by Rich Wandschneider | Oct 25, 2023 | beaver, beaver hats, buffalo, Ken Burns, Nez Perce, Nez Perce Fisheries, Oregon, salmon
The new Ken Burns documentary, the American Buffalo, follows the Euro-Americans across the continent as they kill buffalo, kill them mostly for profit—meat for the railroad workers; tongues which fetched high prices as culinary delicacies in the East; buffalo robes...
by Rich Wandschneider | Apr 16, 2021 | beaver, beaver hats, fur trade, Hudson’s Bay Company
We know now that the fur trade in North America began in the 1500s with English, and French and Spanish Basque, fishermen off the Atlantic coast. When the fish weren’t enough—or when economies suggested—the fishermen went ashore and took and traded for beaver pelts...
by Rich Wandschneider | Dec 6, 2012 | 1491, Alvin Josephy, American West Magazine, beaver hats, Charles Mann, Columbian Exchange, fur trade, fur traders, Hudson’s Bay Company, Louisiana Purchase, Plymouth colony, smallpox
Sometimes you read something or hear something or something happens that changes how you look at the world. For me, reading Charles Mann’s 1491: New Revelations of the Americas before Columbus, and thinking about world history in terms of the “Columbian Exchange” did...
