Rock Poker to Pay Dirt: The History of Alaska's School of Mines and Its Successors

he spirit of family, of loyalty to the fraternity, was dominant among mining folk just as it was among bush pilots, cowboys, mule-skinners, bridge builders and steel workers. Their work set them apart. This was their recognition and reward, the wellspring of their pride in doing. From the preface by Dr. William R. Wood Rock poker, a game created by a School of Mines professor in the 1920s to teach prospectors the rocks and minerals of their trade, also describes the high-risk, high-reward gamble played by countless men and women in Alaska's young economy. Central to the developing territory, then state, were the students pursuing a minerals degree at the University of Alaska and the university staff, faculty, and administrators who nurtured the students and the mineral industry alike. This book recounts more than fifty years of history and stories, all of them intriguing and important, some of them poignant, and some of them hilarious. From gold rush to oil boom, Rock Poker, from t