Fritz Miller

Fritz Miller was a German-born prospector who joined the northward stampede of 1898. Rather than continuing to the Klondike, Miller and his partner Kenneth 'Kenny' McLaren left the trail at Bennett, crossed the ice of Taku Arm and Atlin Lake, and prospected the streams flowing into the lake's eastern shore, where they found gold on Pine Creek.

The partners recorded their discovery claims at the government registry office on 30 July 1898, and news of the strike spread rapidly among the thousands of gold-seekers already in the passes bound for Dawson. Many diverted to the new field, and within months the Atlin camp had swelled dramatically, with the town of Atlin springing up on the lakeshore. The Atlin district proved genuinely rich, producing steadily for a decade and earning its description as British Columbia's last great placer gold rush; mining on Pine Creek and its neighbours continued long after the boom subsided around 1908.

Biographical details about Miller himself are scarce, as is typical of the individual prospectors of the northern rushes, and his birth and death dates are not reliably recorded in accessible sources. He remained in the North and lies buried in the Atlin Pioneer Cemetery, where a provincial marker honours him and McLaren as the discoverers who triggered British Columbia's last placer gold rush.