Klondike Valley, using excavators and diesel pumps, as well
as shovels and gold pans. Some of them are fi nding signifi -
cant amounts of gold, and spending their money on whiskey,
poker, blackjack and can-can shows at Diamond Tooth Ger-
ties gambling hall.
The downtown streets are unpaved. You walk on raised wood-
en sidewalks past frontier-style buildings, some dating back to
the gold rush era. At the Downtown Hotel is the Jack London
Grill and a saloon that serves a highly unusual cocktail, the
Sourtoe—a severed, mummifi ed human toe dropped into the
liquor of your choice. The legend is that the drink dates back to
the 1920s, and originally involved an amputated frostbitten toe.
These days, according to the bartender, the saloon accepts toes
lost to other misfortunes, includ-
ing lawnmower accidents.
I ordered mine with Wild Turkey,
and it was served by the Sourtoe
Captain, a young man with a patch
of green hair wearing a captain’s
hat. Opening a wooden chest, he
retrieved a long brown shriveled toe
from a jar of salt, dropped it into the
shot glass, warned of a $2,500 fi ne
for chewing or swallowing, and then
said, “You can drink it fast or drink
it slow, but your lips must touch
the gnarly toe.” When the deed was
done, he presented me with a certif-
icate suitable for framing.
By providential coincidence, the
Sourtoe Captain’s mother, a fi lm-
maker named Lulu Keating, was
working on a documentary about
Jack London’s time in the Yukon.
She took me to an ancient dive bar
called the Pit with dramatically
sloping fl oors and a raunchy oil
painting on the wall. The custom-
ers included gold miners, a profes-
sor, a dancer and a musician.
“This is a land of characters,
then and now, and Jack mined
them,” said Keating. “He was
fi ercely intelligent, and had a lot
of confi dence, but instead of try-
ing to impress people, he looked
and listened and felt. That’s what
made him a good writer.”
On her iPad, she showed me
copies of letters that Jack wrote
to people in Dawson after he left,
requesting stories, details, fl avor
and gossip. She also had a letter
written by Father Judge, a Cath-
olic priest, in which he describes
falling through river ice and just
managing to build a fi re to saveThe dominant primordial beast was strong
in Buck, and under the fi erce conditions of
trail life it grew and grew. Yet it was a secret
growth. His newborn cunning gave him
poise and control. He was too busy adjusting
himself to the new life to feel at ease, and
not only did he not pick fi ghts, but he
avoided them whenever possible. A certain
deliberateness characterized his attitude.
The Call of the Wild