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The Mary Hitchcock quote I use is from her 1899 book, Two Women in the Klondike. The book is quite hard to find today and is very expensive. Luckily, the Smithsonian Institution's Postal Museum web site has information on Mary and Edith's journey to the Klondike, complete with photos from the book and excerpts from the book itself. Another great source for information on Mary and Edith and the way I first discovered Mary's writing is the book Klondike Women - True Tales of the 1897-1898 Gold Rush by Melanie Mayer ©1989. The two paragraphs from Mary's book that I quote are:
"At last the whistle sounded. ‘All aboard' was shouted. Then the Klondike ‘boys' began to exclaim joyously, ‘A train after all these years!' ‘How long since you been in one, Jim?' ‘Too long to talk about,' said Jim, as the tears rolled down his weather-beaten cheeks. The ‘boys' began to sing Home Sweet Home. ‘My old mother don't know I'm a-coming. Poor Bill! His people have all died, he's been away so long, and he ain't got even a sweet-heart to welcome him back, but he'll have a hot time in Skaguay tonight with all his nuggets disappearing.' The ‘boys' caught up the strain and A Hot Time in Skaguay was predicted from dozens of throats.
Some stiff, stately persons seated in front of us drew themselves together, their noses high in the air, and gazed contemptuously upon the noisy rabble. They could not see the pathetic side of the picture–of how the poor ‘boys' had tramped, footsore and weary, for days, months and even years; putting up with privations of all descriptions, suffering from lack of proper nourishment, half frozen in winter or risking their lives in going to the assistance of a less fortunate comrade, or they would not have frowned upon those shouts of joy at being once more within the bounds of civilization. A sudden whistle! ‘A cow on the tracks, boys! Let's get off an' look at her. I've forgotten how one looks.'"
