Helen McGundy, Big Salmon Pat and Mrs. Big Salmon Pat sitting in front of a cabin with geese hanging behind. George Johnston photographer, Hazel Campen Collection.

Two Yukon First Nations have their traditional lands in the Whitehorse area - the Taa'an Kwächän and the Kwanlin Dün. The Southern Tutchone names for these people reflect their ties to the land. Taa'an means "head of the lake," referring to Lake Laberge, while Kwanlin means "water running through a narrow place," describing the turbulent waters of Miles Canyon and Whitehorse Rapids.

For centuries the Southern Tutchone had strong trade and family ties with groups from all over the Yukon and the Alaska panhandle. In 1898, their lives changed radically. According to one elder, the Klondike gold rush brought "so many white people, there was like water running all the rime."

Frank Slim and his family aboard a river steamer in 1940.

For Aboriginal people, their close links to the land are crucial to their cultural identity. Land claim settlements recognize the Yukon's First Nations as separate levels of government working with the governments of Yukon and Canada. Yukon's First Nations rely on wisdom and experience of their elders to draw from tradition and direct their paths into the future. Irene Smith, 1990:
"You know where Lake Laberge is now, the new village… my grandma used to go out grouse hunting, gopher hunting. All through there, there were lots of old bush camps… they all burned up when there's fire in 1958."

Excavated artifacts found in the Whitehorse area dating back as far as the end of the last Ice Age, between 8,000 and 10,000 years ago.