Bullboats
BULLBOATS
BULLBOATS. When Hudson's Bay Company traders first visited the Mandan Indians in 1790, they found that the tribe possessed tublike boats with frameworks of willow poles, covered with raw buffalo hides. Later, frontiersmen who ascended the Missouri River noted this light, shallow-draft boat. From 1810 to 1830, American fur traders on the tributaries of the Missouri regularly built boats eighteen to thirty feet long, using the methods
of construction employed by the Indians in making their circular boats. These elongated "bullboats" were capable of transporting two tons of fur down the shallow waters of the Platte River.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Meyer, Roy W. The Village Indians of the Upper Missouri: The Mandans, Hidatsas, and Arikaras. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1977.
Carl P.Russell/a. r.
See alsoFur Trade and Trapping ; Indian Art ; Indian Technology .