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Voyageurs
Voyageurs (; ) were 18th- and 19th-century French and later French Canadians and others who transported furs by canoe at the peak of the North American fur trade. The emblematic meaning of the term applies to places (New France, including the and the ) and times where that transportation was over long distances, giving rise to folklore and music that celebrated voyageurs' strength and endurance. They traversed and explored many regions in what is now Canada and the United States. Despite their fame, their lives were arduous and not nearly as glamorous as folk tales made out. For example, they had to be able to carry two bundles of fur over portages. Some carried four or five, and there is a report of a voyageur carrying seven bundles for half a mile.Mike Hillman, "La Bonga: The Greatest Voyageur" Boundary Waters Journal Magazine, Summer 2010 Issue, pp 20–25 Hernias were common and frequently caused death. Most voyageurs started working in their early twenties and continued w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Coureurs Des Bois
A coureur des bois (; ) or coureur de bois (; ) were independent entrepreneurial French Canadians, French Canadian traders who travelled in New France and the interior of North America, usually to trade with Indigenous peoples of the Americas, First Nations peoples by exchanging various European items for furs. Sometimes they operated in competition with the larger and licensed ''voyageurs''. Some coureur des bois learned the trades and practices of the indigenous peoples, and even went into business with them. These expeditions were part of the beginning of the North American fur trade, fur trade in the North American interior. Initially they traded for North American beaver, beaver coats and furs. However, as the market grew, ''coureurs de bois'' were trapping and trading prime beavers whose skins were to be Felt#Manufacturing methods, felted in Europe. Evolution While French settlers had lived and traded alongside Indigenous people since the earliest days of New France, cou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Canoe
A canoe is a lightweight, narrow watercraft, water vessel, typically pointed at both ends and open on top, propelled by one or more seated or kneeling paddlers facing the direction of travel and using paddles. In British English, the term ''canoe'' can also refer to a kayak, whereas canoes are then called Canadian (canoe), Canadian or open canoes to distinguish them from kayaks. However, for official competition purposes, the American distinction between a kayak and a canoe is almost always adopted. At the Olympics, both conventions are used: under the umbrella terms Canoe Slalom and Canoe Sprint, there are separate events for canoes and kayaks. Culture Canoes were developed in cultures all over the world, including some designed for use with sails or outriggers. Until the mid-19th century, the canoe was an important means of transport for exploration and trade, and in some places is still used as such, sometimes with the addition of an outboard motor. Where the canoe play ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
North American Fur Trade
The North American fur trade is the (typically) historical Fur trade, commercial trade of furs and other goods in North America, beginning in the eastern provinces of French Canada and the northeastern Thirteen Colonies, American colonies (soon-to-be northeastern United States). The trade was initiated mainly through French, Dutch and English settlers and explorers in collaboration with various Indigenous peoples of the Americas, First Nations tribes of the region, such as the Huron tribe, Wyandot-Huron and the Iroquois; ultimately, the fur trade's financial and cultural benefits would see the operation quickly expanding coast-to-coast and into more of the continental United States and Alaska. Competition in the trade especially for the European market, led to various wars among indigenous peoples aided by various European colonial allies. Europeans began their participation in the North American fur trade from the initial period of their European colonization of the Americas, c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
North West Company
The North West Company was a Fur trade in Canada, Canadian fur trading business headquartered in Montreal from 1779 to 1821. It competed with increasing success against the Hudson's Bay Company in the regions that later became Western Canada and Northwestern Ontario. With great wealth at stake, tensions between the companies increased to the point where several minor armed skirmishes broke out, and the two companies were forced by the British government to merge. Before the Company After the French landed in Quebec in 1608, independent French-Canadian traders commonly known as spread out and built a fur trade empire in the St. Lawrence River, St. Lawrence basin. The French competed with the Dutch (from 1614) and English (1664) in New York and the English in Hudson Bay (1670). Unlike the French who traveled into the northern interior and traded with First Nations in their camps and villages, the English made bases at trading posts on Hudson Bay, inviting the indigenous people t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Portage
Portage or portaging ( CA: ; ) is the practice of carrying water craft or cargo over land, either around an obstacle in a river, or between two bodies of water. A path where items are regularly carried between bodies of water is also called a ''portage.'' The term comes from French, where means "to carry", as in "portable". In Canada, the term "carrying-place" was sometimes used. Early French explorers in New France and French Louisiana encountered many rapids and cascades. The Native Americans carried their canoes over land to avoid river obstacles. Over time, important portages were sometimes provided with canals with locks, and even portage railways. Primitive portaging generally involves carrying the vessel and its contents across the portage in multiple trips. Small canoes can be portaged by carrying them inverted over one's shoulders and the center strut may be designed in the style of a yoke to facilitate this. Historically, voyageurs often employed tump lines on t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
French Canadians
French Canadians, referred to as Canadiens mainly before the nineteenth century, are an ethnic group descended from French colonists first arriving in France's colony of Canada in 1608. The vast majority of French Canadians live in the province of Quebec. During the 17th century, French settlers originating mainly from the west and north of France settled Canada. It is from them that the French Canadian ethnicity was born. During the 17th to 18th centuries, French Canadians expanded across North America and colonized various regions, cities, and towns. As a result, people of French Canadian descent can be found across North America. Between 1840 and 1930, many French Canadians emigrated to New England, an event known as the Grande Hémorragie. Etymology French Canadians get their name from the French colony of Canada, the most developed and densely populated region of New France during the period of French colonization in the 17th and 18th centuries. The original use of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hudson's Bay Company
The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), originally the Governor and Company of Adventurers of England Trading Into Hudson’s Bay, is a Canadian holding company of department stores, and the oldest corporation in North America. It was the owner of the namesake Hudson's Bay (department store), Hudson's Bay department stores (colloquially The Bay), and also owns or manages approximately of gross leasable real estate through its HBC Properties and Investments business unit. HBC previously owned the full-line Saks Fifth Avenue and off-price Saks Off 5th in the United States, which were spun-off into the Saks Global holding company in 2024. After incorporation by royal charter issued in 1670 by Charles II of England, King Charles II, the company was granted a right of "sole trade and commerce" over an expansive area of land known as Rupert's Land, comprising much of the Hudson Bay drainage basin. This right gave the company a monopoly, commercial monopoly over that area. The HBC functioned ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shooting The Rapids 1879
Shooting is the act or process of discharging a projectile from a ranged weapon (such as a gun, bow, crossbow, slingshot, or blowpipe). Even the acts of launching flame, artillery, darts, harpoons, grenades, rockets, and guided missiles can be considered acts of shooting. When using a firearm, the act of shooting is often called firing as it involves initiating a combustion (deflagration) of chemical propellants. Shooting can take place in a shooting range or in the field, in shooting sports, hunting, or in combat. The person involved in the shooting activity is called a shooter. A skilled, accurate shooter is a ''marksman'' or ''sharpshooter'', and a person's level of shooting proficiency is referred to as their ''marksmanship''. Competitive shooting Shooting has inspired competition, and in several countries rifle clubs started to form in the 19th century. Soon international shooting events evolved, including shooting at the Summer and Winter Olympics (from 1896) and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Indigenous Peoples Of The Americas
In the Americas, Indigenous peoples comprise the two continents' pre-Columbian inhabitants, as well as the ethnic groups that identify with them in the 15th century, as well as the ethnic groups that identify with the pre-Columbian population of the Americas as such. These populations exhibit significant diversity; some Indigenous peoples were historically hunter-gatherers, while others practiced agriculture and aquaculture. Various Indigenous societies developed complex social structures, including pre-contact monumental architecture, organized city, cities, city-states, chiefdoms, state (polity), states, monarchy, kingdoms, republics, confederation, confederacies, and empires. These societies possessed varying levels of knowledge in fields such as Pre-Columbian engineering in the Americas, engineering, Pre-Columbian architecture, architecture, mathematics, astronomy, History of writing, writing, physics, medicine, Pre-Columbian agriculture, agriculture, irrigation, geology, minin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Beaver
Beavers (genus ''Castor'') are large, semiaquatic rodents of the Northern Hemisphere. There are two existing species: the North American beaver (''Castor canadensis'') and the Eurasian beaver (''C. fiber''). Beavers are the second-largest living rodents, after capybaras, weighing up to . They have stout bodies with large heads, long chisel-like incisors, brown or gray fur, hand-like front feet, webbed back feet, and tails that are flat and scaly. The two species differ in skull and tail shape and fur color. Beavers can be found in a number of freshwater habitats, such as rivers, streams, lakes and ponds. They are herbivorous, consuming tree bark, aquatic plants, grasses and sedges. Beavers build dams and lodges using tree branches, vegetation, rocks and mud; they chew down trees for building material. Dams restrict water flow, forming ponds, and lodges (usually built in ponds) serve as shelters. Their infrastructure creates wetlands used by many other species, a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
First Nations In Canada
''First Nations'' () is a term used to identify Indigenous peoples in Canada who are neither Inuit nor Métis. Traditionally, First Nations in Canada were peoples who lived south of the tree line, and mainly south of the Arctic Circle. There are 634 recognized List of First Nations band governments, First Nations governments or bands across Canada. Roughly half are located in the provinces of Ontario and British Columbia. Under Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, Charter jurisprudence, First Nations are a "designated group", along with women, Visible minority, visible minorities, and people with physical or mental disabilities. First Nations are not defined as a visible minority by the criteria of Statistics Canada. North American indigenous peoples have cultures spanning thousands of years. Many of their oral traditions accurately describe historical events, such as the 1700 Cascadia earthquake, Cascadia earthquake of 1700 and the 18th-century Tseax Cone eruption. Writ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Great Lakes
The Great Lakes, also called the Great Lakes of North America, are a series of large interconnected freshwater lakes spanning the Canada–United States border. The five lakes are Lake Superior, Superior, Lake Michigan, Michigan, Lake Huron, Huron, Lake Erie, Erie, and Lake Ontario, Ontario (though hydrologically, Lake Michigan–Huron, Michigan and Huron are a single body of water, joined at the Straits of Mackinac). The Great Lakes Waterway enables modern travel and shipping by water among the lakes. The lakes connect to the Atlantic Ocean via the Saint Lawrence River, and to the Mississippi River basin through the Illinois Waterway. The Great Lakes are the largest group of freshwater lakes on Earth by total area and the second-largest by total volume. They contain 21% of the world's surface fresh water by volume. The total surface is , and the total volume (measured at the low water datum) is , slightly less than the volume of Lake Baikal (, 22–23% of the world's surface f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
