When we look at American history, even black history, our past doesn't tell us much about the black people who played a significant role in the development of the American West. It seems that all the major achievements of black men and women in the West are not important in history. We're here to tell you that they were. From the birth of the nation until 1840 the fur trade was one of the vanguards of American industry. When you look at business in America, they could be compared to Henry Fords, Andrew Carnegies and John D. Rockefellers. At that time women wore beaver coats, hats and collars. Each man wore a hat also made of beaver. The American fur trade played an important role in the development of the United States and Canada for over 300 years. When we do research and look at history, history tells us that some of the most famous fur companies were John Jacobs Astor's American Fur Company, the Hudson Bay Company, which is the oldest company in North America, and the Missouri Fur Company by Manuel Lisa. Like all aspects of American history, the fur trade is a layered history of different cultures. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Native Americans had been in the industry since the 1500s. The American West was great because of the fur trade and the role African Americans played in the West. Whenever you research the history of the fur trade in the American West, you will repeatedly come across references to black mountain men, traders, and even travelers in the American fur trade. Blacks held positions in the fur trade that ranged from slave to free fur trappers and from camp keeper to independent contractor. Slavery was still legal in the United States during the fur trade era, and numerous traders and fur company executives used slaves to help create their fur trading empires. William Clark's slave York, who apparently never had any other name, accompanied the Lewis and Clark expedition across the continent and back. While the men of the expedition were said to have worked well, one of the two leaders of the expedition also said that the only two who could be relied on to do what they were told were York and the Newfoundland dog, Scammon. The slave fur trapper Davy Jackson, known only as Jim, accompanied an expedition to California through Santa Rita del Cobre in Mexico and along the desolate Gila Trail. Trading posts often had black employees in various capacities, including wrangler, cook, trader, laborer, interpreter, hunter, and trapper. Jim Hawkins was a black man who worked at the Fort Union Trading Post on the upper Missouri River. Hawkins was the cook at Fort Union and later performed the same job at Fort Laramie in what is now Wyoming. Hawkins escaped on a company boat while at Fort Union and went to work for Pierre Sarpy. He was evidently a slave and sent part of his pay to his master in St. Louis and kept the rest. Fort Union was also home to Jasper, a black man whose work at the fur trading post went unrecorded. There were also several Black Frontiersmen. Jacob Dodson and Sanders Jackson were both free blacks who accompanied John C. Fremont on his expedition to California in 1848. Dodson went with Fremont and Kit Carson on all three expeditions to California and Oregon and faced the same threats and dangerous conditions as the rest of the world. the group. Dodson also fought in the fight for.