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By June of 1898, gold production was at an all-time high and at that time the big influx hadn't been arrived! Few of the newcomers knew much about mining, building a cabin or surviving sub-zero temperatures but they had the dream of striking it rich on the gold fields. Contrary to this dream few miners left the Klondike region wich pockets full of gold. According to the figures of a historian about 100.000 headed for the gold fields between 1897 and 1899. Only a third of them arrived in the Klondike region and probably half of those actually mined for gold. Of those, only a few hundred struck it rich.
One of the places that seemed to be full with gold was Eldorado, a tiny arm of Bonanza Creek: In 1898, Alex McDonald's bought half interested claim No. 30 on the Eldorado, the purchase price was some flour and bacon. Then he hired two men to work on his claim and with his percentage he was able soon to buy more and more claims - over 40 all together on gold producing creeks. He amassed a fortune so big, it's said he didn't know how many millions he possessed himself - probably the reason why he was known as the "King of the Klondike".
For most Klondikers who owned a claim, the search for gold was hard labor. Mining was a wet process: standing in icy creeks, swirling water in pans and trough so-called sluice-boxes. Also the climate did a good job in making live as tough as possible because on average there were only 90 frost-free days per year and during those "good months" mosquitoes were ever-present.
In the winter miners had to set fire in order to melt the ground so that they were able to use their picks and shovels. As soon as the loose gravel reached the ground it froze again and stayed that way until spring. That's when the payoff came, the miners called it "spring cleaning" and for many the work and the wait paid off.
Later the gold fields of the Klondike attracted big American capitalists like the Rothschilds and the Guggenheims. It was the time when mining entered a new phase: There was a change from labor-intensive work done by hand to machinery-driven mining. Also the size of the claims increased up to 40 square miles per parcel and in 1901 the first dredge began its work. It had huge buckets which dug up the earth and moved it back into the dredge, where the material was washed and the gold filtered out. What two old-style miners could process in an entire winter now took just one afternoon.
By the time the dredges came the gold diggers left, and also the social cluster in Dawson City and the whole Klondike region changed dramatically. Some of the miners with their wives and children headed for Fairbanks (AK) others gave up gold altogether. Even with all the mechanization the new century brought, gold production declined until 1908, when it was at the minimum of about 3.6 million Dollars. Since then there were ups and downs, but it never reached the amount of the late 19th century.
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