The Kusko Times

ALASKA'S FIRST CHILD BRIDE VISITS JUNEAU

After being initiated into the mysteries of wedlock in the little mining town of Sumdum at the tender age of 13, Mrs. R. V. Underwood, five times a bride, came back to Juneau recently to visit the land of her early youth, says the Alaska Daily Press.

She was accompanied by her fifth and last husband, R. V. Underwood, to whom she has been married for 13 years and stood amazed at the changes that have taken place in Alaska since she arrived on the little packet Alcott, 41 years ago, a little girl of 11.

Mrs. Underwood, during her visit, went to the office of United States Commissioner Felix Gray and copied down the record of her marriage to W. D. Benninghoff, who was chief superintendent of the Sumdum mine then, and 32 years old.

The record reads prosaically. "This is to certify that Loyal L. Wirt, a regular ordained minister of the gospel, did unite in marriage at Sumdum, Alaska, on November 25, 1898, W. S. Benninghoff and Miss Stella Thompson, and Henry E. Boehrig and Miss Viola Thompson. Marriage certificates were duly issued by me to both parties and in witness thereof the same were signed by F. C. Ward and Mrs. Lizzie Ward, mother of both brides."

For Stella Thompson's 17-year-old sister was married in the little camp, to a 24-year-old mine assistant. And of these two couples who were married in the presence of the group of 14 white families living in Sumdum, only Mrs. Underwood is living. Boehrig died only two weeks later, leaving 17-year-old Viola a widow, and Benninghoff died two years later.

Many stories could Stella Thompson Benninghoff Underwood, still a remarkably young-looking woman, tell of her experiences after coming to Alaska with her mother and sister. She knew well the famous "Klondike Kate," now Mrs. Kate Rockwell Matson, who is at present visiting in Dawson. She also knew H. T. Tripp, one of Juneau's oldest residents.

But the adventure she will remember above all is her simple yet ornate wedding, which was held in typical early-day Alaskan fashion.

The girls stitched and sewed dresses for days and weeks, and when the time arrived, Benninghoff chartered a ship to come to Juneau for the occasion, complete with a pastor and a sumptuous consignment of huckleberry wine.

Child marriages were deplored in a wave of sentiment which swept through the country early this year.

Mrs. Underwood, hale and slender and vigorous, and a social leader in Redmond, Oregon, would be a good subject for study by those who speak the loudest—or perhaps just the exception which proves the rule.