Frances Noyes Muncaster was born Arabelle Frances Patchen in Saint Paul, MN in 1874. She married Samuel G. Allen in 1892, at 18 but left him in 1895 and went East, acquiring some success as a theatre actress. Thomas Clarke Noyes fell in love with her after seeing her on stage and they were married in 1897. Settling in Candle, Alaska, Tom established the T.C. Noyes Banking Co. and became associated with the mining industry. In about 1905, they adopted a five-year old half-Native girl, Bonnie. A financial disaster closed the banking operation in 1910, but not before Frances mushed a dog team across the Seward Peninsula with $10,000 of her own money to try and save it. Soon after the bank closed they moved to Tongass Is., near Ketchikan.

Thomas Noyes died in 1916, and in 1919, Frances married Bill Muncaster. They owned a cabin near Haines but spent much of their time traveling, camping and hunting throughout Alaska. She staked her own mining claims in Squaw Creek, B.C., and for the next 10-12 years, she and Bill mined them in the summers and traveled winters. Frances prospected until her death, Oct. 28, 1952. Her husband, Bill, died Feb. 6, 1968.

William Muncaster wanted to see historically important material preserved. Much of the collection belonged to Frances Muncaster and was acquired during her marriage to Tom Noyes (1897-1916). [From: Inventory of the Frances Noyes Muncaster Papers, 1850-1952, Louetta Ward.]