Michael J. Heney was known as "Big Mike" to his railroad crews and the "Irish Prince" in the financial and social circles of Seattle, San Francisco, New York and London; to his friends he was simply "MJ." He ran away from his Pembroke, Ontario home at age 14 to work on the Canadian Pacific Railroad and learned to measure grades, blast cliffs, build tunnels and estimate costs. His natural talent to inspire working men established him as a railroad contractor by age 21. He worked on railroads in the Northwest, permanently establishing himself in Seattle. Then in 1897, he went to Alaska and the next 12 years, worked to build the White Pass & Yukon Route and the first hundred miles of the Copper River & Northwestern, his dream of building a railroad up the Copper River. Both railroads involved "insurmountable engineering and construction difficulties." He never married. He died at age 45 on Oct. 11, 1910, of pulmonary tuberculosis and left an estate of over one million dollars to relatives, associates, Catholic charities, and the Alaskan Indians in care of Episcopal Bishop Rowe. The mountains overlooking Cordova were named for him. [From: Big Mike Heney, Irish prince of the iron rails, builder of the White Pass and Yukon, and Copper River Northwestern Railroads, by Elizabeth Tower, 1990.]