Mountain MenMountain men were:

very rough and toughadventurous businessmen transient they needed an

economic frameworkto support their occupation

The furtrade provided the fiscal support and stability that the mountain men needed to crisscross the continent in search of adventure and profit.

Types of Mountain MenThere were two types of

Mountain MenSkin trappers & Free-trapper

Skin Trappers –were mountain men who worked for fur companies like The American Fur Company and the Rocky Mountain Fur Company, trapping furs

Free Trappers –men who were “beholden to no company and outfitted himself and trapped with whom and where he pleased.”

There were essentially two spheres of fur trade - The Rocky Mountain Fur Trade and the Upper Missouri TradeThe Upper Missouri trade - relied on

Indians to bring buffalo skins to trading poststhe skins were bought and sent to St.

Louis via the river.

The Rocky Mountain Fur Trade - Beaver was the fur of choice in the Rockies beavers were trapped primarily by

Euro-American mountain men traveling in company groups

pelts were sold at a yearly rendezvous

The Fur Trade

The RendezvousYearly events where

trappers sold the pelts they had trapped

Buyers would travel overland to the designated site

Buyers would then haul the furs by mule train and wagon to cities to be sold

The rendeavous system allowed the mountain men to stay in the wilderness year round

The RendezvousThe rendezvous began as a

practical gathering to exchange pelts for supplies

It evolved into a month long carnival in the middle of the wilderness

Mountain man James Beckwourth described the festivities as : “"mirth, songs, dancing,

shouting, trading, running, jumping, singing, racing, target-shooting, yarns, frolic, with all sorts of extravagances that white men or Indians could invent."

The Rendezvous At the rendezvous there were:

horse races running races target shooting Gambling and whiskey drinking that

accompanied all of them.

An easterner gave this view: "mountain companies are all

assembled on this season and make as crazy a set of men I ever saw."

After rendezvous, the men headed off to their fall trapping grounds.

Jedediah SmithSmith was:

the first American after the Astorians to cross west over the Continental Divide

the first Anglo-American to travel overland to California

the first to traverse the Sierra Nevada

the first to cross the Great Basin Desert

the one who rediscovered South Pass

the man who roamed through more of the West than anyone of his era