Lewis and Clarke Came Second
Among the many American stories which are part true and part myth is the heroic saga of Meriwether Lewis and William Clark whose well-funded expedition, between 1804 and 1806 adventured across North America from the white-settled East to the Pacific. Almost without exception, Americans will tell you confidently that this was the first such voyage by a non-indigenous person across the continent, north of Mexico. They would tell you that because that’s what they learned in school. Yet they would be wrong.
The first such crossing was in fact a self-funded expedition across what is now Canada by Alexander Mackenzie with his cousin, two First Nations guides, and six voyageurs. And a dog of unknown name. They left Fort Chipewyan on October 10, 1792, overwintered on the banks of the Peace River, then continued across the Continental Divide, arriving at the mouth of the Bella Coola River on July 20, 1793, some eleven years before Lewis and Clark.
Interestingly enough, Mackenzie missed linking up with Captain George Vancouver’s sea expedition by forty-eight days.
In another twist of history, Mackenzie could well have been an American. Born in Scotland, he went to New York with his father and uncle, but when the latter two joined the Loyalist militias during the American Revolutionary War, the young Mackenzie was sent to live with relatives in Montreal. And the rest is history.
What few of us realize is that this was not Mackenzie’s first great feat – in 1789 he had already pioneered a route to the Arctic Ocean, following the great river which today bears his name.
Together with the LaVerendrye family and David Thompson, Mackenzie is owed much by Canadians (and Americans) for the exploration of our huge continent.