Hudson's Bay Company

"HBC" redirects here. For other uses, see HBC (disambiguation).

"Hudson's Bay" redirects here. For the body of water, see Hudson Bay. For the store owned by the HBC, see Hudson's Bay (retailer).

The Hudson's Bay Company
Compagnie de la Baie d'Hudson

Type	Public
Traded as	TSX: HBC
Founded	2 May 1670
Headquarters	Simpson Tower Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Key people	Richard Baker, Governor & CEO Bonnie Brooks, President
Revenue	$7.0 billion CAD ( $59.7 million FY 2009)
Owner(s)	NRDC Equity Partners
Parent	NRDC Equity Partners
Divisions	Hudson's Bay Lord & Taylor Zellers Home Outfitters
Website	hbc.com

The Hudson's Bay Company (French: Compagnie de la Baie d'Hudson), abbreviated HBC, or "The Bay" ("La Baie" in French) is the oldest commercial corporation in North America and one of the oldest in the world. A fur trading business for much of its existence, today Hudson's Bay Company owns and operates retail stores throughout Canada and the United States including Hudson's Bay (formerly The Bay), Zellers, Home Outfitters and Lord & Taylor. The company head office is in the Simpson Tower in Toronto, Ontario.

The company was incorporated by English royal charter in 1670 as The Governor and Company of Adventurers of England trading into Hudson's Bay and functioned as the de facto government in parts of North America before European states and later the United States laid claim to those territories. It was at one time the largest landowner in the world, with Rupert's Land having 15% of North American acreage. From its long-time headquarters at York Factory on Hudson Bay, the company controlled the fur trade throughout much of British-controlled North America for several centuries. Undertaking early exploration, its traders and trappers forged early relationships with many groups of First Nations/Native Americans. Its network of trading posts formed the nucleus for later official authority in many areas of Western Canada and the United States. In the late 19th century, its vast territory became the largest component in the newly formed Dominion of Canada, in which the company was the largest private landowner.

With the decline of the fur trade, the company evolved into a mercantile business selling vital goods to settlers in the Canadian West. The Hudson's Bay Company Archives, a collection of the company's many records and maps, are located in Winnipeg, Manitoba.

In July 2008, the company after a series of change of ownership was eventually acquired by the American private equity firm, NRDC Equity Partners, which also owned department store chain Lord & Taylor. From 2008 to 2012, HBC was run through a holding company of NRDC, Hudson's Bay Trading Company, which was dissolved on 23 January 2012. HBC is now directly managed by NRDC and it oversees the operations of Lord & Taylor in the United States in addition to its Canadian subsidiaries Hudson's Bay (formerly The Bay), Zellers and Home Outfitters.

History

17th century

Flag of the Hudson's Bay Company which originated from its days as a British trading company.

In the 17th century the French had a monopoly on the Canadian fur trade. However, two French traders, Pierre-Esprit Radisson and Médard des Groseilliers, learned from the Cree that the best fur country was north and west of Lake Superior and that there was a "frozen sea" still further north. Correctly guessing that this was Hudson Bay, they sought French backing for a plan to set up a trading post on the Bay, thus reducing the cost of moving furs overland. But, the recently appointed French Secretary of State, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, was trying to promote farming in the colony and was opposed to exploration and trapping.

Radisson and des Groseilliers approached a group of businessmen in Boston, Massachusetts to help finance their explorations. The Bostonians agreed on the plan's merits, and brought the two to England to elicit financing. In 1668, the English commissioned two ships, the Nonsuch and the Eaglet, to explore possible trade into Hudson Bay. The Nonsuch was commanded by Captain Zachariah Gillam and accompanied by des Groseilliers, while the Eaglet was commanded by Captain William Stannard and accompanied by Radisson. On 5 June 1668, both ships left port at Deptford, England, but the "Eaglet" was forced to turn back off the coast of Ireland.

The Nonsuch continued to the southern portion of James Bay, where its explorers founded Fort Rupert at the mouth of the Rupert River. Both the fort and the river were named after the sponsor of the expedition, Prince Rupert of the Rhine. After a successful trading expedition over the winter of 1668–9, the Nonsuch returned to England.

Rupert's Land, the drainage basin of Hudson Bay, the Company's grant.

The Governor and Company of Adventurers of England Trading into Hudson's Bay was incorporated on 2 May 1670, with a royal charter from King Charles II. The charter granted the company a monopoly over the Indian Trade, especially the fur trade, in the region watered by all rivers and streams flowing into Hudson Bay in northern Canada. The area was called Rupert's Land after Prince Rupert, the first director of the company and a first cousin of King Charles. This region constitutes 1.5 million square miles (3.9×10^⁶ km²) in the drainage basin of Hudson Bay, comprising over one-third the area of modern day Canada and stretching into the north central United States. The specific boundaries were unknown at the time. Rupert's Land would eventually be Canada's largest land purchase in the 1800s.

The HBC established six posts on Hudson Bay: on James Bay: Rupert House (1668,southeast), Moose Factory (1673,south) and Fort Albany, Ontario (1679,west); and on the western shore of Hudson Bay proper:Fort Severn (1689), York Factory (1684) and Fort Churchill (1717). Inland posts were not built until 1774. After that date York Factory became the main post because of its convenient access to the vast interior waterway systems of the Saskatchewan and Red rivers. Called "factories" (because the "factor," i.e., a person acting as a mercantile agent did business from there), these posts operated in the manner of the Dutch fur trading operations in New Netherlands.

During the spring and summer, First Nations and Métis trappers did the vast majority of the animal trapping and pelt preparation. They travelled by canoe and walking, being received at the fort to sell their pelts. In exchange they typically received metal tools and hunting gear, often imported by the company from Germany, the centre of inexpensive manufacturing in that era.

Logo on old fur trading fort.

The early coastal factory model contrasted with the system of the French, who established an extensive system of inland posts and sent traders to live among the tribes of the region. In March 1686, the French sent a raiding party under the Chevalier des Troyes over 1,300 km (810 mi) to capture the company's posts along James Bay. The French appointed Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville, who had shown great heroism during the raids, as commander of the company's captured posts. In 1687 an English attempt to resettle Fort Albany failed due to ruses and deceptions by d'Iberville. After 1688 the two kingdoms were officially at war. D'Iberville raided Fort Severn in 1690 but did not attempt to raid the well defended local headquarters at York Factory. In 1693 the company recovered Fort Albany; d'Iberville captured York Factory in 1694, but the company recovered it the next year. In 1697, d'Iberville again commanded a French naval raid on York Factory. On the way to the fort, he defeated three ships of the Royal Navy in the Battle of Hudson's Bay, the largest naval battle in the history of the North American Arctic. D'Iberville's depleted French force captured York Factory by a ruse; they laid siege to the fort while pretending to be a much larger army, the French held all of the outposts except Fort Albany until 1713. (Fort Albany was again unsuccessfully attacked in 1709 by a small French and Indian force.) The economic consequences of the French possession to the company were significant; it did not pay any dividends for more than 20 years. See Anglo-French conflicts on Hudson Bay.

18th century

The Rupert's Land territory was ceded to the Kingdom of Great Britain (so named following the union of Scotland and England in 1707) in the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht. After the treaty, the company built Prince of Wales Fort as a stone star fort at the mouth of the nearby Churchill River, its present location. In 1782, during the American Revolutionary War, a French squadron under Jean-François de Galaup, comte de La Pérouse captured and demolished York Factory and Prince of Wales Fort.

In its trade with native peoples, the Hudson's Bay Company exchanged wool blankets, called Hudson's Bay point blankets, for the beaver pelts trapped by aboriginal hunters. The number of indigo stripes (aka points) woven into the blankets identified its weight and size. An occasional misconception is that the number of stripes is related to its value in beaver pelts.

A parallel may be drawn between HBC's control over Rupert's Land with the trade monopoly and government functions enjoyed by the Honourable East India Company over India during roughly the same period.^{[citation needed]}

The Hudson's Bay Company's second inland trading post was established by Samuel Hearne in 1774 in Cumberland House, Saskatchewan.

Sternwheelers and steam ships

• Beaver (1835–1874)
• Caledonia (1891–1898) -- She ran aground on rocks at Port Simpson during a storm and her hull was destroyed. Her engines were put into the Caledonia 2
• Caledonia (2) (1898–1909) -- Her machinery was from the Caledonia 1.
• Mount Royal (1902–1907)
• Princess Louise (1878–1883)
• Strathcona (1900)
• Port Simpson (1907–1912)
• Hazelton (1907–1912)

19th century

HBC coat of arms, showing the Latin motto pro pelle cutem: a skin for a skin.

In 1821, the North West Company of Montreal and Hudson's Bay Company merged. Their combined territory was extended by a licence to the North-Western Territory, so it reached to the Arctic Ocean on the North and the Pacific Ocean on the West. Before the merger, the employees of the HBC, unlike the North West Company, did not participate in its profits. After the merger, with all operations under the management of Sir George Simpson (1826–1860), the company had a corps of commissioned officers, 25 chief factors and 28 chief traders, who shared in the profits of the company during the monopoly years. Its trade covered 7,770,000 km² (3,000,000 sq mi), and it had 1,500 contract employees.

The progression for officers, together referred to as the Commissioned Gentlemen, was to enter the company as a fur trader. Typically, they were men who had the capital to invest in starting up their trading. They sought to be promoted to the rank of Chief Trader. A Chief Trader would be in charge of an individual post and was entitled to one share of the profits of the company. Chief Factors sat in council with the Governors and were the heads of districts. They were entitled to two shares of the profits or the losses of the company. The average income of a Chief Trader was £360 and that of a Chief Factor was £720.

A Hudson's Bay Company post on Lake Winnipeg, c.1884.

Although the HBC maintained a monopoly on the fur trade during the early to mid-19th century there was competition from James Sinclair and Andrew McDermot (Dermott), independent traders in the Red River Colony. They shipped furs by the Red River Trails to Norman Kittson a buyer in the United States. In addition, Americans controlled the Maritime Fur Trade on the Northwest Coast until the 1840s.

Throughout the 1820s and 1830s, the HBC controlled nearly all trading operations in the Pacific Northwest, based at the company headquarters at Fort Vancouver on the Columbia River. Although authority over the region was nominally shared by the United States and Britain through the Anglo-American Convention of 1818, company policy, enforced via Chief Factor John McLoughlin of the company's Columbia District, was to discourage U.S. settlement of the territory. The company's effective monopoly on trade virtually forbade any settlement in the region. It established Fort Boise in 1834 (in present-day southwestern Idaho) to compete with the American Fort Hall, 483 km (300 mi) to the east. In 1837, it purchased Fort Hall, also along the route of the Oregon Trail, where the outpost director displayed the abandoned wagons of discouraged settlers to those seeking to move west along the trail.

Sketches of life in the Hudson's Bay territory, 1875

The company's stranglehold on the region was broken by the first successful large wagon train to reach Oregon in 1843, led by Marcus Whitman. In the years that followed, thousands of emigrants poured into the Willamette Valley. In 1846, the United States acquired full authority of the most settled areas of the Oregon Country south of the 49th parallel. McLoughlin, who had once turned away would be settlers as company director, then welcomed them from his general store at Oregon City and was later proclaimed the "Father of Oregon". The company retains no presence today in what is now the United States portion of the Pacific Northwest.

During the 1820s and 1830s, HBC trappers were deeply involved in the early exploration and development of Northern California. Company trapping brigades were sent south from Fort Vancouver, along what became known as the Siskiyou Trail, into Northern California as far south as the San Francisco Bay Area. These trapping brigades in Northern California faced serious risks, and were often the first to explore relatively uncharted territory.

Sketches of life in the Hudson's Bay territory, 1876

Between 1820 and 1870, HBC issued its own paper money. The notes, denominated in pounds sterling, were printed in London and issued at the York Factory, Fort Garry and the Red River Colony.

The Guillaume Sayer Trial in 1849 contributed to the end of the HBC monopoly. Sayer, a Métis trapper and trader, was accused of the illegal trading of furs. The Court of Assiniboia brought Sayer to trial, before a jury of HBC officials and supporters. During the trial, a crowd of armed Métis men led by Louis Riel Sr. gathered outside the courtroom. Although Sayer was found guilty of illegal trade, having evaded the HBC monopoly, Judge Adam Thom did not levy a fine or punishment. Some accounts attributed that to the intimidating armed crowd gathered outside the courthouse. With the cry, Le commerce est libre! Le commerce est libre! ("Trade is free! Trade is free!"), the Métis loosened the HBC's previous control of the courts, which had enforced their monopoly on the settlers of Red River.

Another factor was the findings of the Palliser Expedition of 1857 to 1860, led by Captain John Palliser. Although he recommended against settlement of the region the report sparked a debate. That ended the myth publicized by the Hudson's Bay Company that the Canadian West was unfit for agricultural settlement. In 1863, the International Financial Society became the majority shareholders of the HBC.

In 1870, the government abolished the HBC monopoly and opened trade in the region to any entrepreneur. The company relinquished its ownership of Rupert's Land under the Rupert's Land Act 1868, enacted by the Parliament of the United Kingdom.

Rent obligation under charter

Under the charter forming the Hudson's Bay Company, the company was required to give two elk skins and two black beaver pelts to the English king, then Charles II, or his heirs, whenever the monarch visits an area that had been Rupert's Land. The ceremony was first conducted with the Prince of Wales (the future Edward VIII) in 1927, then with King George VI in 1939, and last with his daughter, Queen Elizabeth II in 1959 and 1970. On the last such visit, the pelts were given in the form of two live beavers, which the Queen donated to the Winnipeg Zoo in Assiniboine Park. However, when the Company permanently moved its headquarters to Canada, the Charter was amended to remove the rent obligation. Each of the four "rent ceremonies" took place in or around Winnipeg.^{[citation needed]}

Rivals

HBC is the only European trading company to have survived and outlived the rivals. It has changed ownership many times.

Years	Company	Fate
1551–1917	Muscovy Company	taken over by Soviet Union
1581–1825	Levant Company	dissolved
1600–1858	Honourable East India Company	dissolved
1602–1800	Dutch East India Company	went bankrupt
1621–1791	Dutch West India Company	bought by Dutch government
1672–1752	Royal African Company	replaced by African Company of Merchants
1711–1850s	South Sea Company	abolished
1779–1821	North West Company	merged with HBC
1799–1867	Russian American Company	folded with sale of Russian America to the U.S. and commercial assets in North America sold to Hutchinson, Kohl & Company (now as Alaska Commercial Company)
1808–1842	American Fur Company	folded

Modern operations

Simpson Tower, headquarters

Department stores and diversification

By the late 18th century, HBC expanded into the interior and set-up posts along the river settlements that later developed into the modern cities of Winnipeg, Calgary and Edmonton. In 1857, the first sales shop was established in Fort Langley. This was followed by other sales shops in Victoria, Winnipeg, Calgary, Vancouver, Vernon, Edmonton, Yorkton, and Nelson. The first of the grand "original six" department stores was built in Calgary in 1913. The others department stores that followed were in Edmonton, Vancouver, Victoria, Saskatoon, and Winnipeg.

During the early years of the 20th century, demand for general merchandise increased, and stores were first operated from the trading posts that were established across northern Canada. Many HBC stores were the only stores in remote Canadian towns. More recently, the stores in major downtown locations have been transformed into boutiques. Today, the department store business is the only remaining part of the company's operations, in the form of department stores under the Hudson's Bay brand.

The First World War interrupted a major remodelling and reconstruction of retail trade shops planned in 1912. Following the war, the company revitalized its fur-trade and real-estate activities, and diversified its operations by venturing into the oil business.

Oil and gas operations

The company co-founded Hudson's Bay Oil and Gas Company (HBOG) in 1926 with Marland Oil Company (which merged with Conoco in 1929). HBOG expanded during the 1940s and 1950s, and in 1960 began shipping Canadian crude through a new link to the Glacier pipeline and on to the refinery in Billings, Montana. The company became the sixth-largest Canadian oil producer in 1967. In 1973, HBOG acquired a 35% stake in Siebens Oil and Gas, and, in 1979, it divested that interest. In 1980, it bought a controlling interest in Roxy Petroleum. In the 1980s, sales and oil prices slipped, while debt from acquisitions piled up which led to Hudson's Bay Company selling its 52.9% stake in HBOG to Dome Petroleum.

Retail expansion

In 1964, the company acquired the Morgan's department store chain in central Canada and by 1972 had rebranded its stores as Bay stores, allowing the chain to expand into Montreal, Toronto, Hamilton and Ottawa. The new logo for "the Bay" was modelled on the Morgan's logo.

In 1970, on the 300th anniversary of the company, head office functions were transferred from London to Winnipeg. As the company expanded into eastern Canada, head office functions were moved to Toronto.

In 1972, the company acquired the four-store Shop-Rite chain of catalogue stores. The chain was quickly expanded to 65 stores in Ontario, but closed in 1982 due to declining sales. In these stores, little merchandise was displayed; customers made their selections from catalogues, and staff would retrieve the merchandise from storerooms. HBC also acquired Freimans department stores in Ottawa and converted them to the Bay.

In 1978, the Zellers discount store chain made a bid to acquire HBC, but HBC turned the tables and acquired Zellers instead. Also in 1978, Simpson's department stores were acquired by Hudson's Bay Company, and were converted to Bay stores in 1991. (The related chain Simpsons-Sears was not acquired by the Bay, but became Sears Canada in 1978.)

In 1979, Canadian billionaire Kenneth Thomson won control of the company in a battle with George Weston Limited, and acquired a 75% stake for $400 million. Thomson sold the company's the oil and gas business, financial services, distillery, and other interests for approximately $550 million, transofrming the company into a leaner, more focused operation. In 1997, the Thomson family sold the last of its remaining shares.

The Northern Stores Division was sold in 1987 to a group of investors and employees, which adopted The North West Company name three years later.

Hudson's Bay Company reversed a formidable debt problem in 1987, by shedding non-strategic assets such as its wholesale division and getting completely out of the oil and gas business. HBC also sold its Canadian fur-auction business to Hudson's Bay Fur Sales Canada. (This company is now known as North American Fur Auctions.)

HBC acquired Towers Department Stores in 1990, combining them with the Zellers chain, and Woodward's stores in 1993, converting them into Bay or Zellers stores. Canada was acquired in 1998 and merged with Zellers.

In 1991, the Bay agreed to stop selling fur in response to complaints from people opposed to killing animals for this purpose. In 1997, the Bay reopened its fur salons to meet the demand of consumers. Animal rights groups, such as Freedom for Animals, have been campaigning to induce the Bay to stop selling furs.

The Hudson's Bay Company building in Montreal.

From 2004 to 2008, HBC owned and operated a small chain of off-price stores called Designer Depot. Similar to the Winners and Home Sense retail format, Designer Depot did not meet sales expectations, and its nine stores were sold. Another HBC chain, Fields, was sold to a private firm in 2012.

Purchase by American interests, 2003

In December 2003, Maple Leaf Heritage Investments, a Nova Scotia-based company created to acquire shares of Hudson's Bay Company, announced that it was considering making an offer to acquire all or some of the common shares of Hudson's Bay Company. Maple Leaf Heritage Investments is a subsidiary of B-Bay Inc. Its CEO and chairman is American businesswoman, Anita Zucker, widow of Jerry Zucker. Zucker had previously been the head of the Polymer Group, which acquired another Canadian institution, the Dominion Textile Company.

On 26 January 2006, HBC's board unanimously agreed to a bid of $15.25 CAD/share from Jerry Zucker whose original bid was $14.75 CAD/share, ending a prolonged fight between HBC and Zucker. The South Carolina billionaire financier was a longtime HBC minority shareholder. In a 9 March 2006 press release, HBC announced that Zucker would replace Yves Fortier as Governor and George Heller as CEO, becoming the first US citizen to lead the company. After Jerry Zucker's death the board named his widow, Anita Zucker, as HBC Governor and HBC Deputy-Governor Rob Johnston as CEO.

The Bay's, HBC retail building in Winnipeg.

In July 16, 2008, after Zucker's death, the company was sold to NRDC Equity Partners, a private equity firm of Purchase, New York which already owned Lord & Taylor, the oldest department store chain in the United States. The Canadian and U.S. holdings were transferred to NRDC Equity Partners' portfolio company, Hudson's Bay Trading Company, as of the fall of 2008.

In September 2011, HBC began downsizing the Zellers chain with the announcement that it would sell the majority of the leases for its locations to the U.S.-based retailer Target Corporation (with aims to expand into Canada) and close all of their remaining locations by early 2013. In January 2013, it was confirmed that only three of the remaining Zellers locations would remain open.

On January 24, 2012, The Financial Post reported that Richard Baker (owner of NDRC and governor of Hudson Bay's Company) had dissolved Hudson’s Bay Trading Company and that HBC would now also operate the Lord & Taylor chain. This new structure is run by The Bay CEO Bonnie Brooks. Baker remains governor and CEO of the business and Donald Watros stays on as chief operating officer.

Public offering, 2012

In October 2012, HBC announced a $1.6 billion initial public offering (IPO); Baker planned to use the IPO to allow Canadian ownership to return to the company, and to help pay off debts with other partners. Additionally, the company also announced that it would re-brand The Bay department store chain as 'Hudson's Bay'.

The new Hudson's Bay brand was launched in March 2013; incorporating a new logo with an updated rendition of the classic Hudson's Bay Company coat of arms, designed to be modern and better reflect the company's heritage. Following the IPO, HBC had introduced a new corporate logo of its own (reviving a wordmark from the original HBC flag), but the new logo was not intended to be a consumer-facing brand.

Current operations

Today, HBC is diversified into joint ventures and other types of business products. HBC has credit card, mortgage, and personal insurance branches. These other products and services are joint partnerships with other corporations. HBC also has other HBC Rewards corporate partners such as: Imperial Oil/Esso, M&M Meat Shops, Chapters/Indigo Books, Kelsey's/Montana's Restaurants, Thrifty Car Rental, Cineplex Entertainment Theatres, etc. HBC Rewards points can be redeemed in house or into corporate partners' gift cards and certificates. Points can also be converted to Air Miles.

HBC is involved in community and charity activities. The HBC Rewards Community Program raises funds for community causes. The HBC Foundation is a charity agency involved in social issues and service. HBC used to sponsor the annual HBC Run for Canada, a series of public-participation runs and walks held across the country on Canada Day to raise funds for Canadian athletes. The company discontinued this event in 2009.

Olympic outfitter

HBC was the official outfitter of clothing for members of the Canadian Olympic team in 1936, 1960, 1964, 1968, 2006, 2008 and 2010. The sponsorship has been renewed through 2020.

On 2 March 2005, the company was announced as the new clothing outfitter for the Canadian Olympic team. under the $100 million deal, The Bay provided clothing for the 2006, 2008, 2010, and 2012 games. The previous Canadian Olympic wear-supplier, Roots Canada Ltd., ended its involvement with Canada's Olympic teams in 2004. HBC had been criticized for the way the 2008 Summer Olympics uniforms looked, and where they were made. Roots ensured that the clothes were made in Canada using Canadian material, whereas HBC produced the clothes in Canada and China. Apparel for the 2010 Winter Olympics held in Vancouver proved to be extremely popular, particularly red-and-white mittens featuring a large maple leaf.

Archives

The legacy of the HBC has been maintained in part by the detailed record-keeping and archiving of material by the company. Before 1974, the records of the HBC were kept in the London office headquarters. The HBC opened an Archives department to researchers in 1931. In 1974, the Hudson's Bay Company Archives were transferred from London to the Canadian office in Winnipeg. The company granted public access to the collection the following year. In 1991 the archival records of the company were donated to the Archives of Manitoba in Winnipeg, Manitoba.

In 1994, the HBC donated the company records to the Province of Manitoba. The appraised value of the records was nearly $60 million. A foundation, funded through the tax savings resulting from the donation, was established to support the operations of the HBC Archive as a division of the Archives of Manitoba, along with other activities and programs. More than two kilometres of filed documents and hundreds of microfilm reels are now stored in a special climate-controlled vault in the Manitoba Archives Building.

In 2007, the Hudson's Bay Company Archives became part of the United Nations "Memory of the World" project, under UNESCO. The records covered HBC history from the founding of the company in 1670. The records contained business transactions, medical records, personal journals of officials, inventories, company reports, etc.

The Bay Queen Street, the chain's flagship store

Corporate governance

Current members of the board of directors of the Hudson's Bay Company are:

• Richard A. Baker
• Robert C. Baker
• David G. Leith
• William L. Mack
• Lee S. Neibart
• Denise Pickett
• Wayne Pommen
• Earl Rotman
• Matthew Rubel

Corporate hierarchy

Hudson’s Bay Company operated with a very rigid hierarchy when it came to its employees. This hierarchy essentially broke down into two levels; the officers and the servants. Comprising the officers were the factors, masters and chief traders, clerks and surgeons. The servants were the tradesmen, boatmen, and laborers. The officers essentially ran the fur trading posts. They had many duties which included supervising the workers in their trade posts, valuing the furs, and keeping trade and post records. In 1821, when Hudson’s Bay Company and the North West Company merged, the hierarchy became even stricter and the lines between officers and servants became virtually impossible to cross. Officers in charge of individual trading posts had much responsibility because they were directly in charge of enforcing the policies made by the governor of the company. One of these policies was the price of particular furs and trade goods. These prices were called the Official and Comparative Standards. Made-Beaver, the quality measurement of the pelt, was the denomination used by the Hudson’s Bay Company to define the Official and Comparative Standards. Because the governor was stationed in London, England, they needed to have reliable officers managing the trade posts halfway around the world. Because the fur trade was a very dynamic market, the governors of the HBC needed to have some form of flexibility when dealing with prices and traders. Price fluctuation was deferred to the officers in charge of the trade posts, and the head office recorded any difference between the company’s standard and that set by the individual officers. Overplus, or any excess revenue gained by officers was strictly documented to insure that it wasn’t being pocketed and taken from the company. This strict yet flexible hierarchy exemplifies how the Hudson’s Bay Company was able to be so successful while still having its central management and trade posts located so far apart.

Governors

1. 1670–1682  Prince Rupert of the Rhine
2. 1683–1685  James Stuart, Duke of York
3. 1685–1692  John Churchill, Earl of Marlborough
4. 1692–1696  Sir Stephen Evans
5. 1696–1700  Sir William Trumbull
6. 1700–1712  Sir Stephen Evans
7. 1712–1743  Sir Bibye Lake, Sr.
8. 1744–1746  Benjamin Pitt
9. 1746–1750  Thomas Knapp
10. 1750–1760  Sir Atwell Lake
11. 1760–1770  Sir William Baker
12. 1770–1782  Sir Bibye Lake, Jr.
13. 1782–1799  Samuel Wegg
14. 1799–1807  Sir James Winter Lake
15. 1807–1812  William Mainwaring
16. 1812–1822  Joseph Berens
17. 1822–1852  Sir John Henry Pelly in 1826, Simpson becomes governor of HBC
18. 1852–1856  Robert Waznerboj Colvile
19. 1856–1858  John Shepherd
20. 1858–1863  Henry Hulse Berens
21. 1863–1868  Sir Edmund Walker Head
22. 1868–1869  Simon Williams, 1st Earl of Kimberley
23. 1869–1874  Sir Stafford Henry Northcote
24. 1874–1880  George Joachim Goschen
25. 1880–1889  Eden Colvile
26. 1889–1914  Donald Alexander Smith
27. 1914–1915  Sir Thomas Skinner
28. 1916–1925  Sir Robert Molesworth Kindersley
29. 1925–1931  Charles Vincent Sale
30. 1931–1952  Sir Patrick Ashley Cooper
31. 1952–1965  William Keswick
32. 1965–1970  Derick Heathcoat-Amory
33. 1970–1982  George T. Richardson
34. 1982–1994  Donald S. McGiverin
35. 1994–1997  David E. Mitchell
36. 1997–2006  L. Yves Fortier
37. 2006–2008 Jerry Zucker
38. 2008 Anita Zucker
39. 2008–present Richard Baker

See also

• Steamboats of the Island to the Mainland
• Steamboats of the Lower Fraser River and Harrison Lake
• Steamboats of the Upper Fraser River
• Steamboats of the Skeena River
• Hudson's Bay Rewards
• Hudson's Bay tokens
• List of Hudson's Bay Company brands
• Muscovy Company
• American Fur Company (Astoria Company)
• John McLoughlin
• James Douglas (Governor)
• List of Hudson's Bay Company trading posts
• Columbia District
• Maritime fur trade
• New Caledonia (Canada)
• British colonization of the Americas
• List of Canadian department stores
• North-West Rebellion
• Red River Colony
• Voyageurs
• Coureur des bois

Further reading

• Buss, Helen M (2003), Undelivered Letters to Hudson's Bay Company Men on the Northwest Coast, Univ. of British Columbia Press, ISBN 0774809736 
• Strong-Boag, Veronica and Anita Clair Fellman, ed. Rethinking Canada: The Promise of Women’s History. Toronto: Copp Clark Pitman Ltd., 1991.
• Bryce, George. The Remarkable History of the Hudson's Bay Company. New York: B. Franklin, 1968.
• Dillon, Richard H. Siskiyou Trail The Hudson's Bay Company Route to California. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1975. ISBN 0-07-016980-2
• Galbraith, John (1957), The Hudson's Bay Company 1821 – 1869, University of California Press 
• Elle, Andra-Warner (2009), Hudson's Bay Company Adventures: The Rollicking Saga of Canada's Fur Traders, Heritage House Pub. Co, ISBN 978-1-894974-68-4 
• Hearne, Samuel. A Journey to the Northern Ocean: The Adventures of Samuel Hearne. Victoria: Touchwood Editions, 2007.
• MacKay, Douglas. The Honourable Company; A History of the Hudson's Bay Company. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1936.
• Maurice, Edward Beauclerk. The Last of the Gentleman Adventurers. London: Harper Perennial, 2005 ISBN 0-00-717164-1
• Murray, Alexander Hunter. Expedition to Build a Hudson's Bay Company Post on the Yukon. 1848.
• Newman, Peter Charles. Empire of the Bay An Illustrated History of the Hudson's Bay Company. Markham, Ont: Viking Studio, 1989. ISBN 0-670-82969-2
• Simmons, Deidre. Keepers of the Record The History of the Hudson's Bay Company Archives. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2007. ISBN 978-0-7735-3291-5
• Van Kirk, Sylvia. Many Tender Ties: Women in the Fur- Trade Society, 1670–1870. Winnipeg: Watson & Dwyer Pub., 1980.
• Van Kirk, Sylvia. "The Role of Native Women in the Fur Trade Society of Western Canada, 1670–1830." Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies 7, no. 3 (1984):9–13.
• Willson, Beckles. The Great Company (1667–1871): A History of the Honourable Company of Merchants-adventurers Trading Into Hudson's Bay. London:Smith, Elder and Company, 1900.
• White, Bruce. M. "The Woman who Married a Beaver: Trade Patterns and Gender Roles in the Ojibwa Fur Trade." Ethnohistory 46, no. 1 (Winter 1999): 109–147.

External links

• Official website
• Hudson's Bay Company Archives – held by the Government of Manitoba
• Works by Hudson's Bay Company at Project Gutenberg
• Hudson's Bay Company papers at the University of Oregon
• The Other Side of the Ledger: An Indian View of the Hudson's Bay Company
• The Canadian Encyclopedia, The Hudson's Bay Company