Ruby's Place, Dawson City, Yukon

Dawson City is located in the Yukon territory - about 100 kilometers east of the Alaska border, on the shore of the Yukon River where it meets the Klondike River. Before roads, these rivers were transit routes for people and goods.

Dawson's false-front architecture, gravel streets, and raised wooden boardwalks reflect its history from the gold rush era. Tall false fronts on buildings gave a more impressive facade... and were cheaper and quicker than building the whole structure to a high standard.

After gold was discovered in 1896, one hundred thousand people, mostly single men, headed north. Their collective pursuit of fortune became known as the Klondike Gold Rush. Less than half actually made it all the way to Dawson.

The first of many challenges on the busiest route to Dawson was the Chilkoot Trail, an important trade route for the Tlingit people that was soon overrun with stampeders, as the gold-seekers were called. Both men and women suffered the journey in search of prosperity.

In Dawson's early days, sex workers who braved the journey were free to ply their trade, and mostly operated in the unofficial red light district on Second Avenue, shown here. Many worked out of saloons, small private cabins (called cribs), or on the streets. 

These interior photographs were taken when Parks Canada acquired Ruby's Place and show the furnishings as she left them.

We only know a little about Ruby’s life before Dawson. She was born Mathilde de Ligneres in northern France in the 1880s. She lived in Paris, Strasbourg, San Francisco, Honolulu, and Keno City (another Yukon mining community), and ran brothels in at least some of these places.

Ruby's Place had a living room, dining room, kitchen and four bedrooms upstairs.

The details about Ruby's past are a bit blurry, but we know even less about the women who worked for her because they were rarely mentioned in historical records. We do know that they worked in these rooms.

The garment is a woman's full-length light summer dress with a tie around the waist. It's stained and crumpled after decades stuffed in a wall, but it was originally purple with a white checked pattern.

The dress tag reads "Billie Burke Registered." Actress Billie Burke is best remembered for her role as Glinda, the Good Witch of the North, in the film The Wizard of Oz - and like many celebrities today, she had her own fashion line.

In the early 1960s, as Ruby was winding down her business, and mining activity dwindled in the region, Parks Canada decided to take an active role in preserving that history - and a number of buildings around Dawson.

Dawson Historical Complex and the other Klondike National Historic Sites are open to visitors year-round. Events and tours, some guided by costumed interpreters (pictured), run from May through September.

Dawson City, Yukon is located 525 kilometers northwest of Whitehorse. There are flights to Dawson airport year-round, or you can visit by car if you fancy a long road trip - it's about 27 hours from Edmonton, Alberta.

To learn more about Ruby Scott and the history of Dawson City, please listen to the full podcast episode of ReCollections: A Ruby in the Rough.