Fur Trade: Museums and Parks

As the fur trade spread northwestward from the Great Lakes and Hudson Bay in the eighteenth century, an organized system of transportation and supply formed over a 3000-mile canoe route between Montreal and Fort Chipewyan on the shores of remote Lake Athabaska. The "Voyageur's Highway" that threaded this vast northern wilderness included some 120 exhausting portages, 200 treacherous rapids, and 50 lakes large enough that stormy weather could imperil even the big "Montreal" canoes.

NPS: Firearms of all shapes and sizes—everything from large caliber rifles to small pocket pistols—proved essential to Fort Union's daily activities. Guns, a fur trade staple, were supplied to the Northern Plains tribes in exchange for buffalo robes and furs. Having well-armed hunters at remote American Fur Company (AMFCo) posts like Fort Union and their nearby competitors was equally important to residents and visitors; AMFCo's hunters, for instance, procured as many as 800 bison for food each year.

The special collections of the library consist of over 400 individual collections with archival materials numbering in the millions, including over 100 historic newspaper titles, presidential letters, early travel diaries and civil war era letters, fur trade records and the newspaper and printing morgue of the St. Louis Globe Democrat.

Lists several items in their fur trade collection which have been digitalized.

Museum of the Mountain Man is a museum located in Pinedale, Wyoming, that exhibits western historical pieces relating to the mountain men who explored the region in the early to middle part of the 19th century.

The Museum of the Fur Trade is dedicated to preserving the rich history of the North American fur trade by illustrating its diverse stories through the over 6,000 authentic artifacts on display.

The Missouri History Museum looks at the history of the St. Louis region from the Mississippian people up to the present day. The collection includes information about the Chouteaus and the fur trade in Missouri.