Raatikainen was an Alaskan pioneer and fish buyer when fish made people wealthy. During the fishing season he would hardly sleep, as he bought fish and ran them from the fishing grounds to Sitka. Raatikainen would leave Deer Harbor when the last troller had unloaded for the night. He would arrive in Sitka around three in the morning awaken the crew, unload, pick up groceries and arrive back on the fishing grounds by noon. Hoping to give better and faster service to the fisherman and buyers, he began looking for a place to build a cold storage plant close to the fishing grounds.