I meet the most interesting people whose passion is the fur trade. Greg Ingram is one, a member of the Fur Traders and Explorers, centered around Alberta, Canada.
As a re-enactor, Greg has developed several first-person characters named “Gregoire” — from voyageur to post master and even chief factor (that’s him wearing the top hat in the above photo!). That encompasses an impossible range of careers for a person in the olden days, but not so for Greg. (He has an even wider range of interests — collecting, carving and more, at the end of this post.)
Individually and with his group, “Gregoire” can offer school programs, presentations for corporate events and parties, summer reenactments and such.
He wrote, “The best thing about being in one of my characters is that people remember me, even 8 years after they first time they met me. When I do school programs in first person, I love the questions I get after class, like: ‘Was I a voyageur before I retired from that job and promoted to Post Master (from a grade 5 student)!’ It’s an honour to teach our kids! Video(2)
“One highlight of my shows is a fun routine for initiating a voyageur. [For what that means, check out my blog on ‘baptising’ voyageurs.] Always before going into the high country, they would initiate newcomers, who then had to promise never to kiss another voyageur’s wife without HER permission. When people now hear that, men laugh and many women fist-pump “yes,” acknowledging their power and control.
“But — there was practicality in to her answer. As a voyageur husband may never come back — he might have died or have been assigned to another post (abandoning her). If she had little ones that had to be looked after, she needed to decide if she should take on another husband.”
Greg, in center, and his group of Fur Traders and Explorers ready for the Calgary Stampede Parade.
In July, Gregoire’s group re-enacted events of the fur trade at the Calgary Stampede Parade (with a live and TV audience of 300,000+). “We re-enacted a portage over the 6 km of parade route!”
On Heritage Day in August, they performed a reenactment with trappers / voyageurs taking their furs down the Bow River to the Hudson’s Bay Company Trading Post, just across the river from Fort Calgary — and included his twin grandchildren in the video!Enjoy the singing as well.
Greg and his group have set up several historical shoots over the past two years. In one (the featured photo for this blog), he’s the chief factor, awaiting his young daughter who has just returned from years being educated in the east.
In this later image of the shoot, Greg said the young voyageur who who helped the daughter out of the canoe so she would not get we, seems to have won a place in her heart.
“In this re-enactment, the Post Master is visiting a trapper and his wife in their camp to see how things were going. The Post Master (sitting), his guide (nicknamed “Mule”) and the trapper and his wife (standing) receive the North West Mounted Police who is delivering an important letter to the Post Master.”
In the future Fur Traders and Explorers want to re-enact the several methods of moving a canoe along its journey — Tracking and the Decharge.
[Note: Tracking is done from shore when the footing is reasonable or the current is too fast or rocky for paddling— men pull the canoe by rope along the shore while the steersmen stay in the canoe, steering with poles or long paddles to keep boat in the water off the rocks. A decharge occurs when the river is shallower, the canoe is grounding out, the water is not moving too fast, and footing is good. Then everybody gets out of the canoe and into the water. This lightens the load and refloats the canoe and gear. They grab a side of the canoe and walk it up the river to deeper water where they get back in and paddle onwards.]
Greg’s carving of HBC head surveyor Philip Turnor with Peter Fidler, his assistant.
Slated for this fall is the third, with a descendant of Peter Fidler the surveyor for the HBC.
“They will re-create the exact scene taken from a historic picture; and now in carving I have done. In this shoot, HBC head surveyor Philip Turnor is at a canoe landing on shore in order to set up camp and take survey measurements before dark. In the evening he’s doing the calculations by lamp light with Peter Fidler, the apprentice surveyor recording measurements.”
To further his interest and find answers to his questions about the fur trade, Greg has been collecting books, maps and realia for years.
In addition, he’s carved many scenes showing historic events—from signing Rupert’s Land into law, to Lewis and Clark to George Simpson and his bagpiper Colin Fraser paddling down the river on way to Fort St. John. I featured Greg’s carvings in an earlier blog.
What an amazing gift he brings to the community, sharing his knowledge and passion for an era that reminds us of our not-so-distant-past history. Merci, Gregoire.
Final Thoughts
- Book 3, “Uncharted Waters” is available. Yahoo! I’ve posted some of the comments about it on Facebook and Instagram — and Amazon has an amazin’ review!
- Start from the beginning with Books 1 and 2 — buy “Waters Like the Sky” or “Treacherous Waters”
- Let me know if you want the digital version.
- Subscribe to this blog and read posts as they are published!
- Visit me on Facebook or Instagram (@nlnlnraj): I love your comments.
- Book me as a speaker.
- Ask your library, local school, gift shop to buy copies.
- Be a voyageur for an hour — come to a presentation. Or organize one for your community!
