1954 Yukon Nuggets

The Big Inch Saga

The land is still here - listed as Group 2 in lot 243 - a nineteen-acre plot on the west bank of the Yukon River about three miles upstream from Dawson City. It is long way from Chicago, Illinois where in 1954, the Klondike Big Inch Land Caper began.

Bruce Baker was an advertising executive with Quaker Oats company. For years, through his ad campaigns, he told the children of North America that Quaker Oats cereal was shot from guns. But by the mid-fifties, other cereals gave away prizes in every box. Baker needed something new; something catchy and simple and related to the cereal's radio show about Sergeant Preston, a Mountie in the Yukon. Then he had a brain wave.

In each box of Puffed Rice and Puffed Wheat, he would give away a deed to a square inch of Yukon land exactly where Sergeant Preston and his trusty dog King carried out their adventures in radio land.

So began the Klondike Big Inch Land Caper, one of the most successful sales promotions in North American business history.

In October 1954, Baker, his brother John, and a Quaker Oats advertising executive chartered a plane and flew from Chicago to the Yukon, to look for land. In Whitehorse, the three introduced themselves to lawyer George Van Roggen who drove the men from Whitehorse to Dawson City. In the frigid early hours of Thursday, October 7, the three Chicago ad men set out in an open boat to inspect the land they would buy for 1000 dollars.

Their guide was Constable Paul LeCocq, a real-life Mountie stationed in Dawson. It was the most exciting day of Bruce Baker's life. The trip gave him a wooden leg to prove it. The Yukon river was choked with cakes of ice. The wake sprayed up over Constable LeCocq and froze. His leather jacket was soon completely covered with ice. Still they maneuvered upstream against the current for about 40 minutes and arrived at the land in question.

Paul turned in toward shore and suddenly - Crash!. The boat smashed up on a rock. Water poured over the stern and turned to ice in the bottom of the boat. They had to paddle about 50 yards to shore, made a hurried inspection of the Quaker Oats property and headed back, wet and cold, to Dawson, drifting with the current because the sheer pin of their outboard motor had broken off when they crashed.

When they got back to town, they headed straight for the hotel bar and got pickled on 180-proof rum. Bruce Baker's feet were badly frostbitten. Years later, complications resulted in the amputation of his right leg below the knee.

Back in Chicago, Quaker Oats formed a subsidiary called the Klondike Big Inch Land Co. to handle the promotion, so that deeds could be decorated with an official-looking corporate seal.

The promotion was first announced on the Sgt. Preston network radio show on January 27, 1955, and ads appeared in newspapers across North America: "You'll actually own one square inch of Yukon land in the famous Klondike gold country!"

The public response surpassed Baker's wildest dreams. Quaker Oats cereal sold as quickly as the deeds could be printed and stuffed into the boxes.Twenty-one million were issued in just a few years and resulted in Puffed Wheat and Rice taking control of the highly competitive cereal market.

The Sgt. Preston radio show went off the air in the late 1950s. The Klondike Big Inch Land Company was kept alive until 1966, to handle thousands of inquiries.

Then, the 19 wilderness acres of Yukon land were repossessed by the Canadian government for non-payment of $37.20 in taxes. Today, the deeds for the Klondike Big Inch Company are worth upwards of US $35 in the collectible's marketplace.

 

A CKRW Yukon Nugget by Les McLaughlin.