|
by: Isaac Cowie
Amazon.com's Price: $29.95 Prices subject to change. Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 917.192041
EAN: 9780803263505
ISBN: 0803263503
Label: University of Nebraska Press
Manufacturer: University of Nebraska Press
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 555
Publication Date: March 01, 1993
Publisher: University of Nebraska Press
Sales Rank: 1942076
Studio: University of Nebraska Press
Editorial Review:
Product Description:
The Hudson's Bay Company had been operating for nearly two centuries when young Isaac Cowie joined it in 1867. He sailed from the Shetland Islands to Rupert's Land, finally reaching York Factory, where he awaited his assignment. Company of Adventurers describes the early, lusty history of the HBC and the years of Cowie's service, when manufactured goods were driving out the demand for furs and buffalo hides. It contains rare information about the Assiniboin and Plains Crees Indians during the period before their confinement to reservations.
Alive to the historical and ethnographic value of his writing, Cowie tells about his tenure as a clerk (later manager) at Fort Qu'Appelle in southern Saskatchewan, the colorful personalities who served with him, the wide-ranging fur brigades, remote outposts, and the Company's relations with Indian tribes. He was the first white man known to have set foot within the Swift Current District when in 1868 he hunted buffalo there. His dealings with the Métis during the Red River Rebellion placed him where history was being made.
In an introduction to this Bison Book edition, David Reed Miller discusses how Cowie fitted into a great commercial enterprise and how he became a victim of unpleasant circumstances that forced his retirement in 1891.
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating: - Life on the Canadian Plains in the 1870s
Isaac Cowie sailed to Canada from the Shetland Islands in 1867 with prospects of joining the Hudson's Bay Company. After arriving at York Factory via Hudson Bay, he was assigned to Fort Qu'Appelle, where he remained until 1874, the last two years as manager. Cowie kept a journal (now lost) during these years from which he wrote a series of articles for a Manitoba newspaper that was published in 1912; a year later the series was issued in book form, a reprint of which is presented here.
Read More
|
