To: WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net
Date: Mon, 30 Oct 2006 01:35:05 -0500
Subject: [WSFA] Hudson's Bay Company
From: ronkean at juno.com
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net>

On Sun, 29 Oct 2006 22:50:25 -0500 (EST) "Keith F. Lynch"
<kfl at KeithLynch.net> writes:

> (Why is it "Hudson Bay," but "Hudson's Bay Company"?)
>

The company was chartered in 1670 as "The Governor and Company of
Adventurers of England trading into Hudson's Bay", so perhaps at that
time Hudson Bay may have just as easily been called Hudson's Bay.  New
York harbor had sometimes been called Hudson's Bay, so perhaps at some
point "Hudson Bay" was standarized as the name of the large bay to
distinguish it from the harbor.  Henry Hudson explored what is now New
York harbor and the Hudson River in 1609, and Hudson Bay in 1610.

The 1670 HBC charter granted Rupert's Land, the 1.5 million square mile
watershed of the Hudson Bay and its tributaries to Prince Rupert of the
Rhine, Governor of the Company.  Rupert's Land extended far from the Bay,
even including part of what is now North Dakota.  In 1870, the Company
ceded Rupert's Land to the Dominion of Canada.

Ron Kean

.