David Thompson fonds
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North American David Thompson
Bicentennials Partnership
The Archives of Ontario is a proud partner of the North
American David Thompson Bicentennials Partnership. This
initiative is a three-year continent-wide public and private
sector heritage awareness partnership. The partnership will
commemorate the character and accomplishments of David Thompson,
one of North America’s greatest explorers, map-makers
and geographers. Between 1784 and 1850, Thompson explored
and mapped 3.9 million square kilometres of North America. |
The Archives of
Ontario holds the largest collection of Thompson’s
original writings, including his journals dated from 1789-1864
and his map of the North-west Territories Territory of the
Province of Canada, also commonly known as the “Great
Map.”
For more information on the North American David Thompson
Bicentennials Partnership go to: www.davidthompson200.org
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| David Thompson
(1770-1857) was an explorer, surveyor, and
astronomer for the Hudson Bay Company and the Northwest
Company who also completed survey work of the Canada-United
States border for the British Government under the Treaty
of Ghent. |
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Click
here to see a larger image (363K)
Map of the North-West Territory of the Province
of Canada by David Thompson, 1814
David Thompson fonds
Reference Code: F 443, R-C(U), AO 1541
Archives of Ontario, I0012850
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Biographical Sketch |
Born in Westminster,
England, Thompson arrived at the Hudson Bay Company post
in what is now Manitoba in 1784 and undertook his first
fur expedition in 1786. From 1788 to 1797, Thompson held
a variety of jobs with the Hudson Bay Company, including
teaching, clerical and trade work, and surveying of the
river systems in what is now northern Saskatchewan and Manitoba. |
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In 1797, Thompson left HBC
for the North West Company and for the next fifteen years,
undertook a number of celebrated surveys, including the
survey of the 49th parallel from Lake Superior
to the prairies (when he located the source of the Mississippi);
the Rocky Mountain surveys of 1800-1801; and the Columbia
River voyage from 1807-1812 (undertaken in response to Lewis
and Clark's expedition to the Pacific). Thompson completed
his well-known map of what are now western Canada and the
Northwestern United States in 1814.
In 1817, Thompson was hired as an astronomer and surveyor
for the British Commission established under the Treaty
of Ghent. He surveyed the border with the United States
along the St. Lawrence and the Great Lakes in the early
1820s, and remained with the Commission until 1827.
Thompson also held the position of Justice of the Peace
for Glengarry County, Upper Canada, from 1820 until the
1830s. During his later years, Thompson resided in Montreal,
where he tried to make a living selling his maps and writing
the manuscript of his travel Narrative (which was
not published until 1914 by geologist J. B. Tyrell). He
died in 1857.
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Fonds includes
notebooks and journals which document Thompson's journeys
into what is now the interior of Canada and the northwest
United States, the mapping and surveying of Canada, and
relations between fur traders and aboriginal peoples. The
fonds also contains field books of boundary surveys conducted
by Thompson for the Treaty of Ghent Boundary Commission,
miscellaneous outgoing correspondence relating to maps and
boundary surveys, and hand-drawn copies of boundary surveys.
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The following series
are available on microfilm:
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Associated Material
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Former Codes
MU 2968 to MU 2982.
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