Manuel Lisa - Creation of The Missouri Fur Company

Creation of The Missouri Fur Company

Upon his return to St. Louis in August 1808, Lisa established the Missouri Fur Company (sometimes referred to as the St. Louis Missouri Fur Company), a joint venture with Jean Pierre Chouteau, Pierre Chouteau, Jr., William Clark, Andrew Henry, and other prominent St. Louis fur traders. Jean Pierre Chouteau had also come from New Orleans, so the two men had ties to its French and Spanish Creole community. The company was created as a temporary trust by its founders, designed to either expire or reorganize after three years.

In the spring of 1809, Lisa returned to Fort Raymond with a major expedition, made up of 350 men, about half of whom were Americans, the rest French Canadians and Creoles. They had 13 barges and keel-boats loaded with food, munitions, and articles suitable for the Indian trade, and the trip up the Missouri River was slow. Lisa transferred the fort's contents to the new company, and abandoned the isolated post.

Directing the large force of men, Lisa built the first Fort Lisa (also called Fort Manuel) near what is now Bismarck, North Dakota. It was near a Gros Ventres village between the mouth of the Little Missouri and the Knife rivers. After the new fort was constructed, Lisa returned to St. Louis in October 1809. The next year, he ascended the river to Fort Lisa and conducted more trading operations. He returned to St. Louis in the autumn of 1810.

In April 1811, Lisa began a final expedition of the Missouri Fur Company's first three years; he had two goals: to locate the then-lost fur trader Andrew Henry, and to transport the remaining property from Fort Lisa to St. Louis. The expedition became famous in its day as the company's barges heading up the Missouri overtook the rival Astor Expedition, led by William Price Hunt for the American Fur Company, which had set out three weeks earlier. Lisa remained among the Mandan and Arikara tribes until Henry came downriver, and they returned to St. Louis together at the end of 1811.

When the Missouri Fur Company was reorganized during the winter of 1811-1812, Lisa became more prominent among its leadership. That year he built a brick home in St. Louis as a measure of his success. (Earlier he had built a stone warehouse for his fur company, which stood until the late 1930s, when it was demolished for other development.

In May 1812, Lisa went upriver to Fort Lisa, trading there until his return to St. Louis on June 1, 1813. Lisa happened to be at Fort Lisa in North Dakota when Sacagawea, the historic interpreter and guide for the Lewis and Clark Expedition, died at the fort on December 20, 1812. She was buried there.

On this journey he established a new fort further downriver, also called Fort Lisa, in what is now the North Omaha area of Omaha, Nebraska. Lisa at that time became the first known United States settler of Nebraska. His outpost became among the most important in the region, and the basis for the development of the major city of Nebraska.