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Canadian Canoe Routes (early)
This article covers the water based Canadian canoe routes used by early explorers of Canada with special emphasis on the fur trade. Introduction European exploration of Canada was principally by river. The land has many navigable rivers with short portages between them. There are no serious barriers to water-borne travel east of the Rockies. The fur trade, principally in beaver, drove and financed exploration and initial settlement. Traders obtained furs from the natives and exported them to Europe. Canada and Siberia Both Canada and Siberia are largely covered by Boreal Forest. Both were opened up by water-borne fur traders. In both countries the problem was to find streams that flowed in approximately the right direction and to find short portages to move from one river basin to the next. Both regions are flat. One can move from the Saint Lawrence to the Rockies or from the Urals almost to the Pacific with only a few short portages. In both countries furs were obtained by n ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Coureurs Des Bois
A coureur des bois (; ) or coureur de bois (; plural: coureurs de(s) bois) was an independent entrepreneurial French-Canadian trader who travelled in New France and the interior of North America, usually to trade with First Nations peoples by exchanging various European items for furs. Some learned the trades and practices of the indigenous peoples. These expeditions were part of the beginning of the fur trade in the North American interior. Initially they traded for beaver coats and furs. However, as the market grew, ''coureurs de bois'' were trapping and trading prime beavers whose skins were to be felted in Europe. Evolution While French settlers had lived and traded alongside Indigenous people since the earliest days of New France, coureurs des bois reached their apex during the second half of the 17th century. After 1681, the independent coureur des bois was gradually replaced by state-sponsored voyageurs, who were workers associated with licensed fur traders. They tra ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lachine Rapids
The Lachine Rapids (french: Rapides de Lachine) are a series of rapids on the Saint Lawrence River, between the Island of Montreal and the south shore. They are located near the former city of Lachine. The Lachine Rapids contain large standing waves because the water volume and current do not change with respect to the permanent features in the riverbed, namely its shelf-like drops. Seasonal variation in the water flow does not change the position of the waves, although it does change their size and shape. The rapids are about in length. In the past these represented a considerable barrier to maritime traffic. Until the construction of the Lachine Canal through Montreal, the rapids had to be portaged. Even with the canal, the difficulty was such that it was usually more convenient to ship goods by rail to Montreal, where they could be loaded at the city's port. Montreal remains a major rail hub and one of Canada's largest ports for that reason. The Lachine Rapids are now passe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
North-West Mounted Police
The North-West Mounted Police (NWMP) was a Canadian para-military police force, established in 1873, to maintain order in the new Canadian North-West Territories (NWT) following the 1870 transfer of Rupert’s Land and North-Western Territory to Canada from the Hudson’s Bay Company, the Red River Rebellion and in response to lawlessness, demonstrated by the subsequent Cypress Hills Massacre and fears of United States military intervention. The NWMP combined military, police and judicial functions along similar lines to the Royal Irish Constabulary. A small, mobile police force was chosen to reduce potential for tensions with the United States and First Nations. The NWMP uniforms included red coats deliberately reminiscent of British and Canadian military uniforms. The NWMP was established by the Canadian government during the ministry of Prime Minister Sir John Macdonald who defined its purpose as "the preservation of peace and the prevention of crime" in the vast NWT ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rupert's Land Act 1868
The Rupert's Land Act 1868This short title was authorised bsection 1of the Act. (31 & 32 Vict. c.105) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland (as it then was), authorizing the transfer of Rupert's Land from the control of the Hudson's Bay Company to the Dominion of Canada. Often confused with the Deed of Surrender, the Act is different as it only expressed that the United Kingdom and Canada permitted the transfer but did not settle on the details of exchange with HBC which were then outlined in the Deed. See also The act resulted in other legislation that created or helped create three Canadian provinces that had been part of Rupert's Land: * ''Manitoba Act'' 1870 * '' Alberta Act'' 1905 * '' Saskatchewan Act'' 1905 *Deed of Surrender The Deed of Surrender or Rupert's Land and North-Western Territory Order is an 1870 British order in council that transferred ownership of Rupert's Land and the North-Western Territory from the Hudson ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carlton Trail
The Carlton Trail was the primary land transportation route in the Canadian Northwest for most of the 19th century, connecting Fort Carlton to Edmonton along a line of intermediate places. It was part of a trail network that stretched from the Red River Colony through Fort Ellice and today's Fort Qu'Appelle, Saskatchewan. From there the trail ran north and crossed the South Saskatchewan River near Batoche, Saskatchewan and reached Fort Carlton on the North Saskatchewan River. From there, it ran west on the north side of the river to Fort Edmonton at what is now Edmonton, Alberta. An alternative, the South Victoria Trail, ran on a more direct route to and from Edmonton, on the south side of the River, following the line of the old telegraph line. A length of it still survives, at the old Krebs homestead east of Fort Saskatchewan. The distance in total the trail traveled between Fort Garry (Winnipeg) to Upper Fort des Prairies (Edmonton) was approximately . Many smaller trails ju ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Red River Trails
The Red River Trails were a network of ox cart routes connecting the Red River Colony (the "Selkirk Settlement") and Fort Garry in British North America with the head of navigation on the Mississippi River in the United States. These trade routes ran from the location of present-day Winnipeg in the Canadian province of Manitoba across the Canada–United States border, and thence by a variety of routes through what is now the eastern part of North Dakota and western and central Minnesota to Mendota and Saint Paul, Minnesota on the Mississippi. Travellers began to use the trails by the 1820s, with the heaviest use from the 1840s to the early 1870s, when they were superseded by railways. Until then, these cartways provided the most efficient means of transportation between the isolated Red River Colony and the outside world. They gave the Selkirk colonists and their neighbours, the people, an outlet for their furs and a source of supplies other than the Hudson's Bay Company, w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
York Factory
York Factory was a settlement and Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) factory (trading post) located on the southwestern shore of Hudson Bay in northeastern Manitoba, Canada, at the mouth of the Hayes River, approximately south-southeast of Churchill. York Factory was one of the first fur-trading posts established by the HBC, built in 1684 and used in that business for more than 270 years. The settlement was headquarters of the HBC's Northern Department from 1821 to 1873. The complex was designated a National Historic Site of Canada in 1936. In 1957, the HBC closed it down. It has been owned by the Canadian government since 1968 and the site is now operated by Parks Canada. No one lives permanently at York Factory; there is a summer residence for Parks Canada staff, and some nearby seasonal hunting camps. The wooden structure at the park site dates from 1831 and is the oldest and largest wooden structure built on permafrost in Canada. Location York Factory is located on the north ba ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pemmican
Pemmican (also pemican in older sources) is a mixture of tallow, dried meat, and sometimes dried berries. A calorie-rich food, it can be used as a key component in prepared meals or eaten raw. Historically, it was an important part of indigenous cuisine in certain parts of North America and it is still prepared today. The word comes from the Cree word (), which is derived from the word (), "fat, grease". The Lakota (or Sioux) word is , originally meaning "grease derived from marrow bones", with the creating a noun, and referring to small pieces that adhere to something. It was invented by the Indigenous peoples of North America. Pemmican was widely adopted as a high-energy food by Europeans involved in the fur trade and later by Arctic and Antarctic explorers, such as Captain Robert Bartlett, Ernest Shackleton, Richard E. Byrd, Fridtjof Nansen, Robert Falcon Scott, George W. DeLong, and Roald Amundsen. Ingredients Traditionally, the specific ingredients used for pemmica ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Métis People (Canada)
The Métis ( ; Canadian ) are Indigenous peoples who inhabit Canada's three Prairie Provinces, as well as parts of British Columbia, the Northwest Territories, and the Northern United States. They have a shared history and culture which derives from specific mixed European (primarily French) and Indigenous ancestry which became a distinct culture through ethnogenesis by the mid-18th century, during the early years of the North American fur trade. In Canada, the Métis, with a population of 624,220 as of 2021, are one of three major groups of Indigenous peoples that were legally recognized in the Constitution Act of 1982, the other two groups being the First Nations and Inuit. Smaller communities who self-identify as Métis exist in Canada and the United States, such as the Little Shell Tribe of Chippewa Indians of Montana. The United States recognizes the Little Shell Tribe as an Ojibwe Native American tribe. Alberta is the only Canadian province with a recognized Métis ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
