The French Fur Trade

For two hundred years, Wisconsin life was dominated by the beaver. From 1650 to 1850 the economy revolved around beavers in the way that today's revolves around oil. Before the French arrived, Wisconsin's most valuable animals were the white-tailed deer, catfish, wild turkey, and freshwater mussels, which supported human communities for twelve thousand years. But after 1650 beaver was king.

The reason was simple. In 1650 no European went to work in an office or a factory. A few worked in shops, but most spent all day outdoors, farming or transporting farm goods, in good weather or bad, sun or rain,... more...

Original Documents and Other Primary Sources

	The founding of Portage, by Frederick Jackson Turner (1883)
	Memories of Milwaukee's first family
	The founding of Fort Winnebago and the career of trader Pierre Paquette
	A Boy's-Eye View of the Fur Trade
	An Indian woman founds the town of Marinette
	Indian Versions of Some Early Wisconsin Events
	Wisconsin Indians Resist French Domination
	An 1818 War Department report describes early U.S. fur trade policies.
	A trader relates his family history and personal adventures, 1745-1857.
	A Scottish trader visits the Ojibwe in 1765, after the French depart.
	A French priest writes home in 1721 about Indians, beavers, and fur.
	A French soldier describes how the fur trade worked in 1685.
	Sex, drinking, and moral corruption on the Wisconsin frontier in 1702.
	Fr. Baraga's 1853 Ojibwe Dictionary
	Folklore and folktales collected by Charles E. Brown
	The history and traditions of the Chippewa Valley
	A photograph of Augustin Grignon near the end of his life.
	Prairie du Chien merchant and judge James H. Lockwood, 1856.
	Correspondence of a fur trade family in northern Wisconsin, 1826-1851
	French settlers' land holdings at Green Bay in 1820.
	A popular French map of the Great Lakes in 1757.
	The Francois Vertefeuille House in Prairie du Chien
	Madeline Island Historical Museum
	Northwest and XY Company Trading Post

Primary Sources Available Elsewhere

	The first fur traders reach Wisconsin about 1654.
	Collected historical documents from the Wisconsin Historical Society
	Baron Lahontan describes his visit to Wisconsin in 1688.
	All of Charlevoix's letters from North America, 1721-1722.
	Henry Schoolcraft's Personal Memoirs (1812-1842)
	A historical, documentary, and descriptive history of Wisconsin to 1854
	An electronic text of the complete Jesuit Relations, at Creighton University.
	Fr. Louis Hennepin describes Wisconsin and Minnesota in the 1670's.
	Jonathan Carver crosses Wisconsin in the 1760's
	Visit Villa Louis, on the site of the Battle of Prairie du Chien.

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