Alexander Monkman
Canadian pioneer and trader (1870–1941)
Alexander Monkman (March 29, 1870 – September 26, 1941) was a Canadian Métis pioneer trader and leader of the farmers in the Lake Saskatoon area of Alberta. He discovered Monkman Pass and led the push to build a highway through it in the 1930s.
Early life
Alexander Monkman was born at Manitoba House on March 29, 1870, and grew up around Fort Garry, however he and his family fled to Edmonton after the suppression of the Red River Rebellion and received his education from mission schools. Monkman travelled to Montana and became a rodeo-rider. He returned to Edmonton from whence he set off to travel overland to join the Klondike Gold Rush in 1898. After a while, Monkman realised that his convoy would not make it and he turned back. He was the only one to turn back and he never heard from his colleagues again.
Career
Monkman was hired by William Bredin and James Cornwall to become the trading post manager at the new Grande Prairie site near Lake Saskatoon. He lived there with his wife Louisa. He was the first non-Hudson's Bay Company trader in the region, and succeeded in cutting off the Hudson's Bay Company from the region's furs.
“Alexander Monkman” enters the record as canadian pioneer and trader (1870–1941). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Alexander, Monkman and Canadian can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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This entry incorporates text from “Alexander Monkman” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.