SS Umatilla

Overcome with “Klondike fever,” Jack departed from San Francisco on the SS Umatilla on July 25, 1897, accompanied and bankrolled by his much older brother-in-law, Captain Shepard.  They sailed to Port Townsend, Washington on Upper Puget Sound, where they boarded the SS City of Topeka which took them to Juneau Alaska.

The SS Umatilla was a steamer of the Pacific Coast Steamship Company, which sailed from San Francisco to the Pacific Northwest.  A prior SS Umatilla had been sunk in 1884.  The ship shown below was still in operation as of 1913, but little is recorded of her origins or disposition.

SS Umatilla.jpg
SS Utamilla circa Alaskan Gold Rush era.