Yukon Hotel

Dawson City, Yukon

This log building was built as a speculative property by local businessman J.E. Binet around 1897, at the start of the Klondike Gold Rush. He quickly leased the building to the Government of Canada as office space for the new Yukon territory, leasing it for the then exorbitant amount of $1,000 a month. In the 1930s, the Binet Block, as it was called, was purchased by a lady hotelier who renamed it the Yukon Hotel. That the hotel has survived intact for more than 100 years is a near miracle. Over the years fire has destroyed many more substantial nearby buildings.

The National Trust for Canada purchased the building in 1975 for $1.00. At that time, it was vacant and decaying, and the National Trust undertook a $386,000 renovation project to recycle it. The project was completed in 1980.

Upon completion, it was leased to the Yukon Housing Corporation to operate as subsidized, non-profit housing for seniors. In 1982 the HSMBC designated the building a National Historical Site,and in 1983 the hotel was sold by the National Trust. In recent years, the hotel has again been lovingly restored and brought up to current building standards as a luxury hotel, this time by Peter Jenkins, a successful local innkeeper.