Fur, Fortune, and Empire
the epic history of the fur trade in America
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About Fur, Fortune, and Empire
For all of fur's contentious position in American culture today, historian Eric Jay Dolin shows its centrality in our nation's ever-surprising history. He argues that the trade in animal skins turned colonial America into a tumultuous frontier where global powers battled for control. From the seventeenth century right on up to the Gilded Age, the developed world's appetite for fur made the new continent, with its wealth of fur-bearing wildlife, a seemingly inexhaustible resource. The result was a major boost in the evolution of the colonies into a powerful new player on the world stage. Dolin sheds insight on the ways the fur trade created international tensions--in New England, the Great Lakes, and in the expanding West. Fur traders were often the first white men to map major rivers, forests, and mountains, then soon pushed Native Americans off their lands as John Jacob Astor's American Fur Company attempted to monopolize the West.--From publisher description.
Reader guide at a glance
Use these edition facts and spoiler-light notes to decide whether this book fits your mood, time, and preferred reading experience.
- Audience
- Adult/general
- Commitment
- Standalone or self-contained
- Estimated reading time
- 12.5 hours at about 40 pages per hour
- Length
- Standard-length read
- Best for
- Readers seeking mountain men nonfiction
Why readers are finding Fur, Fortune, and Empire
Fur, Fortune, and Empire by Eric Jay Dolin, published in 2010, is a 495-page book for readers who prefer to browse by the experience of a story, not only by its sales category. Its strongest discovery signals include Mountain Men Nonfiction.
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- Print ISBN
- 978-0-393-34002-0
- Published
- 2010
- Pages
- 495
