E T was Eldridge Truman Barnette. He doesn't play any direct role in the development of the mines behind Chelmsford but he is the founding father of Fairbanks, Alaska, and the way it came to pass is interesting enough to have a deeper look into his journey.
Little is known of this American's early life except that he was born in 1863 in Akron, Ohio, and that he grew up with a flare for adventure and risky business. He supposedly was sentenced to spend several years in an Oregon prison for some shady horse trading deals. However he received clemency. Some say due to his political connections, or to his families connections, and got out in less than one year on account that he never show up in Oregon again.
So he travelled around looking for a strike somewhere along the gold mines. He ended up on the Tanana river on a 150 foot sternwheeler owned by Captain Charles Adams. Adams boat was called the Lavalle Young. Why ? We hope to find out someday but yet don't know.
E T had a similar boat named the St Michael and had named himself Captain Barnette while intending to travel the Yukon river to Alaska but those plans had failed. The Yukon river being the highway into Alaska and into Klondike gold claims in those days meant he had to go looking for another Captain and another boat.
Before finding Charles Adam and his Lavalle Young, E T Barnette had went to work with North American Trading and Transportation at Dawson. While there he connected with a guy who was keen on building a railroad all the way to Eagle, Alaska. Healy was his name and he supposedly convinced Barnette to go ahead of him to set up a trading post at a point were the railroad would cross the Tanana River.
So the story goes that Barnette took the bait and looked for a means of getting his trade worthy goods to his destination. Well not quite !!!
After a few more failures he seeked out Captain Adams and the Lavalle Young. By now he had partnered up with Charles Smith and they put up 6000$ to hire the Lavalle Young. However Captain Adams explained to them that he could only ferry them to within 200 miles of their destination. They loaded her up with tons of trade worthy goods and off they went from the shores of St Michael's.
Soon enough E T Barnette and his wife Isabella Creary Barnette were settled on the shores of these Fairbanks and soon enough a few gold traders came down from them there hills and things they started looking not too shabby for the Barnette and Smith company.
They had traders, they had stock, and soon enough they had Bradley's in Fairbanks, Alaska which supposedly got its name from an up and coming politician.
"Barnette was the leader of the claim-jumping, miner-robbing gang which held this camp by the throat since its inception. With Barnette Courts and Barnette Juries, the people had no redress. Now comes the most wonderfully terrible part of this tale."
This quote was supposedly part of a message sent to Governor Walter E. Clark in 1911 by Aline Bradley and was found on an Alaska Bar Association site where they look into the world of Aline Chenot Baskerville Bradley Beegler who was a pioneering advocate and medical professional in Fairbanks.
Aline was married several times. Freeman Bradley, a Canadian miner, was one of her husbands.
In 1902 or thereabouts Barnette had bought his own ferry and baptized her the Isabella. For many years thereafter he worked the Fairbanks Gold Rush as an agent merchant banker and trading post owner operator. He used his money and his power and his businesses; Fairbanks Banking and the Northern Commercial Company to gauge miners and residents at will.
Life went on for Mayor Barnette and Isabella who were now parents.
By 1906 Fairbanks, Alaska was a gold haven with a population of more 5000 people.
By 1918 Barnette and his family were living in Los Angeles when Isabella filed for divorce claiming that E T was having an affair.
" I knew there was a reason I put Elizabeth and not Isabella in that sketch ".
Eldridge Truman Barnette died in 1933 in Los Angeles.
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