Clark County History: George SimpsonSubscriber Exclusive

By Martin Middlewood, Columbian freelance contributor

Published: September 30, 2023, 6:02am

This portrait of George Simpson (circa 1787-1860) shows him as he was best known: as an imperious administrator who focused on efficiency and cost reduction, foreshadowing the modern corporation. He wasn't a man who trapped or hunted, but he successfully integrated the British North West Company with the Hudson Bay Company in 1821. (Wikipedia Commons)

Near where the Washington School for the Deaf stands today, George Simpson, governor of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and John McLoughlin, chief factor of the company’s Columbia District, picked the original site for Fort Vancouver in 1824. Simpson’s territory covered all lands west of the Rockies to Hawaii, north to the Arctic and south into Mexico.

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