North Cascades

MARKETING THE WILDERNESS: DEVELOPMENT OF COMMERCIAL ENTERPRISES

MINERAL RESOURCES: MINING

Road Access

USFS horsepacker Fred Berry at Gilbert's cabin, ca. 1930s
(Thompson Collection, Washtucna, Washington)

Perhaps even more challenging than the lifestyle of the prospector was the physical difficulty of reaching the mines. The backcountry of the North Cascades was not easily accessible. Miners navigated water routes as far as possible before setting out on foot with supplies and tools on their backs. Following rivers and streams it was the prospectors who established the first trails into the backcountry. On the west side of the range the steep-walled canyon of the Skagit River above Goodell's Landing proved impassable, and early miners were forced to hike over Sourdough Mountain to reach the Ruby Creek placer mines. Most others traveled overland to Hope in Canada and then headed south about 50 miles on the Skagit-Hope trail, a route established, in part, by Native Americans, and extended by miners in order to reach Ruby Creek. In the 1880s miners petitioned the state for funds to improve the trails. After much publicity the government granted the necessary funds to miners who had offered their volunteer labor to improve the existing trail along the Skagit. Their intent was to run a trail along the north bank of the Skagit River, as this was the most expeditious way into the mining country. Construction of this route required dynamiting a ledge along the canyon walls and building several wooden suspension bridges over open gorges. The route, known by all who traveled it as the Goat Trail, had one particularly dangerous section appropriately christened the Devil's Corner. High above the Skagit waters, on an extremely narrow and precarious ledge, miners and their heavily-laden pack trains gingerly crossed a hanging puncheon bridge suspended beneath a blasted section of rock wall. Although extremely deteriorated, sections of the Goat Trail, including the Devil's Corner, can still be located today hugging the river s north bank.

Hand-in-hand with the problem of accessibility was the challenge of getting the ore to market. Once in the backcountry, miners could work their claims with packed-in tools and equipment, but transporting the extracted ore from the mine to the marketplace was difficult. Packtrains were costly, time-consuming, and an impractical means of carrying ore out for processing. No railroad line existed for miles. The cry for a mine-to-market road was heard on both sides of the Cascades from the 1890s until mining ceased to be a viable industry in the 1940s. Government parties responded periodically by exploring feasible routes for wagon roads. It was eventually determined that the best route for transporting ore to market and connecting east- and west-side mines was through Cascade Pass and Bridge Creek. More survey work was completed and road construction was actually begun. Over the course of 50 years, sections of road along this selected route were completed but never connected. The road up the Cascade River terminating several miles below Cascade Pass, and the rough road along the Stehekin River from Bridge Creek to Cottonwood Camp, are both direct results of the mine-to-market road building effort in the North Cascades

Stehekin Valley horsepacker Dan Devore, his horse "Old Bill," and his dog "Whiskers," n.d.
(NOCA-Stehekin photo file: L.D. Lindsley photo)

The mining industry had a direct impact on the economy as well as the physical landscape of the North Cascades. With the prospectors came those individuals who made their living providing miners with supplies and services. Horse packing quickly became a profitable business. Packtrains twenty horses long were a common sight heading into the backcountry along the Stehekin and Skagit drainages. Miner and settler John McMillan began packing in the 1880s along the Skagit. He brought supplies into the mines by way of Hope to avoid the Skagit River's canyons. Herman Rhode (also spelled Rohde), one of the area's best known packers, began packing out of Marblemount in 1904. Rhode served private miners, large mining companies, and the USFS for many years. Hotel owner Merritt Field ran a packing business in the early twentieth century, carrying supplies and machinery over Park Creek Pass to mines on Thunder Creek. [83] Beginning in the 1880s, Dan Devore became famous throughout the Chelan country packing miners and supplies into Horseshoe Basin and Bridge Creek mines.

Another profitable business serving miners was the operation of roadhouses or inns. On both slopes of the Cascades individuals and families opened their homes, renting rooms and serving meals to weary prospectors. These roadhouses were the last bastions of civilization, providing miners with fresh food and clean beds before they headed out for weeks of isolation in the mountains. On the Skagit, Goodell's Landing, the Ruby Creek Inn, and the Davis family homestead at Cedar Bar all served miners and other travelers; at Stehekin, the Argonaut/Field Hotel, Mountain View House, and Rainbow Lodge operated.

Confluence of Skagit River and Ruby Creek, 1906.
Ruby Inn roadhouse complex in upper right.
(Callahan Collection, Seattle, Washington)