Voyages from Montreal on the River St. Laurence

Voyages from Montreal on the River St. Laurence


Author is Alexander Mackenzie Publisher: Readex Microprint Corporation, 1966
Hardcover - Brown boards with gilt lettering on spine and front7.6 x 10.2 inches, 414 pages

Sir Alexander Mackenzie (1764 – 12 March 1820) was a Scottish explorer known for accomplishing the first crossing of America north of Mexico in 1793, which preceded the Lewis and Clark Expedition by 12 years. The Mackenzie River is named after him.

On behalf of the North West Company, Mackenzie journeyed to Lake Athabasca where, in 1788, he was one of the founders of Fort Chipewyan. He had been sent to replace Peter Pond, a partner in the North West Company. From Pond, he learned that the First Nations people understood that the local rivers flowed to the north-west. Thinking that it would lead to Cook Inlet in Alaska, he set out by canoe on the river known to the local Dene First Nations people as the Dehcho (Mackenzie River), on 3 July 1789. On 14 July he reached the Arctic Ocean, rather than the Pacific. Later, in a letter to his cousin Roderick, he called the waterway "the River Disappointment," since the river did not prove to be the Northwest Passage, as he had hoped. In fact the story is probably apocryphal, as Mackenzie's own and contemporary records merely refer to it as the "Grand River." The river came to be known as the Mackenzie River in his honour.

The Mackenzie River is named for him, as is Mackenzie Bay, and the municipality of Mackenzie, British Columbia.

There are a number of schools in Canada named after him, such as Sir Alexander Mackenzie Senior Public School in Toronto, Sir Alexander Mackenzie Elementary School in Vancouver, and Sir Alexander Mackenzie Elementary School in St. Albert.

He is referenced in the 1981 folk song "Northwest Passage" by Stan Rogers.

The Alexander Mackenzie rose (Explorer Series), developed in 1985 by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, was named in his honour.

Between 1989 and 1993, the Mackenzie Bicentennial Sea-to-Sea Expeditions of Lakehead University attempted a segmented re-enactment of the journey between Montreal and Bella Coola, British Columbia, but was unable to complete the final overland 220 mi Grease Trail when its First Nation owners refused permission.