Trader King is the graphic and powerfully moving story of one of the most fearless and colourful traders of the Canadian North - William Cornwallis King - as told to Mary Weeks in the 1930's. Working
Trader King is the graphic and powerfully moving story of one of the most fearless and colourful traders of the Canadian North - William Cornwallis King - as told to Mary Weeks in the 1930's. Working for the Hudson's Bay Company from 1862 to 1903, King's story is an exciting first-hand account of the early days of the fur trade in Canada.
An excellent storyteller with a sharp memory and an eye for detail, King takes us on his travels with the voyageurs, trading missions with Indian tribes, and walks across the Barren Lands, facing forest fires and starvation and yet continuing to loyally represent the interests of the famous Hudson's Bay Company.
Contents Foreword
Our Multi-coloured Past
Preface
Chapter 1: I Join the "Company of Adventurers"
Chapter 2: I Go on a Trading Trip
Chapter 3: I Leave for Mackenzie's River
Chapter 4: I Reach Norway House
Chapter 5: Grand Rapids to Portage La Loche
Chapter 6: With the Mackenzie River Brigade
Chapter 7: I Trade with the Montagnais and Yellowknives
Chapter 8: I Establish Fort Nelson
Chapter 9: I Walk Across the Barren Lands
Chapter 10: I Trade with the Loucheux Hunters
Chapter 11: A Link with Franklin
Chapter 12: With the Sir Sanford Fleming Expedition
Chapter 13: I Entertain the Geological Survey Party
Chapter 14: Macoun and His Plants
Chapter 15: I Return to Fort Rae
Chapter 16: Tale of a Cannibal
Chapter 17: From Fort Smith to York Factory
Chapter 18: Trader King's Account of the Last Council Meeting
Appendix
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Born in Tracadie, Nova Scotia, in 1884, Mary Loretta Weekes (nee Gerin) trained as a nurse at Boston City Hospital in 1910. She served briefly at the Boston Psychopathic Hospital before moving to Regina with her husband in 1914. Following the birth of the first of three sons, she turned her hand to writing short stories. Her interview with Norbert Welsh in 1931 led to the book The Last Buffalo Hunter (1939), and her interview with William Cornwallis King in 1936 culminated in Trader King. Weekes's other books include Round Council Fires, Painted Arrows, and Great Chiefs and Mighty Hunters. Mary Weekes died in 1980.
View Biographical note