GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
“NARRATIVE HISTORY” AMOUNTS TO FABULATION, THE REAL STUFF BEING MERE CHRONOLOGY
“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Gabriel Franchère HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1786
November 3, Friday: Gabriel Franchère was born at Montréal, Canada, son of the merchant Gabriel Franchère with Félicité Morin or Miron or Marin.
NOBODY COULD GUESS WHAT WOULD HAPPEN NEXT
Gabriel Franchère “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1810
Spring: Gabriel Franchère, Fils became an employee of the Pacific Fur Company of John Jacob Astor.
LIFE IS LIVED FORWARD BUT UNDERSTOOD BACKWARD? — NO, THAT’S GIVING TOO MUCH TO THE HISTORIAN’S STORIES. LIFE ISN’T TO BE UNDERSTOOD EITHER FORWARD OR BACKWARD.
“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Gabriel Franchère HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1811
John Jacob Astor obtained a stateroom on the official government frigate John Adams for his son-in-law and daughter Adrian Bentson and Magdalen Astor Bentson, for their voyage to St. Petersburg, Russia for sightseeing.
Gabriel Franchère, Fils joined the Astor Expedition as a merchant’s apprentice. He would arrive at the company’s new Fort Astoria at the mouth of the Columbia River as a member of the Duncan McDougall party aboard the Tonquin, Captain Jonathan Thorn, after a difficult passage around Cape Horn. He would meet the 1st known lesbian of the Kutenai people.
THE FUTURE IS MOST READILY PREDICTED IN RETROSPECT
“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Gabriel Franchère HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1813
October: There being a prospect of war with Britain, it became necessary for John Jacob Astor to rescue his investment by selling Fort Astoria to the North West Company. Gabriel Franchère, Fils, out of a job, would need to return overland to Montréal.
DO I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION? GOOD.
Gabriel Franchère “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1814
Fort Astoria having been sold to the North West Company, Gabriel Franchère, Fils had returned to Montréal overland. There he would be for a time employed again by John Jacob Astor. He would then live successively in Sault Ste. Marie, in St. Louis, and in New-York.
THE FUTURE CAN BE EASILY PREDICTED IN RETROSPECT
“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Gabriel Franchère HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1815
April 24, Monday: Gabriel Franchère, Fils got married with Sophie Routhier, daughter of J.B. Routhier. The couple would produce eight children six of whom would survive childhood, at Montréal and then at Sault Ste. Marie, but she would die in 1837.
CHANGE IS ETERNITY, STASIS A FIGMENT
Gabriel Franchère “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1818
October 20, Tuesday: Great Britain and the United States of America signed a convention according to which American fishermen were to be allowed use of the submerged seamounts off the coast of Newfoundland, rich in fish. The 49th parallel of latitude was accepted as the boundary between the two nations from Lake of the Woods all the way to the divide in the continental watershed at the crest of the Rocky Mountain chain (the Oregon Territory was not included). Astoria, which had been renamed Fort George when the British had purchased it for their North West Company from Astor in 1813, fell again under US control. Ownership of the Oregon territories was left unresolved. READ THE FULL TEXT
Friend Stephen Wanton Gould wrote in his journal: 3d 20th of 10th M / Wrote a letter to Uncle Stanton. — John has been quite unwell for Several days with a cold & fever, but I think him better this Afternoon — RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS
WHAT I’M WRITING IS TRUE BUT NEVER MIND YOU CAN ALWAYS LIE TO YOURSELF HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1820
G. Franchère, Fils’s RELATION D’UN VOYAGE À LA CÔTE DU NORD-OUEST DE L’AMÉRIQUE SEPTENTRIONALE, DANS LES ANNÉES 1810, 11, 12, 13, ET 14 (Montréal: Michel Bibaud, édit; De l’Imprimierie de C.B. Pasteur). The manuscript had been extensively edited and revised. It would be a prime source to Washington Irving for his trilogy ASTORIA; OR, ANECDOTES OF AN ENTERPRISE BEYOND THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS.
[For full text in French, click on the title page illustration, which appears on a following screen.] HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1828
Gabriel Franchère, Fils became the chief agent of the American Fur Company in Montréal (to 1834). HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1832
May: Gabriel Franchère, Père died.
When Casimir Perier died, his political group fell from power in France. HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1834
Leaving the fur trade, John Jacob Astor asked Washington Irving to write up a history of his fur-trading colony in the American Northwest, Fort Astoria. He placed Ramsay Crooks in control of his American Fur Company. Gabriel Franchère would be dispatched to direct the facility at Sault Ste. Marie. HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1836
February: The 2d of Washington Irving’s books about the prairies and the fur trade, ASTORIA; OR, ANECDOTES OF AN ENTERPRISE BEYOND THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS.
CAMBRIDGE HISTORY OF ENGLISH AND AMERICAN LITERATURE HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1837
Sophie Routhier Franchère died in Sault Ste. Marie. HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1839
April: Gabriel Franchère remarried with a widow, Charlotte Prince, in Detroit. HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1842
The American Fur Company failed. Gabriel Franchère became the New-York agent of Pierre Chouteau, Jr, and Company. HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1850
In about this timeframe at New-York, Gabriel Franchère created the initial American branch of the Société Saint-Jean-Baptiste. He encouraged local literary evenings, and wrote articles for the newspapers of Montréal.
The American Express Company was formed, when Wells & Co., Livingston & Fargo & Co. and the New- York firm Butterfield, Wason & Co. merged.
A map showing Manhattan and the settled part of Brooklyn, New-York, graphically illustrating the progress of expansion, was engraved and lithographed in Philadelphia by Thomas, Cowperthwait & Company — the firm that had just taken over publication of S. Augustus Mitchell’s UNIVERSAL ATLAS: HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1853
On a visit to Montréal, Gabriel Franchère found himself the recipient of a public welcoming, and an address recognizing his efforts as President of the New-York branch of the Société Saint-Jean-Baptiste. HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1854
An English translation of Gabriel Franchère’s RELATION D’UN VOYAGE À LA CÔTE DU NORD-OUEST DE L’AMÉRIQUE SEPTENTRIONALE DANS LES ANNÉES 1810, 11, 12, 13, ET 14 of 1820, not merely translated but also extensively re-edited by Jedediah Vincent Huntington, was put out as a 2d edition entitled NARRATIVE OF A VOYAGE TO THE NORTHWEST COAST OF AMERICA IN THE YEARS 1811, 1812, 1813, AND 1814 OR THE FIRST AMERICAN SETTLEMENT ON THE PACIFIC, by the Redfield Press at 110 and 112 Nassau Street in New-York (there would be, subsequent to this point, four more versions, each with extensive notes and introductions).
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE This volume would be in the personal library of Henry Thoreau. HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1857
In Brooklyn, New-York Gabriel Franchère established his own fur commission house.
William Beard and Jeremiah Robinson began filling in tidal flats and building a breakwater in Brooklyn’s Red Hook neighborhood (the start of construction of the Erie Basin).
Industrialist Peter Cooper founded the Cooper Union school. HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
1863
April 12, Sunday: Gabriel Franchère died in the home of a stepson at St. Paul, Minnesota.
On this day and the following one, there would be fighting at Fort Bisland / Bethel Place.
“MAGISTERIAL HISTORY” IS FANTASIZING: HISTORY IS CHRONOLOGY
COPYRIGHT NOTICE: In addition to the property of others, such as extensive quotations and reproductions of images, this “read-only” computer file contains a great deal of special work product of Austin Meredith, copyright 2014. Access to these interim materials will eventually be offered for a fee in order to recoup some of the costs of preparation. My hypercontext button invention which, instead of creating a hypertext leap through hyperspace —resulting in navigation problems— allows for an utter alteration of the context within which one is experiencing a specific content already being viewed, is claimed as proprietary to Austin Meredith — and therefore freely available for use by all. Limited permission to copy such files, or any material from such files, must be obtained in advance in writing from the “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project, 833 Berkeley St., Durham NC 27705. Please contact the project at
“It’s all now you see. Yesterday won’t be over until tomorrow and tomorrow began ten thousand years ago.” – Remark by character “Garin Stevens” in William Faulkner’s INTRUDER IN THE DUST
“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Gabriel Franchère HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
Prepared: October 20, 2014 HDT WHAT? INDEX
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ARRGH AUTOMATED RESEARCH REPORT
GENERATION HOTLINE
This stuff presumably looks to you as if it were generated by a human. Such is not the case. Instead, someone has requested that we pull it out of the hat of a pirate who has grown out of the shoulder of our pet parrot “Laura” (as above). What these chronological lists are: they are research reports compiled by ARRGH algorithms out of a database of modules which we term the Kouroo Contexture (this is data mining). To respond to such a request for information we merely push a button. HDT WHAT? INDEX
GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE GABRIEL FRANCHÈRE
Commonly, the first output of the algorithm has obvious deficiencies and we need to go back into the modules stored in the contexture and do a minor amount of tweaking, and then we need to punch that button again and recompile the chronology — but there is nothing here that remotely resembles the ordinary “writerly” process you know and love. As the contents of this originating contexture improve, and as the programming improves, and as funding becomes available (to date no funding whatever has been needed in the creation of this facility, the entire operation being run out of pocket change) we expect a diminished need to do such tweaking and recompiling, and we fully expect to achieve a simulation of a generous and untiring robotic research librarian. Onward and upward in this brave new world.
First come first serve. There is no charge. Place requests with