The centrepiece was a series of murals from celebrated local artist Halin de Repentigny. Each one painted as “Dawson in his imagination, as it might have been back in 1904,” says Spriggs. Tucked in the back of the bar was “a trick-of-the-eye mural,” which made the room seem as if it continued forever.

Wilkie grew up in the Yukon. “My youth in Dawson City was spent waiting outside the [Pit’s] door to turn old enough to actually have a drink there,” he says. “It was a momentous day when I finally stepped inside… It’s been a part of my life for my whole life.” 

The Westminster Hotel sold a lot more than just cold beer and ‘Pit ration’ hotdogs. It was enmeshed in the local economy. “People [went] there to buy and sell gold. There were always miners in the pit with gold,” says Wilkie. It also served as a makeshift employment centre. “Never mind a resume. Go to the Pit, get wasted with a bunch of redneck goldminers, and they’ll hire you.” 

When Spriggs took over the Westminster Hotel in 1991, it was only operating seasonally. With a facelift and much-needed repairs to restore its “original 1904 tavern glory,” Spriggs got it “rocking and rolling.” Rumour has it Spriggs bought the bar after being barred from entering. An exaggeration or not, “I was one of my best customers,” says Spriggs.

The Pit went from a slow operation to live music five nights a week. George McConkey was one of the bar’s longest-running performers, known by locals as Harmonica George. Moving to Dawson at the age of twenty from Toronto to pursue the Yukon’s “wide-open, uninhibited spaces,” McConkey has been playing solo and duo gigs since the ‘90s, often alongside a local staple, the Pointer Brothers. 

Of his decades on stage, one night has stuck with McConkey. It was the night he met his wife, Brenda — she was working the room while he was playing the stage. Thirty-four years later, they are still together. 

In the weeks following the fire, residents have been piling around barstools at another beloved local bar, Bombay Peggy’s, to reminisce. 

“Some of my best memories were tragedies,” says Spriggs. “A house burning or a woman who got mauled by a bear” that led to Pit fundraisers. “People would show up very, very generous in their bidding — paying twice the price that they would have if they just went to the store.” In 2002, Spriggs won the Commissioner’s Award for services to the community. 

Coming together in hardship is what Dawson City does. The liveliness of the Pit and the charm of its sunken shape, which brought together locals and travellers for decades, will be carried on through intimate retellings. “It doesn’t just go away,” says Spriggs, “but gets replaced in some way.”