With the first salmon canneries set to open in southeast Alaska in 1878, the transcontinental railroad labor contractor Sisson, Wallace, and Co. in San Francisco created a new company called the North Pacific Packing and Trading Company. They intended to transform some of the existing fish salteries in Alaska into salmon canneries. They prepared the schooner California with needed supplies and also Chinese laborers which they had plenty of from the completion of the railroad construction. This included 120 tons of equipment for a steam sawmill and cannery, 50 tons of tin, along with the first 18 Chinese laborers to … Continue reading The California Schooner Sails to Klawock, Alaska in 1878 with 18 Chinese Laborers