Award-winning author Laurel Downing Bill heard the call of her Alaska history fans and has reproduced Robert W. Service’s The Spell of the Yukon and Other Verses.

This book pays tribute to one of the North Country’s most beloved poets and shares his first published collection of poems that debuted in 1907. This specially created book also features a biography of the Bard of the Yukon, written by Downing Bill, complete with photographs.
Even though he never lived in Alaska, Service helped put it on the map for most people with ballads like “The Shooting of Dan McGrew,” “The Cremation of Sam McGee” and “The Call of the Wild” – all included in this special collection of poetry, which now is part of the public domain.

Service felt a connection to the land and the people of the North and later told a newspaper that the nine years he spent in the Yukon (1904-1912) were “some of the happiest” of his life.

“All the things I am and have, I owe to the north.” Service said in the late 1940s.