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A pistol that belonged to one of the most fascinating figures in Canada’s fur trade is up for sale, but no Canadian museum is interested.

In the late 1770s, explorer and trader Peter Pond (1740-1807) pushed northwest into the Mackenzie River basin — establishing a continental trading network that would lay the foundation for Canada as a nation from sea to sea.

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“You could consider him to be in some sense a Father of Confederation,” said William Buxton, a professor emeritus of communication studies at Concordia University.

Pond was the first non-Aboriginal person to traverse the Methye Portage in northern Saskatchewan and reach the Mackenzie River basin, flowing north to the Arctic Ocean.

“He presciently forecast a transcontinental Canada — linking the St. Lawrence with the Pacific — all based on trade and under the British flag,” said Barry Gough, author of The Elusive Mr. Pond: The Soldier, Fur Trader and Explorer who opened the Northwest (Douglas & McIntyre, 2013).