Distinctly Montana Magazine

38 D I S T I N C T LY M O N TA N A M A G A Z I N E • S P R I N G 2 0 2 3 49 and 100,000 for 1850. After reaching its high-water mark, the AFC's Upper Missouri Outfit purchased 88,927 bison robes in 1853, 75,000 robes in 1857 and, based on Pierre Chouteau's esti- mate, only 50,000 robes in 1859. Sadly, data from individual posts allow us to chronicle the sur- prisingly swift westward contraction of the bison range. Traders at Fort Pierre, which serviced the Sioux, collected 75,000 robes in 1849, "over two-thirds of the robes produced in the northern plains that year." Only eight years later, trade at that post plum- meted to 19,000 robes. Such rapid depletion of game popula- tions fueled the ongoing westward migration of the Lakota and an escalation of intertribal warfare. The advent of steamboat traffic on the upper Missouri dra- matically improved the operational efficiency of the AFC's transportation network and facilitated regional access for a host of dignitaries, explorers, missionaries, and government agents. Adhering to the precedent established by his father, who aid- ed Lewis and Clark in preparations for the Corps of Discovery, Pierre Chouteau, Jr., supported and subsidized the advance- ment of knowledge, most notably in anthropology, geology, and natural science. Consequently, from 1830 until the renowned missionary Pierre Jean De Smet made his final visit to the area in 1863, Fort Union and other AFC posts on the upper Missouri provided lodging and research assistance to a litany of artists, ethnologists, and scholars in various academic disciplines. Beneficiaries of AFC generosity included artists George Cat- lin (1832), Karl Bodmer (1833-34), and Rudolph Friederich Kurz (1851-52). Duke Friedrich Paul Wilhelm, from Württemberg, Germany, was the first dignitary to visit Fort Union in 1830, fol- lowed by fellow naturalists Prince Maximilian of Wied-Neuwied (1833-34), and John James Audubon (1843). In 1862, pioneering anthropologist Lewis Henry Morgan, often described as the "fa- ther of modern ethnology," became the last scientist to travel by steamboat to Fort Union. Expeditions by Catlin and Prince Maximilian are particular- ly noteworthy. When they ventured into this area, landscapes traversed by the upper Missouri remained virtually pristine, despite thousands of years of human occupation. The timing of their fieldwork also was fortuitous; it enabled them to compile a treasure trove of ethnographic data less than five years before the catastrophic smallpox epidemic of 1837-38. Furthermore, their experiences underscore the vital but often neglected role that fur traders played as cultural liaisons and proto-ethnolo- gists, which contributed immensely to the eventual success of Catlin, Maximilian and subsequent researchers. A passenger on the Yellow Stone's inaugural voyage to Fort Union, George Catlin conducted a whirlwind, 86-day ethno- graphic tour of the upper Missouri during the summer of 1832. He produced an impressive written and pictorial record, but an- thropologist John C. Ewers noted that it was "patently impossi- ble for [Catlin] to gain more than a superficial familiarity" with the tribes that he visited. Therefore, Catlin relied extensively on fur traders at AFC posts for data that he incorporated in his journal. Catlin's artwork exhibits a comparable degree of super- When they ventured into this area, LANDSCAPES TRAVERSED BY THE UPPER MISSOURI REMAINED VIRTUALLY PRISTINE, DESPITE THOUSANDS OF YEARS OF HUMAN OCCUPATION.

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