by Debra Moore
Hudson’s Bay Company Archives, Archives of Manitoba
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The Hudson’s Bay Company Archives photograph holdings are strong in images of the Canadian North, particularly the Arctic, as well as the northern areas of most of the provinces including Manitoba. The photographs provide a visual documentation of not only the history of the Hudson’s Bay Company, but the people and places in this region.
Many of the photographs in the collection were taken to document and promote the HBC and its operations. They include images of its fur trade posts, stores, employees, ships, as well as events and individuals connected with its activities. The photographs range from the 1870s to the 1980s. The Beaver magazine, a company publication started in 1920, also hired professional photographers to take photographs for documentary and publicity purposes, which included travelling to northern locations for specific assignments. Photos were submitted by readers of the magazine and others with an interest in the HBC and its history. HBC employees stationed in the north also took their own personal and more candid photographs and often they or their families donated these to the HBC. The result is a rich and diverse visual resource and a collection of images that is consulted and drawn on by researchers from all over the world.
Northern Manitoba locations represented in the collection include York Factory, Churchill and Norway House, where the HBC had key establishments. Other trading posts were often the nucleus of communities that grew up around them, many of which still exist today, for example, God’s Lake, Grand Rapids, Oxford House, Cross Lake, Island Lake, Nelson House, Split Lake, among others. The photographs are particularly important for those communities where there are often few visual records beyond the HBCA’s holdings for the early period of their existence.
Along with photographs documenting HBC business activities, there are images of Aboriginal dwellings, hunting, trapping, traditional clothing, treaty gatherings and the northern landscape. The images also record glimpses of daily life and rituals: a picnic on the rocky shore of a river, children at play, hanging laundry, weddings and funerals. On these pages is just a small “snapshot“ of the numerous photographic records of Manitoba’s north to be found in the HBC Archives.
York Factory, as photographed in 1889 by James McDougall in his capacity as HBC Inspecting Chief Factor.
Source: HBCA 1987/13/29
HBC Governor Sir Patrick Ashley Cooper and Mrs. Cooper outside the company’s store at Churchill, during his 1934 Arctic tour. Photographer: Associated Screen News.
Source: HBCA 1987/363-C-76/10A
Cree woman and young girl hanging laundry, Churchill, 1947. Photographer: Richard Harrington.
Source: HBCA 1987/363-I-9F/1
W. A. McGilvray, HBC post manager at Rossville, 1935. Photographer: Nicholas Morant
Source: HBCA 1987/363-R-31/9
Men hauling logs for the Island Lake post dwelling house, 1938. Photographer: John Watson
Source: HBCA 1987/363-I-12/33
Boys playing in the water near shore, God’s Lake, 1935. Photographer: Nicholas Morant
Source: HBCA 1987/363-I-82/36
HBC clerk Joe Keeper (Canadian Olympian long-distance runner) and Cree trapper Isaiah Clark, who is receiving advances for supplies before setting out on his trapline, Norway House, 1943. Photographer: J. F. Dalman, Bullman Bros. Studio
Source: HBCA 1987/363-N-41.1/4A
HBC post buildings at Norway House, 1935. A stone monument erected by HBC officers was dedicated to the memory of Chief Factor Horace Belanger and his clerk, Stanley Simpson. In 1892, Belanger drowned in the nearby river and Simpson perished trying to save him.
Source: HBCA 1987/363-N-41.1/4A
Page revised: 7 January 2017
