Empire of the Bay: The Company of Adventurers that Seized a Continent (Paperback)

~ Peter C. Newman (Author) "The Hudson's Bay Company turned much of the upper half of North America into a company town writ large, in which customers displayed individuality and..." (more)
Key Phrases: Hudson Bay, Red River, Hudson's Bay Company (more...)

Product Details

• Paperback: 656 pages
• Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) (August 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0140299874
• ISBN-13: 978-0140299878
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.5 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #273,153 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Just plain fun, July 14, 2001

By	Jonah Orlofsky (Chicago) - See all my reviews

This book actually goes far beyond the Hudson Bay Company to tell the history of Western Canada. The real greatness of this book the way the author takes a topic and makes it come alive. For example, when it comes time to discuss pemmicam, the food used by the voyageurs, you get a mini-history of buffalo and how each part of the body is used. These lengthy digressions take away some of the chronological flow of the book, but they are well worth it. If you like to know what it was really like to live in a different place at a different time, this is the book for you.

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars History as it should be written, August 25, 2000

By A Customer

I have waited years for these to be re-issued. This is a collection of two of the author's previous books on the HBC (Hudson's Bay Company): Company of Adventurers and Caesars of the Wilderness. It takes its title from yet another of his books, an illustrated, large format volume published several years ago. This is history told in an enthusiastic, romantic style (as opposed to a fussy, dry, academic one) so the reader is greeted not with sociological studies and boring statistics, but with tales of adventurers and Indians, French trappers tramping through northern forests, crusty Scottish traders manning lonely outposts, and of course scheming English financiers in London. I could go on. The focus is on personalities and characters. This is the way history SHOULD be written. The author shows how the settling of North America was in large part accomplished through the activities of the HBC. It is a story generally ignored by most history books (especially American ones). To my knowledge the author is the only one currently writing about the HBC. I highly recommend this book.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Prince Rupert's Men, June 4, 2004

By	Matherson (New York) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

This is a splendid account of the three hundred and fifty year institution that is Hudson's Bay Company, and even incorporates a number of chapters that chronicle its great rival, the North West Company. Newman traces the origins of the Hudson's Bay Company back to those great explorers Raddison and Groseilliers, Frenchmen sponsored by the English, and then traces it through the many eras of economic and geographic expansion. This was a company that dealt primarily in furs, and as such, Newman begins by paying homage to the Canadian beaver. (If you want to learn a lot of fascinating things about beavers, this is the book for you). The great explorers of Canada's arctic and Western frontiers, Kelsey, Hearne and Fraser, are suitably honored, and the company's great arch-enemy, John Jacob Astor, is suitably reviled. Newman doesn't shy away from pointing out that the HBC was a rather cheap enterprise that kept its best people chronicly underpaid, and occasionally lapses into fond remembrance of the comparatively hedonistic - but less successful - Northwest Company. Ultimately, however, he pays tribute to the long-term impact of the HBC on Canadian culture and values; thrift, modesty, a preference for the collective over the needs of the individual. A masterpiece of narrative history.