Photographer and postal clerk John E. Thwaites was born March 5, 1863 in Eastwood, Ontario, Canada. He came to Alaska in 1905 with the Railway Mail Service and became a postal clerk aboard the mail steamer S.S. Dora from 1905-1912. During this time the S.S. Dora was based in Valdez and made monthly runs on what was called the Westward Run from Valdez to Unalaska. In the winter of 1910 Thwaites was transferred to the Farallon while the Dora was in Seattle for its annual overhaul. On January 5th the Farallon wrecked in Illiamna Bay and he, along with 30 others, had to survive a month on the beach before being rescued. Beginning in the fall of 1913 Thwaites was the mail clerk on the Mariposa which delivered mail along the Inside Passage of Southeast Alaska. Thwaites was a photographer as well as mail clerk while on these mail steamers and took hundreds of photographs of his adventures.

In the fall of 1917 Thwaites retired from the Railway Mail Service due to ill health.

In late 1918 Thwaites settled in Ketchikan and ran a photograph studio and curio shop. Ill health forced his retirement in 1932. He moved to Bell Island Hot Springs near Ketchikan for its healthful benefits and then to Mercer Island, Washington, where he died August 3, 1940. Thwaites’ ashes were carried north on the steamer Aleutian and scattered in the Tongass Narrows.

Information from: Sailing the Mail in Alaska: The Maritime Years of Alaska Photographer John E. Thwaites, 1905-1912 by J. Pennelope Goforth.