To start with, they (Skookum Jim's family) built a little log house there
in Dyea. People used to go there a long time ago, before Skagway was a city.
They had only one store there. They stayed there all the time, Skookum Jim's
family. But in fall time the ground is getting frozen already. But it's
coast, you know, different climate.
Here he went to bathroom outside. When he's coming back, he hear something
making noise. "Whoo", just like sand pouring down. So he stopped
and listened. Here there was a ditch alongside the house there where they
dig up the sand and put it on top of the moss for roofing. That's what they
used long time ago.
So he went on the edge and looked down and here sure enough there was
a big frog -- coast frogs are bigger than this frog, you know. Long
way from water, too, they said. Here it was trying to jump up and trying
to get back. But he fall down, keep doing that, I don't know how long. Gravel
fell down with him. That's what's making the noise.
Anyway, Skookum Jim saw it, so he was looking around for a board. Here
he found a board and he shoved it down that hole there, and then that frog
crawled on that board. So Uncle Skookum Jim just lifted it up, lifted it
up and carry it and took it down to the creek. There must be a creek there.
This is Dyea. So anyway, he left it there. He let it go.
And about a year or so after, here he got kicked in the stomach by
a drunkard man. And it got festered. Oh, he was sick, they say. It happened
somewhere around winter time. He was so sick he couldn't walk no more. And
here it broke open toward the outside.
That's when my mother was looking after him. Well, he's my daddy's
cousin. Their mothers were sisters. My mother's got three kids -- four
altogether with my oldest brother. And she's got one baby and twin girls,
four altogether. My mother was looking after them.
Skookum Jim's wife and my daddy, they go pack stuff. They're freighting
over the summit toward Bennett. They get paid for packing stuff. Flour,
soap, everything like that. And that's what my father was doing, and my
mother stayed home and looked after the kids and my Uncle Skookum Jim.
And here, one morning in June, his stomach broke out. Sun was way out
already when my mother heard Skookum Jim calling her: "Mrs. John, Mrs.
John, la'úshtla, la'úshtla, wake up. Come on!"
Well, she got up. She's young person. She jump up and went over there.
"Look at this thing here." Here he was too hot, it was just
burning, that sore place. So he had his blanket way up and his shirt was
open and he pulled off those bandages because it was too hot. He want to
air it, open place. And there he feel something tickle there. That's why
he looked down. Here it was a frog licking that sore place and that's what
it was that wake him up. My mother see it. Then she just got a board or
something and put that frog on that. It never jumped, too --nothing,
just stay like that.
Well, my mother used to have silk thread and beads and stuff too. She
was good then. She wasn't blind then. They gave him silk thread and some
beads. Swan down feathers. Put it all around him too, and then she took
it down to the creek and left it there. That's payment for Skookum Jim to
that frog. They pay him.
And here, two or three days after, he's starting to feel better and
that started to heal up too. So it healed up good in no time, just in a
week or so. He's all better and he's able to walk around good again.
I don't know how long after that he wants to see his mother. His mother
lives at Carcross -- Natasahin they call it in Tlingit: "water
running through the narrows." Tagish way they call it Todezani:
"blowing all the time." He wants to see if his mother is okay.
It's getting fall time. The ground is frozen already, but no snow yet. So
he went through the pass there (between Tagish and Carcross), Shash zetigi:
"grizzly bear throat," they call it, because there's always north
wind blowing through there. It's open there too, just like down a throat.
So, through there he went to see his mother, down in Carcross. And
here he camped half-way, around the first lake from here (Crag Lake), just
right in the middle. There's camp places there all the time, brush camp
there all the time, and here he camped there. He slept there.
That's the time he dreamt a nice-looking lady came to him. Gee, she's
just pure, just like you can see through her, just like shining gold shining.
He said that lady tell him, "I come for you. I want you to go with
me. I come for you now. I want you to marry me," she said. And my uncle
said, "No, I can't marry you. I got wife already. My wife and children
are in Tagish." That's what he dreamed he told this lady, he said.
"Well," she said, "if you can't go with me, I'll give
you my walking stick." She give it to him. Well, that walking stick
just looks like gold. Well, he knows gold after that! Just shiny as could
be, that walking stick. So he took it. He tells her, "Thank you."
"You save me one time," she said. "I was almost starving
and I was just about going to die, and here you saved me one time. And I'm
the one that saved you when you were sick. When you were sick, I save you.
I helped you. I medicine you, that's why you got better."
That's what the lady supposed to tell him, 'cause he dreamt that. And
that lady tell him when she gave him that walking stick, "You're going
to find the bottom of this walking stick. You're going to find it this way."
So he looked at it and, gee, everything is shining, looks like gold. "Look
this way," she said, pointing towards Atlin. "Look this way."
He looks and he sees just like a search light coming up.
"That's not for you though; that's for somebody else. You go down
this way (and) you're going to have luck, your walking stick" (toward
Dawson). That's what that lady is supposed to tell him.
When he woke up in the morning, here there was snow on top of him, about
a foot deep, they say. It snowed that night. I guess he slept open place.
He didn't sleep under anything.
After he eat breakfast, he went down to Carcross. He got to Carcross
that night, and his mother (and those people), they're fine. It's okay.
That's after his father died, I guess, because they never mention his father
when they tell this story. They just say his mother. Some of her grandchildren
are staying with them. There are some other people there, too, I guess.
But they just mentioned his mother. She was fine, nothing wrong, lots of
wood, lots to eat. Everything.
So he just stayed one night and he started to go back and he camped
on the way back too. Then he finally got home. He thought he's gone four
days. (When he got there) they tell him, "What kept you so long then;
you're gone eleven days." He don't believe it. "No," they
said, "You're gone eleven days."
Well, after that, he forgot about his dream. About a year later, though,
that's the time he went down the (Yukon) river. Didn't think any more about
it until he went down the river and found gold.
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