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the white pass hotel

The White Pass Hotel was located at the corner of First Avenue and Main Street in Whitehorse. I did the above sketch (pen and ink) years ago. This is what the block looked like in the mid-1950s.
robb

The White Pass Hotel was located at the corner of First Avenue and Main Street in Whitehorse.

I did the above sketch (pen and ink) years ago. This is what the block looked like in the mid-1950s.

I arrived in Whitehorse in 1955 and I used to hang around the hotel’s Grill Cafe and also the Hollywood Cafe, which was in the centre of the block around the corner.

The Hollywood Cafe had excellent Chinese food and just about everyone went there to eat after the bars closed.

The hotel beer parlour was very interesting. It had an ornate mahogany bar with mirrors, and, at one time, had a very interesting staff.

Vic Foley, a one-time North American boxing great, worked there as a bartender. Also working there as a waiter was an old Swede, Erik Erikson, who once made a living taking on all comers wrestling in a travelling carnival show.

Despite his age, Erikson could handle just about any troublemaker.

The entire block burned down on Christmas morning in 1961.

The Edgewater Hotel was built on the site of the old White Pass Hotel.

Anyone with information about this subject, please write Jim Robb: The Colourful Five Per Cent Scrapbook—Can You Identify? c/o the Yukon News, 211 Wood Street, Whitehorse, Yukon,

Y1A 2E4, or e-mail through the News website, www.yukon-news.com.