The Alaska Prospector Archive

First published on February 13, 1902, in Valdez and edited by H. H. Hildreth (former editor of Sitka's Alaskan) and businessmen Will H. Craray and Joseph Bourke, the Alaska Prospector absorbed the Valdez News in June 1907 and continued publishing until 1908. Judge James Wickersham, in A Bibliography of Alaskan Literature, incorrectly lists the Alaska Prospector as the Weekly Alaska Prospector.

True to its title, the Prospector provided news of gold strikes in Tanana Valley and started its run with a mere 500 copies. Its first publisher block listed Hildreth as "Quill Pusher," Craray as "Ink Slinger," and Bourke as "Walking Delegate." The popularity of the Alaska Prospector owed a great deal to its advertising. According to Wickersham, the paper changed its publishing frequency and name to the Valdez Weekly Prospector, which ran from August 20, 1908, until August 1, 1912, at which point the paper briefly became the Valdez Miner and the Valdez Miner and Weekly Prospector from August 5-25, 1912. A concurrent paper, the Valdez Daily Prospector, ran until May 18, 1918, although sources are inconclusive regarding a beginning date—Alaska Newspapers on Microfilm 1866-1998 cites 1905, yet the earliest existing reel dates to June 15, 1908.