The Family

Rufus Levi (Arly) Standard
Ezekiel Standard
Nahum Standard
Hettie McCormick
Annie McCormick

 Rufus Levi (Arly) Standard

In his mid-fifties, Arly Standard is the patriarch of the family. Older brother to Ezekiel and Hettie, and father to Nahum. He was a boy during the Civil War, and Arly has seen many hard years since. He has had four wives, and his current wife has been his salvation. Reformed of his drinking and gambling ways, Arly has called his family together to lead them to the Klondike- where his father Nehemiah went before him- to strike it rich.

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 Ezekiel Standard

48 years old, former Lt. in U.S. 7th Cavalry, participated in the "Battle" at Wounded Knee 1891. Discharged honorably from the army, (he was implicated in a prostitution ring involving Indian women in Ft. Reno due to debt obligations from a gambling problem). He most recently left San Francisco in a hurry to extricate himself from obligations there and taken ship for Alaska to join his older brother (Arly) and sister (Hettie) in the Standard Family stake. Nehemiah Standard was his father and he's convinced some bastard Klinkits did him in.

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 Nahum Standard

Nahum had always been the sort of child that was perpetually sick. The combination of illness and an overprotective mother kept him inside and away from other kids for much of his life. His only friends were writers like Dickens and Wilde, and his world the exciting orient of Kipling. Because of his frailty and propensity for daydreaming, Nahum's father had always been severely disappointed in his only son.

Nahum craves the idea of adventure, but somehow the reality never quite seems to live up to the ideal he's read so much about in his books. When he heard that the Standard family would be heading out west, he was excited. Here was his opportunity to prove to his father that he wasn't useless after all. With the works of Jack London as his guide, Nahum is certain that he'll be able to conquer the great white north.

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 Hettie McCormick

Hettie (full name 'Hester,' but no one calls her that) married a farmer (Kyle McCormick) and had a daughter (Annie McCormick) by him. However, Kyle managed to lose the farm as a result of his spendthrift habits--drinking and gambling in town. Once the farm was gone, they moved into town and things got real bad. With no steady work to regulate his debauchery, Kyle went on a binge of self-destruction. Hettie harangued him with the Good Book, with his responsibilities to the family, but one night he just disappeared. Hettie personally believes he ended up dead in a ditch somewhere. She's made due in town as a seamstress, but it has come to represent all that is wrong with the world.

When her brother said he was going up to Alaska to make his own way, she eagerly joined him. It will be good for the whole family--providing them with the chance to work hard, together, away from the evil of the city. Hettie has some concern for Nahum--the boy seems to have promise, but if he doesn't pull his head out of those books and start looking at life straight in the eye, he's gonna be in for a rough ride...

Hettie is tall, lean, used to hardship. She believes in hard work, maybe more than she believes in just about anything else. If you ain't sore and tired at the end of each day, you must be flirting with corruption. She's a slow-burning fire--focused, willful, patient.

Hettie is convinced that this trip will be good for her daughter Annie, taking her away from the moral dangers of the city, and introducing her to the virtues of labor...

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 Annie McCormick

Annie is the only daughter of Hettie, but has always been close to her cousins, and has a protective-older-sister relationship with Nahum. She is a whip-smart young woman who helps keep the family going- resourceful, good at sums and bargaining, and high-spirited. Annie isn't squeamish and she knows how to work hard and get things done. She's a good cook and can stretch a bag of potatoes longer than most folks. She's also of marrying age, so she relies on her family to watch out for her.

Before leaving home to join the family in Alaska, Annie had fallen in love with a young man named Earnest Pickett. Annie and Earnest were sweethearts, and he promised her the moon and stars. However, one day while doing an errand for her mother, Annie stumbled across Earnest courting another girl, Sue Ellen Anderson, and was heartbroken. She refused to see him again, and shortly after that her mother received a letter from her uncle, and they began packing immediately.

Having been hurt too many times (first by her father, then her sweetheart), Annie has closed up her heart. Although she still knows how to use her sweet smile and cleverness to get attention, her focus now is entirely on helping her family succeed in striking it rich.

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