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The S.S. Klondike was built in Whitehorse, in 1929 by the British Yukon Navigation Company (BYN), a subsidiary of the White Pass & Yukon Route railway (WP&YR). Of shallow draft, she was specifically designed and constructed to eliminate the need to push a barge when carrying the heavy ore sacks coming out of the Mayo silver mining district upriver to Whitehorse. With a cargo capacity 50 percent greater than other boats on the river at the time, she was the first sternwheeler on the Yukon River large enough to handle a cargo in excess of 272 tonnes (300 tons) without having to push a barge.

Initially the S.S. Klondike operated between Whitehorse and Stewart Landing. On her downstream run she would carry freight bound for the Mayo Mining District. On her return trip she would carry silver-lead ore from the Mayo District that had been brought down the Stewart River aboard smaller sternwheelers such as the S.S. Keno . In Whitehorse the ore would be transferred to the WP&YR for shipment by rail to Skagway, Alaska.


CanadaThe effects of the depression soon saw the S.S. Klondike moved to the Whitehorse - Dawson City run where she carried both passengers and freight, though she continued to be regarded primarily as a cargo vessel. Carrying general cargo and a few passengers, the S.S. Klondike would make the downstream run from Whitehorse to Dawson City – a distance of some 740 kilometres (460 mi.) in approximately 36 hours with one or two stops for wood. The upstream journey back to Whitehorse, including a stop at Stewart Landing to take on ore, would take four or five days and six wood-stops.
In WS another view