were refusing to accept any more goods for transportation to
Dawson. This was not accomplished by accident nor good fortune, but by the
unlimited use of money and the securing of the very best to be found for
carrying out this important commission. As stated, the result is that
every pound was carried through the blockade and landed four miles above Dawson,
just as the flow of ice stopped for the season; viz., on October 23d.
During the past summer the Express business to Fortymile included a regular
weekly service both ways, the Express company being the regular carriers of the
Canadian government mail, the little steamer Burpee being secured for the
service.
Like other express companies, the Nugget Express was early in its existence
confronted by a strong public demand for a money order department, and the
demand has been filled, the Nugget Express money orders being good in any part
of America.
To many miners the letter department of the Nugget Express is its most
important function. Nearly every miner of importance on the creeks has
listed his name with the Nugget Express and immediately upon the arrival of his
mail in Dawson it is rushed out to his claim and delivered.
Nugget Express rate sheets are to be found in every Wells Fargo office in
America. Nugget Express for American interior points is turned over to the
Wells Fargo Co., at Seattle. The arrangement has brought many and large
packages of money via the Nugget Express to Dawson. This particular
feature of the express company business has proven of the utmost value to its
patrons. Many of them who had waited vainly for remittances through the
post office have received them safely via Nugget Express.
The commission department has filled one of the most crying needs of this
strange land. Taxes are paid on the Outside for inside owners.
Representation is arranged for by Outside miners at the Seattle office.
Miners have been put into communication with relatives in Canada and America
when all track of one another was thought to be lost. Relatives have been
hunted up through the Nugget Express by fortunate Klondikers, who from their far
away Dawson home were thus enabled to relieve financial distress.
Commissions have been received and faithfully executed to bring in miners wives
and children, the waybills on file at the Nugget Express office showing the
delivery of the important "packages" to anxious husbands and fathers.
Miners have bought mining machinery in Vancouver, Victoria, Seattle, San
Francisco and Chicago and had it safely delivered at their cabin doors without
themselves once leaving their claims. In fact nearly everything a miner
could do for himself Outside has been faithfully performed for him by the Nugget
Express, without failure of one single commission.
In Dawson it was found that many patrons of the Nugget Express were not
prepared for immediately taking over and caring for the consignments for them.
The storage department of the Nugget Express was immediately established and
Boyle's warehouse secured for that purpose. Today it is filled from
foundation to rafters by patrons of this department.
Throughout it all there has been a multiplicity of detail to systematize in
such a varied business as would weary our readers in recapitulation. A
letter delivered to the Nugget Express by Postmaster Hartman for delivery to a
distant creek, goes through a process of waybilling, entry and check as to
absolutely prevent its being lost, while a tracer at any time can immediately
locate the whereabouts of the smallest article in process of delivery.
Filed and signed receipts will trace any article from the time of its being
turned over to the Nugget Express at San Francisco, through the hands of agents
and messengers to Dawson, through the hands of messengers and agents to Dominion
creek, into the cabin of the consignee, and finally into his very hands.
The Klondike Nugget,
November 1, 1899.
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