North American Fur Trade

The North American fur trade was the industry and activities related to the acquisition, trade/ exchange, and sale of animal furs in the North American continent. Aboriginal peoples in Canada and Native Americans in the United States of different regions traded among themselves in the Pre-Columbian Era, but Europeans participated in the trade beginning from the time of their arrival in the New World and extended its reach to Europe. The French started trading in the 16th century, the English established trading posts on Hudson Bay in present-day Canada in the 17th century, and the Dutch had trade by the same time in New Netherland. The 19th-century North American fur trade, when the industry was at its peak of economic importance, involved the development of elaborate trade networks and companies.

The fur trade became one of the main economic ventures in North America attracting, at various times, competition among the French, British, Dutch, Spanish, and Russians. Indeed in the early history of the United States, capitalizing on this trade, and removing the British stranglehold over it, was seen as a major economic objective. Many Native American societies across the continent came to depend on the fur trade as their primary source of income. By the mid-1800s, however, changing fashions in Europe brought about a collapse in fur prices. The American Fur Company and some other companies failed. Many Native communities were plunged into long-term poverty and consequently lost much of the political influence they once had.

Read more about North American Fur Trade:  Origins, New France in The 17th Century, British and French Competition, Indian Response To French-English Competition - Over Exploitation and Depletion of Beavers, The English Colonies, Social and Cultural Impact, Modern Day, See Also

Famous quotes containing the words north, american, fur and/or trade:

    I felt that he, a prisoner in the midst of his enemies and under the sentence of death, if consulted as to his next step or resource, could answer more wisely than all his countrymen beside. He best understood his position; he contemplated it most calmly. Comparatively, all other men, North and South, were beside themselves.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    ... though it is by no means requisite that the American women should emulate the men in the pursuit of the whale, the felling of the forest, or the shooting of wild turkeys, they might, with advantage, be taught in early youth to excel in the race, to hit a mark, to swim, and in short to use every exercise which could impart vigor to their frames and independence to their minds.
    Frances Wright (1795–1852)

    How coyote got his
    ratty old fur coat
    bits of old fur
    the sparrows stuck on him
    with dabs of pitch.
    That was after he lost his proud original one in a poker game.
    Leslie Marmon Silko (b. 1948)

    The most conservative man in the world is the British Trade Unionist when you want to change him.
    Ernest Bevin (1881–1951)