Two others who reached the northern Eldorado were Jim Kenealey and Jack Russell. It took them two years to get in. Russell struck pay-dirt in the Cape Nome District, but Kenealey, after abandoning several claims, came out penniless. He died recently at the Cameron House, Strathcona, of which hotel he was proprietor. Kenealey, who came from Peterboro', Ontario, in the early eighties, was a clever sleight-of-hand artist and one time had an encounter with an Indian, it being natural and entirely reasonable that the Indian should demand the fifty cents that Kenealey claimed to have taken from his ear.
"But there were others who reached the gold zone," explains a lawyer who was, in those days, a cub-reporter, type-setter, and I know not what besides. "I have forgotten their names, but you may find them in the files of The Bulletin."
One of these parties comprised four men, Martin McNeeley from Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, George Baalam, W. Schreeves and W. J. Graham.
Schreeves and Baalam reached Dawson safely; Graham was drowned on the way, and McNeeley, who injured his foot, was left behind by the others somewhere near the Devil's Portage.
Some months afterwards, Mr. E. T. Cole of Pelican Rapids, Minnesota, with his party, stumbled upon a small tent in which they found a terribly decomposed body. It was McNeeley's. By his side there was a knife, a compass, a rifle, twenty-five rounds of cartridges, twenty pounds of flour, some meat, matches and wood. The following excerpts are from his diary—
"December 28, 1897—My partners deserted me and tried to cripple me further by taking my grub.
"January 5, 1898—Walked eight miles on my awful foot and am crippled on an Island alone. The pain of my foot is terrible."
The files reveal another tragedy in which two men from Brantford, Ontario, were the principals—the Strathdees.
Mr. A. C. Strathdee was one of the early stampeders. He went north with sixteen pack-horses. His only companion was his son, aged twenty-two, W. Harvey Strathdee, a member of the Dufferin Rifles. They camped one night beside the Taylor Trail that leads to Nelson. In the morning, while cooking breakfast, Harvey sighted a moose and, straightway, started in pursuit. At noon he had not returned and his father, becoming anxious, tried to follow the trail, but unsuccessfully. At night, the now frantic man lit a fire and shot off his rifle in the hope that Harvey might see or hear them. He did this for eight terrible days and eight more terrible nights, till he realized that further delay would endanger his own life. In these eight days, half of his horses died from lack of food, the man being afraid to shift camp in case Harvey might find his way back.
Further on, he met James and John Fair of Elkhorn, Manitoba, who returned with him to spend yet eight other days in unavailing search. At Dunvegan, Mr. Strathdee engaged a white man, an Indian, and a dog-train to go in and make quest till spring. Then he came back to Edmonton, where he exacted promises from the journalists to forward to him at Brantford any report that might come in from the trails regarding the lost youth.