FUR FACTS 17 



hunters from Virginia and Kentucky would have penetrated the 

 region known as Upper Louisiana in time to have been numbered 

 among the earliest settlers at St. Louis. 



The two hundred miles of travel up the Mississippi, however, 

 constituted a barrier, which for many years, separated the settle- 

 ments of Kentucky and Tennessee from those of Missouri. Natur- 

 ally, as might be expected, these settlements grew to differ as radi- 

 cally in character as the sources from which they sprung. The 

 founders of St. Louis were Frenchmen, all the way from New Or- 

 leans, who came, not for the purpose of fighting the Indians and 

 driving them from their ancestral hunting grounds, but to buy 

 from them the furs and skins they had taken. 



The early Kentuckians regarded the Indian as their natural 

 born enemy, always to be approached, even when showing signs of 

 peace and friendship, with a cocked rifle; but the French pioneers 

 in the West had a habit of making friends with the Indians and through 

 this spirit of friendliness and good will they saved themselves from 

 no end of trouble. 



There were many elements to be considered in the successful 

 carrying on of the fur trade in those days. Good judgment was 

 required in selecting articles for trade. If blankets were of a dif- 

 ferent color, or a fraction larger or smaller, or of a different shape 

 from those to which they had been accustomed, the fastidious savages 

 would often refuse to accept them and they would remain unsalable 

 in the hands of the traders. 



The red sons of the forest were extravagant in their offers for 

 anything that suited their fancy, but refused to accept, even as a 

 gift, anything which was not in line with their established customs. 

 Trading companies soon learned that they could not depend upon 

 the red men for supplies of furs and peltries sufficient to make the 

 trade profitable. The savage hunted simply to supply his necessi- 

 ties; hence the quantity of skins and furs available from the Indian 

 was always inadequate. 



It became necessary, then, to employ a number of skillful hunters 

 and trappers upon whose efforts the success of the business depended. 



Many hunters and trappers were engaged for this work. The 

 Missouri Fur Company having at one time as many as two hundred 

 and fifty men, hunters, trappers, Creoles and Canadian voyagers 

 in its service, not to mention the Indians also, who, after a little 

 instruction, contributed to swell the company's annual pack. 



