Birchbark Canoes
From a book titled Canoe Crossings, I learned that what made birchbark canoes so special was that the grain of the bark that covered them was transverse rather than longitudinal.…
Read moreMichel Kaonassé
I fell into Michel Kaonassé’s story long before I knew how important it would be in my York Factory Express book. Kaonassé worked at Fort Alexandria under my great-grandfather Alexander…
Read moreCollin’s Gulch
In 1849, Deputy-Governor Eden Colvile traveled into the New Caledonia by the Peace River route. As he said in his letter to Sir J. H. Pelly, written from Fort Victoria…
Read moreTwo Canoes: To Trout Lake
This, the nineteenth post of this series, is the continuation of Governor Simpson’s journey west to New Caledonia in 1828. The author of the journal is Archibald McDonald, who is…
Read moreDonald Manson’s Retirement
Donald Manson was born in 1800, in Scotland, and worked for the Hudson’s Bay Company until 1857, when he retired. This is what Bruce Watson says of him in his…
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