The French Fur Trade

Paper Summary:

The paper relates that the fur trade dramatically changed the livelihoods, cultures and the entire direction of people in many different cultures. The paper examines the impact of the French fur trade and its implicit effect on the culture and geographic system of North America. The paper depicts how the French were able to leverage the strength of the successful fur industry to completely change the social, political, economic and cultural nature of both the Europeans who settled in America and the Native-Americans who had to adjust to them.

From the Paper:

"With the discovery of the "New World" came an increased need for European nations be competitive for resources. The concept of mercantilism that drove European political and economic understanding argued that there were limited resources and that power is granted to the class of individuals who can first recover this source of wealth. When French and English governments saw that the Spanish returned from America filled with reservoirs of precious metals and gold, they also wanted to be included in the wealth of discovery. Even as Columbus continued to comb the West Indies, both France and England sent explorative teams to the northern reaches of the American continent."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Anderson, Dean L. (1991) Variability in Trade at Eighteenth-Century French Outposts. In French Colonial Archaeology: The Illinois Country and The Western Great Lakes. Edited by John A Walthall, pp. 218-236. University of Illinois Press, Urbana.
• Anderson, Harry H. (1961) The Fort Lookout Trading Post Sites - A Reexamination. Plains Anthropologist 6(14):221-229.
• Belden, A. L. (1917) The Fur Trade of America. New York, Peltries Publishing Co.
• Burley, D., J. Scott Hamilton, and Knut R. Fladmark (1996) Prophecy of the Swan: The Upper Peace River Fur Trade of 1794-1823. University of British Columbia Press, Vancouver.
• Innis, Harold (1956) The Fur Trade in Canada. University of Ontario Press, Totonto.

More papers on The French Fur Trade:

• Term Paper # 139879 : "The Canadian Fur Trade"
• Analytical Essay # 130193 : "Native Canadians and the Economics of the Fur Trade"
• Research Paper # 114519 : "Algonquin Indian Tribes and the French"

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