Peter Pond

Peter Pond (January 18, 1739 or 1740 – 1807) was a soldier with a Connecticut regiment, a fur trader, a founding member of the North West Company and the Beaver Club, an explorer and a cartographer. Though he was born and died in Milford, Connecticut, most of his life was spent in northwestern North America.

Biography

Pond began his fur trading career with his father out of Detroit, Michigan. He traded throughout Minnesota and Wisconsin. Through his business he became acquainted with Alexander Henry the elder, Simon McTavish and the brothers Thomas, Benjamin and Joseph Frobisher. They formed the North West Company which developed a fierce rivalry with the Hudson's Bay Company. In search of new fur resources he explored west of the Great Lakes. In 1776–1778 he wintered at a fur post he established at the junction of the Sturgeon River and North Saskatchewan River near present-day Prince Albert, Saskatchewan. The site is today a National Historic Site.

In 1783, Pond's explorations led him to the Athabasca, a region stretching from Lac Île-à-la-Crosse to the Peace River. There he explored waterways around Lake Athabasca and determined the approximate locations of Great Slave Lake and Great Bear Lake from First Nations peoples of the area. From his notes and diaries Peter Pond drew a map showing rivers and lakes of the Athabasca region, including what was known of the whole area from Hudson Bay to the Rocky Mountains and interpolating his information to the Arctic Ocean or Northwest Passage.