Editing Rupert's Land (section)

==Economy==
{{Further|North American fur trade|List of Hudson's Bay Company trading posts|List of French forts in North America}}[[File:Mixed blood Fur trader 1870.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Métis]] fur trader, {{Circa|1870}}]]
The Hudson's Bay Company dominated trade in Rupert's Land during the 18th–19th centuries and drew on the local population for many of its employees. This necessarily meant the hiring of many First Nations and [[Métis]] workers. Fuchs (2002) discusses the activities of these workers and the changing attitudes that the company had toward them. While [[George Simpson (administrator)|George Simpson]], one of the most noted company administrators, held a particularly dim view of mixed-blood workers and kept them from attaining positions in the company higher than postmaster, later administrators, such as James Anderson and Donald Ross, sought avenues for the advancement of indigenous employees.<ref>{{cite journal |first=Denise |last=Fuchs |title=Embattled Notions: Constructions of Rupert's Land's Native Sons, 1760 To 1861 |journal=Manitoba History |publisher=Manitoba Historical Society |volume=2002–03 |number=44 |pages=10–17 |issn=0226-5036 |url=http://mhs.mb.ca/docs/mb_history/44/embattlednotions.shtml}}</ref>

Morton (1962) reviews the pressures at work on that part of Rupert's Land where [[Winnipeg]] now stands, a decade before its incorporation into Canada. It was a region completely given over to the fur trade, divided between the Hudson's Bay Company and private traders, with some incursions by the rival [[North West Company]] based in [[Montreal]]. There was strong business and political agitation in Upper Canada for annexing the territory; in [[London]] the company's trading license was due for review; in [[St. Paul, Minnesota|St. Paul]] there was a growing interest in the area as a field for U.S. expansion. The great commercial depression of 1857 dampened most of the outside interests in the territory, which itself remained comparatively prosperous.<ref>{{cite journal |first=W. L. |last=Morton |title=Red River on the Eve of Change, 1857 to 1859 |journal=The Beaver |date=Autumn 1962 |number=293 |pages=47–51 |issn=0005-7517}}</ref>