Roadhouses in Alaska and the Yukon Territory
This list of Canadian Development Company (CDC) roadhouses was published in the North-West Mounted Police Annual Report for 1899. The company had won the winter mail contract that year, and these "stopping places" were built to provide food and shelter for their mushers and dogs. In May 1899, they had been awarded the summer mail contract serving Dawson, and with a base at Bennett and a shipyard at West Dawson, operated the sternwheelers Anglian, Australian, Canadian, Columbian, Tasmanian, Victorian, and Zealandian. The company also chartered the sternwheelers Bailey, Joseph Closset, and Sybil.
In 1899, the CDC was constantly being taken to court for huge overcharges, despite contracts having been signed; the company usually won. In the Fall of 1900, they were put out of business by extreme low water at the busiest time of year. The steamboats were bought by the British Yukon Navigation Company, a White Pass & Yukon Route (WP&YR) subsidiary, and the WP&YR took over the mail contracts, which were formally awarded to them in 1902.
Table of Distances to Stopping Places Built by Can. Dev. Co.
No.
|
Post
|
Miles
|
1
|
Bennett
|
0
|
2
|
Cariboo
|
28
|
3
|
Lewgan
|
22
|
4
|
White Horse
|
20
|
5
|
Upper Labarge
|
25
|
6
|
Lower Labarge
|
30
|
7
|
Chico (fork of Nordenskiold Trail
|
23
|
8
|
Montagu
|
23
|
9
|
Cormack's (½ mi. from river)
|
24
|
10
|
MacKay (Rink 5 mi. above)
|
24
|
11
|
Minto
|
24
|
12
|
Selkirk
|
24
|
13
|
Selwyn
|
30
|
14
|
Tulare
|
36
|
15
|
Stewart
|
39
|
16
|
Sixty Mile
|
23
|
17
|
Indian River
|
20
|
18
|
Dawson
|
28
|
Tagish from Bennett
|
50
|
Atlin from Tagish
|
40
|