Arctic Survey Part IV. A Yukon Domesday: 1944

• Published in: Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science
• Main Author: Taylor, Griffith
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Cambridge University Press (CUP) 1945
• Subjects: General Earth and Planetary Sciences; General Environmental Science; Aklavik; Arctic; Canada; Canol; Fort Nelson; Fort Simpson; Fort Simpson Airport; Muskwa; Norman Wells; Yukon; Whitehorse; Alaska
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/137406; https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0315489000024300

The second part of my journey in north-west Canada began when I left Tuktuk on July 25 for Aklavik and Norman Wells. I had hoped to fly from Aklavik to Norman Wells, and so save a week's delay, but the planes are very irregular to the north of Norman Wells and it did not seem advisable to leave the Distributor until I was back in the regular “flying area.” We left the flying field at Norman Wells at 4 p.m. on August 1, and flew across the river to Canol. Here, after a short stop to pick up passengers, the plane proceeded south to Fort Simpson, which we reached in about two hours. We flew at a height of about 10,000 feet at about three miles a minute, so that it was impossible to make detailed notes. There was, of course, no settlement, and the only variations in scenery were in the character of the streams and sloughs. Occasionally outcrops of rock were visible, reminding one of whitish rounded scales in a green hide. We waited only twenty minutes at Fort Simpson Airport, which is some distance from the settlement, and then flew south-west over unoccupied country to Fort Nelson on the Alaska Highway. We could make out the “winter road,” at times crossing from lake to lake, with one group of huts near Petitot River about sixty miles from Nelson. We landed at the huge airport of Muskwa (Fort Nelson) about 8 p.m. I stayed a day at Fort Nelson, and made a survey of the old fur-trading settlement, but it will be more convenient to consider this district after the Yukon area has been described. The distance from Nelson to Whitehorse is about five hundred miles, and we flew this between 8.30 p.m. and midnight.