The Voyageur Review

The Voyageur
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Grace Lee Nute's The Voyageur depicts significant figures in American and Canadian history who have received little attention. Indeed, Nute has written what many consider the classic exploration of the subject in this book that dates back to 1935. The book is divided into nine specific categories on such subjects as the voyageur's canoe, his journey, his songs, his life as explorer etc. Each section is compact, well-researched and fascinating.
The section on voyaging is especially astounding when we consider these men would carry hundreds of pounds on their back when reaching a portage or place where they had to carry their canoes and accessories overland to the next river or lake for their voyage. It is astonishing for me to think, as a resident of the Lake Superior region, what it would have been like to traverse that great lake 300 years ago, to pass through the rapids at Sault Sainte Marie when there were no locks, to sleep under your canoe, to winter inland above the Great Lakes in the dead of winter when the temperature was forty degrees below zero. Nute's book is a true tale of human courage, endurance, and determination, and she makes it clear the voyageur deserves much of the credit for many of the discoveries and explorations which are credited to other men, who never would have reached those places of discovery without their voyageurs' help.
My only criticism of the book is that most of Nute's research is based in the early eighteen hundreds, and I would have preferred to hear more about voyageurs from the earlier years of the seventeenth and eighteenth century. She does explore how important the voyageurs were even long after the United States was founded, in helping John Jacob Astor's American Fur Trade Company, and their roles in early American events, especially the War of 1812. The book is a must read for anyone who lives in the Great Lakes Region or is interested in the early exploration and settlement of North America.
- Tyler R. Tichelaar, author of Iron Pioneers and The Queen City, available on Amazon

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