Fort Union and the upper Missouri fur trade / Barton H. Barbour.
Material type: TextPublication details: Norman : University of Oklahoma Press, c2001.Description: xvi, 304 p. : ill., map ; 24 cmISBN:- 0806132957 (alk. paper)
- Fur trade -- Missouri River Valley -- History -- 19th century
- Fur trade -- North Dakota -- Fort Union Region -- History -- 19th century
- Fort Union (N.D.) -- History -- 19th century
- Fort Union Region (N.D.) -- History -- 19th century
- Frontier and pioneer life -- Missouri River Valley
- Frontier and pioneer life -- North Dakota -- Fort Union Region
- Missouri River Valley -- History -- 19th century
- 978.4/73 21
- F644.F6 B37 2001
Item type | Home library | Collection | Call number | Materials specified | Status | Date due | Barcode | Item holds | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Adult Book | Main Library | NonFiction | 978.473 B239 | Available | 33111001467550 | ||||
Not for Loan | Main Library | North Dakota Collection | 978.473 B239 | Not for loan | 33111001467618 |
Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:
In this book, Barton Barbour presents the first comprehensive history of Fort Union, the nineteenth century's most important and longest-lived Upper Missouri River fur trading post. Barbour explores the economic, social, legal, cultural, and political significance of the fort which was the brainchild of Kenneth McKenzie and Pierre Chouteau, Jr., and a part of John Jacob Astor's fur trade empire.
From 1830 to 1867, Fort Union symbolized the power of New York and St. Louis, and later, St. Paul merchants' capital in the West. The most lucrative post on the northern plains, Fort Union affected national relations with a number of native tribes, such as the Assiniboine, Cree, Crow, Sioux, and Blackfeet. It also influenced American interactions with Great Britain, whose powerful Hudson's Bay Company competed for Upper Missouri furs.
Barbour shows how Indians, mixed-bloods, Hispanic-, African-, Anglo-, and other Euro-Americans living at Fort Union created a system of community law that helped maintain their unique frontier society. Many visiting artists and scientists produced a magnificent graphic and verbal record of events and people at the post, but the old-time world of fur traders and Indians collapsed during the Civil War when political winds shifted in favor of Lincoln's Republican Party.
In 1865 Chouteau lost his trade license and sold Fort Union to new operators, who had little interest in maintaining the post's former culture.
Includes bibliographical references (p. [241]-280) and index.