Author: David Thompson Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP ISBN: 0773585001 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 423
Book Description
David Thompson's Travels is one of the finest early expressions of the Canadian experience. The work is not only the account of a remarkable life in the fur trade but an extended meditation on the land and Native peoples of western North America. The tale spans the years 1784 to 1807 and extends from the Great Lakes to the Rockies, from Athabasca to Missouri. A distinguished literary work, the Travels alternates between the expository prose of the scientist and the vivid language of the storyteller, animated throughout by a restless spirit of inquiry and sense of wonder. In the first volume of an ambitious three-volume project that will finally bring all of Thompson's writings together, editor William Moreau presents the Travels narrative as it existed in 1850, when the author was forced to abandon his work. Accompanying Moreau's transcription is an introductory essay and a textual introduction, extensive critical annotations, historical and modern maps, and a biographical appendix. The definitive collection of Thompson's works, The Writings of David Thompson will bring one of North American's most important early travellers and surveyors and his world to a whole new generation of readers.
Author: William E. Moreau Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP ISBN: 0773583750 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 431
Book Description
David Thompson’s Travels is one of the finest early expressions of the Canadian experience. The work is not only the account of a remarkable life in the fur trade but an extended meditation on the land and Native peoples of western North America. The second in a planned three volumes of Thompson’s writings, this edition completes the great surveyor and fur trader’s spirited autobiographical narrative. In the 1848 Travels, Thompson describes his most enduring historical legacy - the extension of the fur trade across the Continental Divide between 1807 and 1812. During these years he established several Nor’wester trading posts, made contact with the tribal peoples of the Columbia Plateau, and tirelessly mapped the lands he traversed, all the time striving westward toward the Pacific. The tale culminates with Thompson’s historic arrival at the mouth of the Columbia in July 1811. Like its companion Volume 1, this work presents an entirely new transcription by William Moreau of Thompson’s manuscript, and is accompanied by an introductory essay placing the author in his historical and intellectual context. Extensive critical annotations, a biographical appendix, and historical and modern maps, make this the definitive collection of Thompson’s works, and bring one of North America’s most important travelers and surveyors to a new generation of readers.
Author: David Thompson Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP ISBN: 0773577238 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 423
Book Description
"In the first of three volumes that will finally bring all of David Thompson's writings together, editor William Moreau presents the Travels narrative as it existed in 1850, when the author was forced to abandon the work, and supplements it with a textual introduction, extensive annotations, and historical and modern maps." "The definitive collection of Thompson's works, The Writings of David Thompson will present one of North America's most important early travellers and surveyors and his world to a whole new generation of readers." --Résumé de l'éditeur.
Author: D'Arcy Jenish Publisher: Anchor Canada ISBN: 0385672705 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 353
Book Description
Popular historian D’Arcy Jenish recreates the adventure and sacrifice of mapmaker David Thompson’s fascinating life in the wilderness of North America. Epic Wanderer, the first full-length biography of David Thompson, is set in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries against a broad canvas of dramatic rivalries—between the United States and British North America, between the Hudson’s Bay Company and its Montreal-based rival, the North West Co., and between the various First Nations thrown into disarray by the advent of guns, horses and alcohol. Less celebrated than his contemporaries Lewis and Clark, Thompson spent nearly three decades (1784–1812) surveying and mapping over 1.2 million square miles of largely uncharted Indian territory. Travelling across the prairies, over the Rockies and on to the Pacific, Thompson transformed the raw data of his explorations into a map of the Canadian West. Measuring ten feet by seven feet, and laid out with astonishing accuracy, the map became essential to the politicians and diplomats who would decide upon the future of the rich and promising lands of the West. Yet its creator worked without personal glory and died in penniless obscurity. Drawing extensively on David Thompson’s personal journals, illustrated with his detailed sketches, intricate notebook pages and the map itself, Epic Wanderer charts the life of a man who risked everything in the name of scientific advancement and exploration.
Author: Sean T. Peake Publisher: iUniverse ISBN: 9781462017782 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 565
Book Description
At age 75, David Thompson began to write about his life of exploration and surveying in western North America from 1784 to 1812. At this point, how-ever, the odds of ?nishing were slim; his eyesight was failing, his body was worn out after years of strain on portages and mountain passes. For ?ve years he toiled with rewrites and revisions, never able to set the ?nal account in order. On 16 January 1851 he put his papers to right in one last attempt to ?nish his work. By 28 February 1851, no longer able to see, he gave up his pen as well as any hope of completing his Travels. Like a true surveyor, though, he left a well-blazed trail for others to follow. Drawing from the four surviving manuscripts and Thompsons 77 notebooks ?lled with daily journals, reports, essays, and anecdotes, Sean Peake ?nished what Thompson set out to achieve: a full account that encompasses the extent of the forests, of the great Plains, the animals, birds, ?shes &c &c peculiar to each section; the various tribes of Indians which inhabit these countries, their several languages, their religious opinions, manners and mode of life, place and extent of hunting grounds, and the changes which have taken place, by the fortune of war or other causes... a curious and extensive collection of all that can fall under the observation of a traveller. This edition of The Travels of David Thompson is a landmark publication in Canadian history, fully deserving of a place on the bookshelf of anyone interested in a ?rst-hand account of the tumultuous struggle for control of western North America.
Author: Jack Nisbet Publisher: Sasquatch Books ISBN: 9781570610066 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 292
Book Description
In this true story of adventure, author Jack Nisbet re-creates the life and times of David Thompson-fur trader, explorer, surveyor, and mapmaker. From 1784 to 1812, Thompson explored western North America and was the first to chart the entire length of the Columbia River. His field journals provide the earliest written accounts of the natural history and indigenous cultures of the region, and Nisbet uses them to guide his own discovery of the Northwest Territory some two centuries later. Book jacket.
Author: Sean T. Peake Publisher: iUniverse ISBN: 1462017738 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 604
Book Description
At age 75, David Thompson began to write about his life of exploration and surveying in western North America from 1784 to 1812. At this point, how-ever, the odds of ?nishing were slim; his eyesight was failing, his body was worn out after years of strain on portages and mountain passes. For ?ve years he toiled with rewrites and revisions, never able to set the ?nal account in order. On 16 January 1851 he “put his “papers to right” in one last attempt to ?nish his work. By 28 February 1851, no longer able to see, he gave up his pen as well as any hope of completing his Travels. Like a true surveyor, though, he left a well-blazed trail for others to follow. Drawing from the four surviving manuscripts and Thompson’s 77 notebooks ?lled with daily journals, reports, essays, and anecdotes, Sean Peake ?nished what Thompson set out to achieve: a full account that encompasses the “extent of the forests, of the great Plains, the animals, birds, ?shes &c &c peculiar to each section; the various tribes of Indians which inhabit these countries, their several languages, their religious opinions, manners and mode of life, place and extent of hunting grounds, and the changes which have taken place, by the fortune of war or other causes... a curious and extensive collection of all that can fall under the observation of a traveller.” This edition of The Travels of David Thompson is a landmark publication in Canadian history, fully deserving of a place on the bookshelf of anyone interested in a ?rst-hand account of the tumultuous struggle for control of western North America.
Author: David Thompson
Author: William E. Moreau
Author: David Thompson
Author: D'Arcy Jenish
Author: David Thompson
Author: David Thompson
Author: Sean T. Peake
Author: Jack Nisbet
Author: Sean T. Peake
Author: William Clark