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An historical film from Hollywood's golden age — about fur trading?

Many Canadians have stories that wind back to families with Indigenous heritage in both Africa and what is now Canada.

An ulu with a slate cutting edge might have been used to scrape animal skins, to chop meat, and to make clothing.

Carrioles allowed trappers to transport supplies and furs throughout the winter. Pulled by dogs, they were sometimes used to transport high-profile people.

John Bockstoce’s White Fox and Icy Seas in the Western Arctic explores a period from the turn of the last century to the early 1930s, during which a flourishing trade in white fox furs led to economic boom times for trappers and traders in much of the Arctic.

Often called a buffalo knife or chief’s knife, this artifact was described as “extremely heavy… a sort of butcher’s cleaver with a point instead of squared-off end.”

This early 1820s hide coat is associated with the Métis culture from the Red River settlement area.

From the Archives: The September 1935 issue of The Beaver gave readers a tour of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s fur-grading and cold-storage operations in London, England.

This Iglulik Inuit-made qulittuq (man’s parka) was produced in the early twentieth-century from thick caribou skins to withstand the cold winters.

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