The main reason Samuel went to Alaska was to find gold and "strike it rich." In summers he traveled along rivers and beaches. People believed that the sand of the rivers and beaches contained gold.

On one of his hunting trips he stopped by the side of a creek (a natural stream of water smaller than a river) for lunch. When he looked down into the creek to get some water, he saw shiny gold pieces in the cracks of the rocks at the bottom. Samuel knew that this was the fortune he was looking for.