Alaskan History
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Sunday, July 5, 1908: DAWSON, June 1—(Special.)—Jujiro Wada, the great long distance musher of Alaska, holder of the fiftymile indoor racing championship of Alaska, is now on his way from Dawson to the Firth River, near Herschel Island, where he has staked a claim. The trip he is now on is 5,000 miles long. Wada is racing against the steamboats from Dawson to St. Michael. He goes down the river in a small boat to St. Michael, thence to Nome, where he will ship on a whaler to the Firth River. The great musher’s trip to Herschel and Firth River last winter covered 1,600 miles, and was made with no companion save his dogs. On the way down his supplies ran low, and he fed his trousers to his dogs, after oiling them with whale oil. He also sacrificed his socks. He mushed into Dawson with only his underwear to hide his nakedness. Jujiro Wada was born in Southern Japan, but he has been away from home since he was a very small boy. He has shipped to all parts of the world. A few years ago he drifted into the Arctic regions, and has since made it his home. The nut brown hustler weighs 126 pounds, and stands 5 feet 1 inch. On the present trip Wada is taking with him a little food, a grip of clothing, a frying pan, a cup, a tin plate, a knife, his five dogs, and a roll of blankets. He carries letters for government officials at Herschel Island which contain an appointment making Sergt. Fitzgerald, at Herschel, a commissioner for taking affidavits. Wada found that when he would get into Herschel he would be hundreds of miles from a mining recording office, and that there would be no place for recording his assessment work without coming all the way back to Dawson. The appointment of an inspector had to come from Ottawa, and since Wada was leaving immediately, it was decided to obviate this difficulty by letting him make oath at Herschel before the Northwest mounted police there as to the work.
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