The circle banner. [volume] (Circle, Mont.) 1914-1939, 1924-12-26
BY MARTHA e. PLAssMANN.

w a asN P london e55s youth who was was
w educated in the famous Blue
Coat School, enlisted with the Hud-
sons Bay Company as a surveyor,
but disguised with the policy OF his
superiors in not encouraging sclen-
tific explorations, he left the Hud-
sons Bay Company to take service
with the Nor'Westers. He joined the
latter company when the work OF
competent surveyors was in demand
both by the British and the Ameri-
cans, to determine the boundary line
between the United States and Can
ada. His new employees, DESTROYS
of learning whether any OF their
posts were below the disputed line,
sent the twenty-six year old survey
or, David Thompson, to tlnd out,
little dreaming that this unknown
young man was to leave his mark
in history.
His first work was to explore the
country from Lake Superior to Win
nipeg River and Lake Winnipeg.
From there he advanced to Lake
Manitoba, the Assiniboine and Qu'-
Appellee, thus encircling the present
Manitoba, except on the south
The winter Of 1895 Thompson
spent on the Assiniboine, and the
next summer prepared to explore
south to the Missouri. 1t would be
an expensive undertaking, and the
company expected him to defray its
cost. His preparation took the form
of Indian goods, which he obtained
on credit to trade with the Mandans.
He set out for the Southwest in mid
winter when Arctic cold held the
country in its embrace. The jour
ney of three hundred miles through
bIizzard-swept region, endured for
three months. When he reached his
destination he was surprised, and
it may be inferred, not pleased to
find traders of the rival company on
the Missouri ahead of him.
The trading opportunities of the
Missouri country did not escape his
discerning eye, and the report he
carried north to Chaboillez, it is
thought, induced the Nor'Westers to
enter that territory. In 1904 Cha
boillez sent Larocque, together with
two clerks and two voyageurs to the
Missouri where, it may be recalled,
they met Lewis and Clark, who no
titled the Canadians that they were
on American soil, and intimated that
they had better confine their future
trading with the Indians to the other
side of the boundary line.
After his return from the Missouri.
Thompson continued his ascent of
the Red River, and then went east
ward through Minnesota to Lake
Superior; then up the South and
North Saskatchewan nearly to Banff
and to Athabasca.
In 1906 he was dispatched by the
company to explore the Rockies, Fol-
lowing up the Saskatchewan from
Edmonton, he reached the glacier
field that is said to be unsurpassed
anywhere in the world. At upper
Blackberry Creek, he made log raft,
and loading it with his supplies,
started down stream. 1t was then
June of 1907, he having wintered in
that vicinity. The spring flood car
ried him swiftly down to where the
stream entered a river he believed
flowed into the Pacific. This river
was the Columbia, which at the
point where he struck it, made
great bend northward before turning
south again.
Thompson was extremely anxious
to reach this rivers mouth in the
shortest possible time, in order to
claim the territory for Great Britain
before Astor's men, whom he knew
were headed in that direction, could
Illustrate his plans, by arriving first
AS they eventually did-and taking
over that region in the name of the
United States. The utmost speed