Pap.'^No: ist ^0^"^ PIERRE II — SMITH 149 



fortunately preserved (such as trading-post inventories, the business 

 records of the day) are available for study of such topics, and further 

 new data will be forthcoming with more extensive exploration of 

 sites, and of archival and manuscript collections. 



Sometliing more should be added concerning the relationship of 

 studies of this kind, of historic sites of White origin, to studies of sites 

 of native history in the Northern Plains — the latter of increasing 

 interest to students, with the practical disappearance of native culture 

 and with river-basin salvage operations in the Missouri basin pro- 

 ducing whole new groups of data for study of native culture history, 

 as well as for comparative cross-cultural studies other than historical. 

 Direct relationship linking sites of Wliite origin with prehistoric 

 native sites is, of course, ordinarily lacking (though reoccupation 

 of numerous prehistoric sites during the historic period, by both 

 Indian and White groups, is known), but with the beginnings of 

 contact between native and White persons in the area, sites such as 

 those of continued trading activities take on special significance be- 

 cause they are amenable to archeological study. 



At the outset of the trade, the free trader, usually solitary (and 

 sometimes himself of mixed blood) often resided with native groups, 

 exerting primary cultural influence as well as frequently intermarry- 

 ing. These individual traders, with the passage of time, tended to 

 disappear, to be replaced by small groups of traders in semiperma- 

 nent "houses" (probably of modest size) ; these houses in turn were 

 replaced by true "posts," usually stockaded and frequently called 

 forts, which accommodated still larger groups of White persons en- 

 gaged in trade, and eventually had somewhat formal organization of 

 personnel, as well as rather highly organized systems of transport of 

 both goods bartered and furs, hides, and other commodities received. 

 At the height of the trade, operations assumed much of the complexity 

 of any modern commercial system. 



The increasing scope and complexity of these commercial establish- 

 ments is probably directly related to the increasing dependence of 

 native gi'oups upon such alien residents, however permanent. By 

 the 1830's and 1840's in the Dakota region, the trading centers had 

 become major sources of influence upon native culture, even attract- 

 ing native settlements to their immediate vicinity in some notable 

 instances, settlements that often outlived the posts themselves. Thus 

 the data of the fur trade and Indian trade conducted by Whites are 

 far from merely incidental to native history proper, but fully worthy 

 of study, especially from this point of view, for the light they may 

 shed upon native affairs, quite apart from their independent impor- 

 tance as embryonic White colonies. Native affairs during these years 

 are, indeed, otherwise poorly recorded (despite their crucial signifi- 

 cance), except in special spheres, such as that of formal governmental 



