The Mapmaker's Eye: David Thompson on the Columbia Plateau Review

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(More customer reviews)David Thompson was a fur trader, explorer, and meticulous geographic surveyor. He was, and is, the English and Canadian counterpart of Lewis and Clark. He visited the Mandan villages on the Missouri River in 1798. He crossed the Continental Divide in 1807 and spent five winters on the west side of the divide trading with the Indians. He explored the Columbia River from its origin to the Pacific Ocean. He kept complete journals. He was a better writer than Meriwether Lewis, although not Lewis' equal as a naturalist. He took astronomical readings and did his own computations of both latitude and longitude. Because of this, his maps were much more accurate than those of William Clark. Later in his life, Thompson helped survey the boundary between Canada and the United States. Thompson's story is also the story of Charlotte, his half-Indian wife of 57 years who bore him 13 children. She and the first few children traveled with him in his explorations, including his first crossing of the Continental Divide. Jack Nisbet is also the author of "Sources of the River," another book about David Thompson. "The Mapmaker's Eye" is a bit more readable and is better illustrated

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