Hall, James A.: [Klondike Gold Rush]:

$600 · Offered by William Reese Company · No longer available

STARVING ON A BED OF GOLD OR THE WORLD'S LONGEST FAST. An inscribed copy of what Kurutz calls "one of the most dramatic and riveting recollections that can be found in the literature of the Alaska gold rushes." The text recounts trials and tribulations while lost in the wilderness of Alaska's Seward peninsula from July through August 1900, where the author nearly starved to death. Written in Teller, Alaska, in the months during his recovery from his near-death experience, the author self-published his story nine years later. This copy was inscribed by the author two decades after the events described: "With the most pleasant recollections of old times, I remain your friend the author Watsonville, May 23rd 1921." James Hall was a lawyer from Watsonville, California, practicing in San Francisco. In early 1900, a friend asked Hall to accompany him to the gold fields of Alaska, and after some consideration, Hall decided to try his luck. After some preparation and an uneventful journey by steamboat and foot to Teller, Alaska, Hall was asked in July to accompany some men on a four-day journey to look at a quartz prospect that could be rich with gold. During a mountain climb, Hall was separated from the other members of his team in the fog, becoming hopelessly lost. Thus began Hall's sixty-seven-day journey in the Alaskan wilderness, subsisting on water, roots, and berries. This eminently readable narrative takes the reader through the Alaskan wilderness as the author tries to retur

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