| Summary: | On verso of image: Summit, Chilcoot Pass, Summit Lake Filed in Alaska--Passes/Trails--Chilkoot Chilkoot Pass is 3,739 ft. high and is on the Alaska-Canada boundary, 4.1 miles northeast of Mount Hoffman and 17 miles north of Skagway. The first known crossing of this pass by a "white man" was made in 1864 or 1865 by an employee of the Hudson's Bay Company, who started at Fort Selkirk and was delivered by the Chilkoot Indians to Captain Swandson, commander of one of the company's steamers. The first expedition to cross the pass was that of George Holt in 1875, who travelled from Lynn Canal to the headwaters of the Yukon River. With the discovery of gold in the Yukon in the 1870s, this pass was used by many prospectors, and during the Klondike Gold Rush in 1896, the Dyea-Chilkoot Pass route became one of the important routes to the gold fields. [Source: Donald Orth. Dictionary of Alaska Place Names: Geological Survey Professional Paper 567. Washington: United States Government Printing Office, 1967.]
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