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The Alaska Mining and Prospect Company was formed in Elmira, New York in 1897 and incorporated on December 24, 1987 in Colorado. Sale of stock in the company was to support and expedition to the Klondike to locate and mine gold. The president of the company was John M. Dixon of Elmira. Andrew Sherwood, geologist from Mansfield, PA, was hired to lead a party of prospectors and miners. The group left in May 1898 and reached the Klondike via the Teslin Trail. They wintered in Wrangell and returned to the stated in the spring having located no mines and extracted only a few samples of gold. Andrew Sherwood and his son, Hugh, later settled in Portland, Oregon.
The Alaska Mining and Prospecting Company records consist of correspondence and other documents that reflect the Company's expedition to the Klondike. The first box primarily consists of correspondence. The letters present are company letters both to and from Andrew Sherwood, the general manager of the company and leader of the Alaskan expedition. The subject of the letters range from the sale of stock for the funding of the expedition to the selection of the ten members to the preparations for the expedition. There are also letters concerning the status of the expedition both to and from Sherwood. In addition to correspondence, the first box contains reports about the status of the expedition written by Sherwood to John Diven, secretary of the company. The first box also contains letters written by Sherwood to various newspapers promoting the expedition and the sale of stock.
Besides correspondence, the first box also contains the articles of incorporation and the by-laws for the Alaska Mining and Prospecting Co., the bonds and agreements for the members of the expedition and various printed material concerning the sale of stock and the generation of funds. There are also three photographs present in the collection of the expedition. The first box concludes with newspaper clippings concerning the company and the expedition and a book about the genealogy of the Sherwood family, written by Andrew Sherwood.
The second box contains journals by Hugh M. Sherwood. The journals are in five volumes and range in dates from May 17, 1898 to September 9, 1899. After the journals are maps taken on the expedition which label trails, coal and gold deposits and various travel maps. The conclusion of the box contains various magazines and publications concerning Alaska and the Yukon area. The dates range from 1897 to 1912.
The Alaska Mining and Prospecting Co. Records is a small collection, as the Company was primarily concerned with the expedition to Alaska and its only endeavor. The collection lacks any financial records or meeting minutes by the stockholders or board of directors.