venturing4th: First business in North America

Today was a great day, one of those days when we visited a place that our journey in Venturing4th leads us to in the unlikeliest places. When we decided to stop at Chadron State Park it was because we needed to spend some time between our stay at Lake Minatare State Park and Fort Robinson State Park where we have a reservation beginning tomorrow. It turns out that we have had some great hiking in Chadron and today we went into town and visited a few historic spots and the Museum of the Fur Trade. As they say, who knew that a little town of 5,851 in northwestern Nebraska would have a world-class museum on the history of the first business in North America that would tie into some of the other fascinating places and sights we have seen. There were many "a-ha" moments.

The Museum of the Fur Trade traces the history of the fur trade back to the Mound Builder Culture of the Ohio River valley (500 BC - 200 AD) and the Mississippian Culture of the Southeast (800 AD - 1450 AD) when long distance trade became an important feature in the rise of these advanced and complex cultures. Some trade trails reached over a thousand miles.

One of our favorite tie-ins was with the cod fisheries that we learned so much about when we were in Newfoundland. As you might remember, beginning about 1500, thousands of ships from Portugal, Spain, France and England fished the rich waters of the Grand Banks around Newfoundland. Indians visited the fish camps, which, in the beginning, were only there in the summer, and bought knives, axes, and clothing from the fishermen and sailors using furs as payment. North American furs taken back to Europe fetched high prices for garments and hats. For a hundred years, the fur trade was tied to the fishing fleets.

France, England, the Netherlands, and Sweden all established colonies and trading posts along the Atlantic seaboard in the early 17th century. The first English post was established in Maine in 1607, before Jamestown, the Dutch opened Fort Orange on the Hudson River in 1615, and the Swedes began trading at Fort Christina on the Delaware in 1638. The French and the Dutch were the most successful traders. Tens of thousands of beaver pelts and many other furs were shipped annually to European markets and made into clothing and hats. Trade goods sought by the Indians included clothing and textiles, iron tools and weapons including guns, powder, and lead for bullets; beads, wampum, tobacco, liquor, paints, and toys and ornaments such as bells, bracelets and rings.

Virginia traders were sending pack trains of trade goods over the Appalachian Mountains by 1650. For fifty years, deerskins were the leading export from the province of Carolina. As many as a million deerskins were shipped to Europe each year in the early 18th century. Usually untanned, they were worked up into men's breeches, gloves and gauntlets, coverings for luggage and small bags and purses. Larger, thicker skins were worth double the value of those taken from fawns and does. By 1800, the standard price for the skin of a large buck deer was one dollar, and the use of the term, "a buck" for a dollar entered American English usage about that time.

By 1665, only France and England remained as major Indian traders in North America and for 100 years, the British and French forces and their Indian allies clashed repeatedly from Hudson's Bay to Florida for control of the fur trade. As we learned when we were in Canada, especially Quebec, these wars ended in 1763 when France lost the Seven Years' War and her colonies in the New World and was no longer a participant in the North American Fur Trade.

The Museum had exhibits on the regional fur trade centers, the Great Lakes, the Russians on the west coast, and St. Louis, established in 1764 by disaffected Frenchmen not wishing to become British citizens. The principal fur the Indians produced was the buffalo robe, elegantly tanned and weighing about ten pounds. Used for bed covers and carriage robes, over a hundred thousand were shipped annually to Europe. As the fur trade expanded in the Missouri basin after the Louisiana Purchase, the traders found many tribes unwilling to trap furs to sell. Instead, until bison were virtually exterminated in the 1880s, buffalo robes were the principal items traded from Texas to theDakotas.

Museum of the Fur Trade. It is closed for the season until May 1, but we called and asked for an appointment.

One of the exhibits of early trade goods that caught our attention was this one of axes from a cache of sixteenth century tools found in a Rhode Island Indian village site.

Look familiar? Found in nearly every part of North America, the beaver lives in burrows dug in stream banks, or it dams up streams and builds houses in the resulting ponds. Beavers are skillful engineers, able to dig tunnels and drainage ditches, and to detect slight fluctuations in water levels. They are the mascot of both Caltech and MIT.

Textiles were the single most important class of goods traded to American Indians, and the Museum of the Fur Trade's collection is the most comprehensive in the world.

Athabaskan embroidered shirt that belonged to Christy Hardy, the Hudson Bay Company trader who opened the first posts in the Canadian Western Arctic.

Mid-nineteenth century "wearing blanket" made from an indigo blue blanket and scarlet trade cloth, decorated with hundreds of mother of pearl buttons.

Parka or waterproof raincoat made of seal intestines worn by sea otter hunters in ocean-going kayaks.

One of the principal productions of Colonial New Mexico was wool. Thousands of blankets were collected annually from the Pueblo Indians as taxes, thousands more were bought from the Navajos.

Blankets with fancy embroidery.

This rare example of a "roses" duffel blanket was collected from the Penobscot Indians in Maine. To the left is a match coat, a cloth cloak that followed the form of a prehistoric Indian fur cape, popular from 1600 to the nineteenth century. This example was made about 1750 from superfine scarlet wool.

Beaded moccasins - left, Cheyenne , middle, Yankton Sioux, and right, Santee Sioux.

Lakota (Sioux) children's moccasins except for the far left which is Athabaskan.

Legend has it that British tax collectors levied export duty on each blanket, so blanket makers finished them in pairs that were then cut in two for the customer.

Sioux women's dress purchased at Spotted Tail Agency in 1876.

Sioux dress of blue stroud, a kind of cotton, with 4,000 detanlaia shells.

Sioux man's shirt.

Typical old Mojave collar of blue and white beads.

One exhibit hall at the Museum is called "TheVoyageurs," to commemorate the canoe men who moved the fur trade goods and furs across the continent.

For nearly three centuries, birchbark canoes, keelboats, York boats, Mackinaw boats, log pirogues, and skin canoes plied most of North America's waterways to supply the trading forts and bring in the furs.

These exhibits tell the story of the boat men and their unique way of life.

The largest and most complete collection of guns made specifically for Indians - the Northwest gun, plus Kentuckies, Hawken rifles, buffalo guns, and many others.

The Gift Shop had some textiles for sale. This Button Blanket, Northwest Coat, 19th century, is for sale for $2,500.

Beautiful bag made by...

Sandra Okuma.

Behind the Museum is the restored Bordeaux Trading Post, established on this site in 1837. Built by James Bordeaux, the trading station was once attacked and set afire by hostile Crow warriors.

Indians brought buffalo robes, furs, and ponies to this post to trade for guns, powder, beads, blankets and whiskey which were kept in this storage shed.

This plot of land is being prepared for planting. The museum has maintained a garden of nearly extinct crops grown by Northern Plains Indians including varieties of corn, squash, watermelon, beans, pumpkins and tobacco.

There is another historic building in town. In 1893, a newspaperman devised a way to put Chadron on the map - the Chadron to Chicago Horse Race. The event began as a joke, but then it gained momentum and garnered attention from around the world.

When the Chadron to Chicago Horse Race kicked off it did so with a shot fired by Chadron's fire chief from a Colt revolver from the veranda of the Blaine Hotel. It is now an apartment complex.