The Mapmaker's Eye: David Thompson on the Columbia Plateau (Unabridged‪)‬

Complex, headstrong, curious, and resourceful, David Thompson is a hero in Canada, yet has remained largely unknown in the United States. Between 1801 and 1812, this fur trader, explorer, and cartographer established two viable trade routes across the Rocky Mountains in Canada and systematically surveyed the entire 1250-mile course of the Columbian River. In succeeding years he distilled his mathematical notations from dozens of journal notebooks into the first maps of the northwest quadrant of North America. Information from some of his earlier mapwork was even used by the Lewis and Clark Expedition.

Author Jack Nisbet utilizes fresh research to convey how Thompson experienced the full sweep of the human and natural history etched across the Columbian drainage. He places Thompson's movements within the larger contexts of the European Enlightenment, the British fur trade economy, and American expansion as represented by Lewis and Clark. The Mapmaker's Eye is a fascinating chronicle of Thompson's life and adventures.

The book is published by University of Washington Press.