Editor’s Note: Derek Leebaert is the author of several books on American history and the military, including Unlikely Heroes: Franklin Roosevelt, His Four Lieutenants, and the World They Made. He is a founder of the National Museum of the United States Army.
In the winter of 1933, the United States was at the height of the Great Depression. The unemployment rate had reached a staggering 24.9% and close to thirteen million people were out of work. Even elegant Central Park was considered a shanty town, more prominently known as a “Hooverville,” and serving as an encampment for the homeless. But the daily economic struggles did not prevent Americans from making the trek to their local theaters to see the latest musical from Radio-Keith-Orpheum (RKO) Studios, Flying Down to Rio.
Before August 17, 1896, Americans had little interest in Alaska, a far-off “district” — not even a territory — full of wolves and ice and forests. That attitude started to change 128 years ago, when a Tagish Indian known as Skookum Jim spotted something shimmering among the stones in a creek near the Yukon River. The Klondike Gold Rush began as soon as news of the discovery reached the states, and between 1897 and 1899, one in every 700 Americans had abandoned their home and set out for the “Golden River.”
Editor's Note: The following was adapted from Carolyn Woods Eisenberg’s recent book, Fire and Rain: Nixon, Kissinger, and the Wars in Southeast Asia.