Whitehorse

Continuing north I reached the city of Whitehorse at Historic Mile 918. With a population of around 25,000 people it is the capital and largest city in the Yukon (and indeed in Northern Canada). Whitehorse is on the Yukon river and was the terminus of the White Pass and Yukon Route narrow-gauge railway that linked the port of Skagway with Whitehorse where goods could be transferred to boat for distribution. The transport links made it an important point in the construction of the Alaska Highway.

Because I was travelling north at the very beginning of the tourist season most “attractions” were still closed but the Yukon Transportation Museum, which is right beside the Alaska Highway was open and was well worth visiting, they have website.

In front of the museum is this (rather rusty) 1888 Porter 0-6-0T narrow gauge steam locomotive.


	There was a large collection of plaques mounted outside the museum together with the marker for Historic Mile 917.


	Steam powered sternwheelers were used as extensively – over a roughly ninety year period some 250 sternwheelers plied the Yukon River and its tributaries.


	Outside the museum is this rather odd looking vessel. From its shape it looks typical of the vessels that sailed the rivers of the Yukon. I wonder if it used to be a sternwheeler that was converted to a house boat.


	The museum also boasts this most unusual windsock.


	A Douglas DC-3 was repainted in her original markings as CF-CPY and originally mounted on a pedestal in front of the Whitehorse Airport. It was later moved to the museum where her nose always points into the wind.


	Here is the museum’s Exhibit Gallery designed to captures the essence of old time Whitehorse with building facades and boardwalk, a full-scale train car, and replica “Queen of the Yukon” aircraft and various other vehicles.

The centrepiece of the museum, suspended from the roof, is a replica of the Ryan Brougham B-1 monoplane “Queen of the Yukon” fitted with ski landing gear and carrying the originals registration G-CAHR. The Ryan Brougham series of planes were modelled after the Spirit of St.Louis and were advertised as its “sister ships”. They were described as having "an interior completely upholstered in mohair,…[were] roomy, [with] comfortable seats, perfect visibility and easy access."

The original Queen of the Yukon was intended to serve a long and profitable career hauling mail and passengers throughout the Yukon. However, eight months after the inaugural flight it crashed and was damaged beyond repair. The delivery of the Queen of the Yukon II on August 1929 brought a short lived recovery to Yukon Airways but on 2nd November 1929 pilot John Patterson was taking off at Mayo when the aircraft crashed and he was killed - the Yukon’s first aviation fatality.


	The museum features displays such as this car parked outside a facade of a typical Whitehorse store of the period.


	Another display shows this truck used to transport goods from the railway and dock.


	This railway carriage has been restored to its original condition.


	Also suspended from the roof is this Smith DSA-1 “CF-RKN”. The DSA stands for Darn Small Aeroplane which it certainly is.


	Next to the Exhibit Gallery was a storage and restoration building containing a variety of items.


	This 1928 Fairchild FC-2W2, was used by by Northern Airways Ltd. of Carcross and on flew general bush charters and was then used by various operators to fly to the communities and logging camps. It crashed at a logging camp in Jervis Inlet in 1967. In 2004 the remains were recovered for restoration and display at the Yukon Transportation Museum.


	Among the vehicles in the storage building is this one that was used by the Whitehorse Fire Department


	Also on display is this ambulance.


	There were also a number of 1940’s military vehicles that, I suspect, were left behind once work on the Alaska Highway wound down.

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