Summary: | This thesis is an examination of the fur trade transportation
system through the northern Cordillera of North America in the
19th century. An historical geographical approach is used to
reveal the development of the fur brigade system in what are now
British Columbia and Washington State between 1793 and 1885.
The earliest European explorations across the Cordillera,
discussed in the first chapter, provided a framework for the
routes subsequently used by the fur brigades. Many of the routes
were aboriginal trade corridors; native guides typically helped
the explorers find their way through the Cordillera. Theoretical
considerations are also posed in this chapter to place fur trade
transportation in a broader context of transportation modelling.
The brigade routes through the Cordillera are the focus of
the second chapter but connections beyond the Cordillera and the
larger context of the fur trade are important also. The fur
trade was a transcontinental and international enterprise. A
description and analysis is made of the major routes through the
Cordillera used by the Pacific Fur Company until 1812, the North
West Company until 1821, and the Hudson's Bay Company until 1846.
The system of the Siberian fur trade in this period is also
considered.
The third chapter describes the changes that occurred to the
transportation system after 1846 with the settlement of the
international boundary from the Rockies to the Pacific. The Hudson's Bay Company searched for an all-British route north
of the 49th parallel, settling on a trail across the Cascade
Mountains between forts Hope, Kamloops and Colvile.
Chapter four identifies the different components of the
transportation system in the Cordillera, termed "brigades,"
including different modes of transportation - canoes and bateaux,
horses, men's backs, and dogsleds (used in the winter). The
problems of portages, the variety of goods and supplies
transported, the regimen, including the scheduling and logistics
of the brigades, are all analyzed. Considered also is the human
organization of the brigades and the concomitant problems of
discipline and protection. The brigade system was tenuously
maintained; much was problematic.
The concluding chapter summarizes the development of a
transcontinental link and the problems of maintaining such a
system of transportation and communication in the pre-railway
west. Theoretical issues are raised. The Fraser River gold rush
of 1858 impacted on the fur trade in general; the construction of
the Cariboo Waggon Road through British Columbia in the early
1860s further altered the system of fur trade transport. The
surveys for a transcontinental railway after Confederation and
the union of B.C. with Canada in 1871 resulted in the demise of
the fur brigade routes as important transportation corridors
through the Cordillera. === Arts, Faculty of === Geography, Department of === Graduate
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