Jean-Baptiste Barsalou (9 September 1706 18 March 1776) was from a business family in Montreal, his father having been a master

tanner Tanner may refer to: * Tanner (occupation), the tanning of leather and hides People * Tanner (given name), * Tanner (surname), a surname (including a list of people with the name) *The Tanner Sisters, also referred to as "The Harbingers of Weir ...

with his own business in that location. Due to the premature death of his father, Jean-Baptiste's family was divided up and he fell under the custody of an elder brother who ran the tannery and other business interests of the family. Jean began his working life in the

fur trade The fur trade is a worldwide industry dealing in the acquisition and sale of animal fur. Since the establishment of a world fur market in the early modern period, furs of boreal, polar and cold temperate mammalian animals have been the mos ...

as a

voyageur The voyageurs (; ) were 18th and 19th century French Canadians who engaged in the transporting of furs via canoe during the peak of the North American fur trade. The emblematic meaning of the term applies to places (New France, including the ' ...

for his uncle, Jean-Baptiste Neveu. By the early 1730s he had taken over the family tannery and entered into various business arrangements to further this enterprise. By 1747 he had expanded into buying and selling land on the

St. Lawrence Saint Lawrence or Laurence ( la, Laurentius, lit. " laurelled"; 31 December AD 225 – 10 August 258) was one of the seven deacons of the city of Rome under Pope Sixtus II who were martyred in the persecution of the Christians that the Roman ...

. The Seven Years' War and the subsequent English rule was devastating to many businesses of the time and Jean-Baptiste's holdings were no exception. Instead of passing a large estate to his sons, his holdings were almost all gone. His sons became voyageurs and the Barsalou tannery ceased to exist.

References

* 1706 births 1776 deaths Pre-Confederation Quebec people 18th-century Canadian businesspeople Canadian fur traders Tanners People of New France {{Canada-business-bio-stub