Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 41, Number 1, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 September 1908 — Discovering the North Pole. [ARTICLE]

Discovering the North Pole.

There is a popular belief In the extreme Northwest that the north pole will be discovered by a musher, and not by any scientific polar exped; This belief is based on the conviction' that a gold stampede will eventually ' be started toward north latitude 90 degrees, and that mushers will rush in where Arctic explorers have feared; to tread. So completely unknown to fame is this newcomer in the race for the pole that to the majority of people, the name suggests nothing but cereal breakfast food. Gilbert Parker, the novelist, who finds his most congenial theme In French-Canadian life, has made hls readers familiar with “Marche-t’-en!” the cry with wh ch drivers of dog teams urge forward their panting animal;.

French-Canadian trappers were among the earliest white men in the far northwest, and American prospectors on the Yukon soon learned to goad their dogs on with the same erv, without, however, understanding the French which, in their mouths, was rapidly corrupted to “Muchon!” to this day an Alaska dog driver’s equivalent for “Gee up!” Dog drivers generally run with the team, and therefore from “Mush-on” has come the noun musher, used all over Alaska and the Yukon territory to designate a trailsman. The musher is generally prospector, stampeder and trailsman all rolled into one, and Alaska trails are such uncertain quantaties that he has frequently to make his own precedents over newly frozen sea and THRSieks' snow. The musher achieves most of his stampeding to new gold fields during the arctic winter, for then the rigid sea becomes a highway and mighty rivers need no bridging.—Sunset Magazine.