WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.520 I want you to picture the bear. And just so we're 00:00:02.520 --> 00:00:04.639 clear, right off the bat, we are not talking 00:00:04.639 --> 00:00:07.080 about a nature documentary here. We aren't talking 00:00:07.080 --> 00:00:09.539 about a grizzly roaming the Rockies or a polar 00:00:09.539 --> 00:00:11.960 bear on an ice floe. Not at all. Although the 00:00:11.960 --> 00:00:14.099 man we're talking about today certainly had the 00:00:14.099 --> 00:00:17.160 temperament of one. We're talking about a nickname. 00:00:17.460 --> 00:00:20.920 A nickname earned by a man who dominated the 00:00:20.920 --> 00:00:24.039 19th century British landscape with just absolute 00:00:24.039 --> 00:00:28.179 brute force. We are talking about... Edward Ellulis. 00:00:28.339 --> 00:00:30.600 It's a name that might not ring a bell for everyone. 00:00:30.800 --> 00:00:32.700 I mean, he isn't in the history books in the 00:00:32.700 --> 00:00:36.299 same bold font as, say, a prime minister or a 00:00:36.299 --> 00:00:39.119 king. No, but in his time, he was everywhere. 00:00:39.460 --> 00:00:41.939 He really was. Exactly. This is a guy who is 00:00:41.939 --> 00:00:45.179 a merchant, a politician, a fixer, and a tycoon. 00:00:45.719 --> 00:00:47.840 He operated right at that murky intersection 00:00:47.840 --> 00:00:51.299 where global trade collides with government power. 00:00:51.539 --> 00:00:54.280 He is arguably the prototype for the modern power 00:00:54.280 --> 00:00:56.460 broker, the kind of person who doesn't just play 00:00:56.460 --> 00:00:59.159 the game. No. He changes the rules of the game 00:00:59.159 --> 00:01:01.200 while everyone else is still reading the instruction 00:01:01.200 --> 00:01:04.099 manual. So here's our mission for this deep dive. 00:01:04.359 --> 00:01:06.959 We've pulled together biographical records, historical 00:01:06.959 --> 00:01:09.400 accounts of the fur trade, political archives. 00:01:09.599 --> 00:01:11.579 A lot of material. A lot of it. And we're going 00:01:11.579 --> 00:01:13.760 to try and figure out how one single man could 00:01:13.760 --> 00:01:16.719 control the Canadian fur trade, own massive sugar 00:01:16.719 --> 00:01:19.420 plantations in the Caribbean, orchestrate one 00:01:19.420 --> 00:01:21.480 of the biggest political reforms in British history, 00:01:21.640 --> 00:01:24.480 and have an entire island nation named after 00:01:24.480 --> 00:01:26.859 him, all while operating, for the most part, 00:01:26.900 --> 00:01:28.879 from the shadows. It's a study in influence, 00:01:29.219 --> 00:01:33.120 pure and simple. And it all starts, appropriately 00:01:33.120 --> 00:01:36.319 enough, with that nickname, the bear. Right. 00:01:36.379 --> 00:01:39.060 So let's unpack the origin story. Edward Elise 00:01:39.060 --> 00:01:43.219 is born in London in 1783. But this isn't exactly 00:01:43.219 --> 00:01:45.920 a started from the bottom narrative, is it? Oh, 00:01:45.959 --> 00:01:48.060 not at all. Not even close. Yeah. He comes from 00:01:48.060 --> 00:01:51.019 a merchant family with serious reach. His father, 00:01:51.200 --> 00:01:53.900 Alexander Elise, had already purchased... the 00:01:53.900 --> 00:01:56.359 Signory of Vilshove in Canada. So the path was 00:01:56.359 --> 00:01:58.620 already paved for him. It was paved with gold, 00:01:58.659 --> 00:02:00.599 or at least, you know, with land deeds, before 00:02:00.599 --> 00:02:03.019 Edward even took his first step. He goes to Winchester 00:02:03.019 --> 00:02:05.719 School, then Marischal College in Aberdeen. So 00:02:05.719 --> 00:02:08.379 he's well -educated, well -connected, set up 00:02:08.379 --> 00:02:10.680 for a comfortable life in London society. He 00:02:10.680 --> 00:02:12.379 could have been. He absolutely could have just 00:02:12.379 --> 00:02:16.039 managed the accounts. But in 1803, the family 00:02:16.039 --> 00:02:19.419 sends him to Canada. And that is where the bear 00:02:19.419 --> 00:02:21.939 is born. You really have to understand the Canadian 00:02:21.939 --> 00:02:25.360 fur trade at this time. When we say trade, people 00:02:25.360 --> 00:02:27.780 might picture a friendly exchange of goods at 00:02:27.780 --> 00:02:29.979 a trading post. Right, swapping some blankets 00:02:29.979 --> 00:02:32.800 for beaver pelts. Everyone goes home happy. It 00:02:32.800 --> 00:02:35.319 was nothing like that. Not even remotely. This 00:02:35.319 --> 00:02:37.960 was essentially corporate warfare. You had these 00:02:37.960 --> 00:02:41.099 massive rival factions, specifically the Northwest 00:02:41.099 --> 00:02:43.740 Company and the Hudson's Bay Company, fighting 00:02:43.740 --> 00:02:45.979 for dominance over the wilderness. And when you 00:02:45.979 --> 00:02:47.860 say fighting, you don't mean in court. No, I 00:02:47.860 --> 00:02:50.819 mean burning down forts, seizing goods, and starvation 00:02:50.819 --> 00:02:53.939 tactics. It was brutal. So Alas steps right into 00:02:53.939 --> 00:02:56.400 a combat zone. And he thrives in it. He becomes 00:02:56.400 --> 00:02:59.699 a partner in the firm Finn, Alyssa's, and Inglis, 00:02:59.840 --> 00:03:02.400 which was heavily involved with another outfit, 00:03:02.639 --> 00:03:05.659 the XY Company. And here's where you see his 00:03:05.659 --> 00:03:08.969 first stroke of... Whoa, genius. He's in his 00:03:08.969 --> 00:03:11.270 early 20s, right? Most people that age are just 00:03:11.270 --> 00:03:13.469 trying to figure out their career. Elise is already 00:03:13.469 --> 00:03:15.289 looking at the map and realizing that all this 00:03:15.289 --> 00:03:18.689 competition is just inefficient. So in 1804, 00:03:18.770 --> 00:03:21.550 he becomes a party to the union of the XY and 00:03:21.550 --> 00:03:23.389 the Northwest companies. He's already merging 00:03:23.389 --> 00:03:26.650 companies out on the frontier. Exactly. But the 00:03:26.650 --> 00:03:30.409 violence didn't stop there. The sources describe 00:03:30.409 --> 00:03:33.729 a fierce struggle involving Lord Selkirk and 00:03:33.729 --> 00:03:35.930 the Hudson's Bay Company. It was violent. It 00:03:35.930 --> 00:03:38.990 was incredibly expensive. And it was just unsustainable. 00:03:39.069 --> 00:03:41.610 This is where I want to pause on the how, because 00:03:41.610 --> 00:03:44.229 the history books say he negotiated the end of 00:03:44.229 --> 00:03:47.659 this war. But based on his personality. He didn't 00:03:47.659 --> 00:03:50.000 just ask them to shake hands, did he? Oh, no, 00:03:50.159 --> 00:03:53.460 no. He weaponized the financial losses. He looked 00:03:53.460 --> 00:03:55.259 at the balance sheets. The Northwest Company 00:03:55.259 --> 00:03:57.759 was exhausted. They were bleeding money fighting 00:03:57.759 --> 00:04:00.780 the Hudson's Bay Company. So Elise, along with 00:04:00.780 --> 00:04:03.360 the McGillivray brothers, William and Simon orchestrated 00:04:03.360 --> 00:04:06.020 what is essentially the great merger of the 19th 00:04:06.020 --> 00:04:08.139 century trade world. He basically went to them 00:04:08.139 --> 00:04:10.319 and said, you can keep fighting and go broke 00:04:10.319 --> 00:04:12.939 or you can join me and own everything. That is 00:04:12.939 --> 00:04:16.360 the bear tactic right there. He mauled the opposition 00:04:16.360 --> 00:04:21.019 with logic and leverage. In 1821, he amalgamates 00:04:21.019 --> 00:04:23.899 the Northwest Company, the XY Company, and the 00:04:23.899 --> 00:04:27.160 Hudson's Bay Company into one giant monopoly. 00:04:27.600 --> 00:04:29.860 Okay, let's frame that for you because fur trade 00:04:29.860 --> 00:04:32.959 sounds so quaint. This is like if Google, Apple, 00:04:33.040 --> 00:04:35.279 and Amazon were currently at war hacking each 00:04:35.279 --> 00:04:37.980 other, burning down data sires, and then one 00:04:37.980 --> 00:04:41.439 guy stepped in and merged them all into one megacorporation 00:04:41.439 --> 00:04:44.319 that owned the entire internet. That is a fair 00:04:44.319 --> 00:04:46.800 analogy, maybe even an understatement, because 00:04:46.800 --> 00:04:48.920 Google doesn't have its own private army or legal 00:04:48.920 --> 00:04:51.060 jurisdiction over half a continent. Good point. 00:04:51.160 --> 00:04:53.720 The Hudson's Bay Company effectively did. And 00:04:53.720 --> 00:04:56.079 Elise sits right near the top. He becomes the 00:04:56.079 --> 00:04:58.439 deputy governor. He wasn't just trading pelts 00:04:58.439 --> 00:04:59.959 anymore. He was designing the infrastructure 00:04:59.959 --> 00:05:02.779 of the colonial economy. And his ambitions weren't 00:05:02.779 --> 00:05:04.620 just limited to Canada, were they? I saw a note 00:05:04.620 --> 00:05:07.920 here about New Zealand. Yes. In 1825, he becomes 00:05:07.920 --> 00:05:10.410 a director of the New Zealand Company. This was 00:05:10.410 --> 00:05:12.389 a venture chaired by his brother -in -law, John 00:05:12.389 --> 00:05:15.649 George Lambton. Their goal was the first colonization 00:05:15.649 --> 00:05:18.649 of New Zealand. So you see this pattern. A very 00:05:18.649 --> 00:05:21.490 clear pattern. He is consistently at the forefront 00:05:21.490 --> 00:05:24.370 of British expansionism. Whatever the empire 00:05:24.370 --> 00:05:27.430 is going, Elise is there, usually holding the 00:05:27.430 --> 00:05:29.290 map. But here's the thing that just blows my 00:05:29.290 --> 00:05:32.569 mind. Usually, the guy running the massive colonial 00:05:32.569 --> 00:05:35.689 monopoly stays in the counting house. He counts 00:05:35.689 --> 00:05:39.519 his money. But Elise pivots. He decides he needs 00:05:39.519 --> 00:05:41.939 political power, too. Why? Was the money not 00:05:41.939 --> 00:05:45.439 enough? In that era, commercial power and political 00:05:45.439 --> 00:05:48.459 power were two sides of the same coin. You couldn't 00:05:48.459 --> 00:05:50.699 really protect one without the other. If you 00:05:50.699 --> 00:05:53.120 want to maintain a monopoly, you need the government 00:05:53.120 --> 00:05:56.220 to enforce it. So he goes to Parliament. He served 00:05:56.220 --> 00:05:58.839 as the Member of Parliament for Coventry. And 00:05:58.839 --> 00:06:01.189 not just for a term or two. He held that seat 00:06:01.189 --> 00:06:05.189 from 1818 to 1826, and then again from 1830 all 00:06:05.189 --> 00:06:07.870 the way to his death in 1863. Decades of influence. 00:06:07.970 --> 00:06:10.329 He literally died an MP. And he wasn't just a 00:06:10.329 --> 00:06:13.189 backbencher warming a seat, you know, waiting 00:06:13.189 --> 00:06:16.310 for a pension. Far from it. He was what we would 00:06:16.310 --> 00:06:18.990 call an insider's insider. He served as a whip 00:06:18.990 --> 00:06:21.050 in Lord Grey's government. Okay, let's clarify 00:06:21.050 --> 00:06:23.050 a whip for people who might not follow British 00:06:23.050 --> 00:06:25.069 parliamentary procedure. This is the enforcer, 00:06:25.089 --> 00:06:28.060 right? Exactly. The whip's job is to make sure 00:06:28.060 --> 00:06:30.379 party members vote the way leadership wants them 00:06:30.379 --> 00:06:33.439 to vote. It involves pressure, deals, sometimes 00:06:33.439 --> 00:06:36.160 threats. It's a role that's perfectly suited 00:06:36.160 --> 00:06:38.759 for the bear. And his connection to power was 00:06:38.759 --> 00:06:40.839 personal. Very personal. He actually married 00:06:40.839 --> 00:06:43.699 into the Gray family. His first wife was Lady 00:06:43.699 --> 00:06:46.300 Hannah Gray, the daughter of Earl Gray. The Earl 00:06:46.300 --> 00:06:50.399 Gray, as in the T. The very same. And more importantly, 00:06:50.639 --> 00:06:53.879 the prime minister. So Elise is literally family 00:06:53.879 --> 00:06:55.829 with the head of the government. That explains 00:06:55.829 --> 00:06:59.009 how he became such a prime mover behind the reform 00:06:59.009 --> 00:07:02.670 bill of 1832. But this seems contradictory. The 00:07:02.670 --> 00:07:05.009 reform bill is about modernizing the electoral 00:07:05.009 --> 00:07:07.430 system, right? Giving more people to vote. It 00:07:07.430 --> 00:07:09.449 was. It was about getting rid of rotten boroughs, 00:07:09.509 --> 00:07:12.389 places where a tiny handful of people, sometimes 00:07:12.389 --> 00:07:14.949 just one landowner, could elect an MP. Right. 00:07:15.009 --> 00:07:17.670 Like if a single cornfield in Idaho had the same 00:07:17.670 --> 00:07:20.329 voting power in Congress as all of New York City. 00:07:20.449 --> 00:07:22.990 Precisely. It was a corrupt system. And here 00:07:22.990 --> 00:07:25.430 you have Elise, the ultimate power broker, pushing 00:07:25.430 --> 00:07:28.610 for reform. But you have to ask why. He wasn't 00:07:28.610 --> 00:07:31.850 a radical Democrat. He was a pragmatist. He understood 00:07:31.850 --> 00:07:33.689 that the old system was so broken it was going 00:07:33.689 --> 00:07:35.610 to lead to revolution. If they didn't bend, they 00:07:35.610 --> 00:07:39.529 would break. So he used his bear tactics, bullying, 00:07:39.810 --> 00:07:42.790 cajoling, counting the votes, to force the aristocracy 00:07:42.790 --> 00:07:45.329 to give up a little power so they could keep 00:07:45.329 --> 00:07:47.310 the rest. He also held some heavy government 00:07:47.310 --> 00:07:50.779 titles. Secretary to the Treasury. And then secretary 00:07:50.779 --> 00:07:55.120 at war from 1832 to 1834. And that role as secretary 00:07:55.120 --> 00:07:58.779 at war is crucial. You see his fixer mentality 00:07:58.779 --> 00:08:01.300 coming out again. The British Army at the time 00:08:01.300 --> 00:08:03.959 was a mess of different departments and patronage 00:08:03.959 --> 00:08:06.199 networks. Right. Elise proposed that all army 00:08:06.199 --> 00:08:08.339 appointments should be made directly from his 00:08:08.339 --> 00:08:11.560 office. So centralizing power. Exactly. Taking 00:08:11.560 --> 00:08:13.379 it away from the scattered traditional methods 00:08:13.379 --> 00:08:15.379 and bringing it under a central bureaucratic 00:08:15.379 --> 00:08:17.660 control. It's the same playbook he used with 00:08:17.660 --> 00:08:19.860 the fur trade. Yeah. Consolidate, centralize, 00:08:19.860 --> 00:08:22.459 control. He wanted the army to run like a corporation. 00:08:22.459 --> 00:08:24.980 And speaking of consolidating influence, we have 00:08:24.980 --> 00:08:26.980 to talk about the Reform Club. Because when I 00:08:26.980 --> 00:08:29.579 hear club, I think of leather chairs and brandy, 00:08:29.579 --> 00:08:32.980 not political revolutions. And it was both. Founded 00:08:32.980 --> 00:08:36.879 in 1836 with Elise as the prime mover. This wasn't 00:08:36.879 --> 00:08:39.340 just a social hangout. No. It was the headquarters 00:08:39.340 --> 00:08:42.700 for the liberal political machine. Before this 00:08:42.700 --> 00:08:46.480 political organization was loose, Elise professionalized 00:08:46.480 --> 00:08:48.840 it. If you wanted to get anything done in Whig 00:08:48.840 --> 00:08:50.940 politics, you went to the Reform Club. It's like 00:08:50.940 --> 00:08:52.860 the modern equivalent of a K Street lobbying 00:08:52.860 --> 00:08:55.539 firm combined with a party headquarters. And 00:08:55.539 --> 00:08:58.309 Elise was the man holding the keys. There's one 00:08:58.309 --> 00:09:00.389 detail in the political section that really stood 00:09:00.389 --> 00:09:02.990 out to me as, well, almost spy novel material. 00:09:03.450 --> 00:09:06.330 The sources say he privately urged the French 00:09:06.330 --> 00:09:09.590 government to send troops into Spain in 1836. 00:09:09.990 --> 00:09:12.230 That detail is wild, isn't it? It's a perfect 00:09:12.230 --> 00:09:15.169 example of how his influence transcended borders. 00:09:15.429 --> 00:09:17.389 He wasn't acting as the foreign secretary there. 00:09:17.450 --> 00:09:20.269 He was acting as Edward Elise. He felt comfortable 00:09:20.269 --> 00:09:23.070 telling a foreign government, France, a historical 00:09:23.070 --> 00:09:25.590 rival, to invade a neighbor because he thought 00:09:25.590 --> 00:09:28.009 it was the right strategic move. That is a staggering 00:09:28.009 --> 00:09:30.250 level of arrogance. For confidence, he viewed 00:09:30.250 --> 00:09:32.429 himself as a player on the world stage, independent 00:09:32.429 --> 00:09:34.450 of the government he served. He was operating 00:09:34.450 --> 00:09:36.950 above the nation's state level. Okay, so we have 00:09:36.950 --> 00:09:40.250 the fur baron and the political fixer. He's modernizing 00:09:40.250 --> 00:09:43.190 democracy. He's fixing the army. He sounds like 00:09:43.190 --> 00:09:46.679 a progressive hero, but... We need to pump the 00:09:46.679 --> 00:09:49.320 brakes because there is a massive, ugly contradiction 00:09:49.320 --> 00:09:51.600 in the files that we have to address. We cannot 00:09:51.600 --> 00:09:53.840 talk about 19th century British wealth without 00:09:53.840 --> 00:09:56.220 talking about the Caribbean. And Elise was heavily 00:09:56.220 --> 00:09:58.840 invested. And we aren't talking about a few shares 00:09:58.840 --> 00:10:01.220 in a shipping company. The sources say he was 00:10:01.220 --> 00:10:04.580 a co -owner of eight sugar estates. Eight across 00:10:04.580 --> 00:10:07.519 Grenada, British Guiana, Tobago and Antigua. 00:10:08.000 --> 00:10:11.159 This was industrial scale agriculture. Right. 00:10:11.200 --> 00:10:13.139 And of course, up until the 1830s, that agriculture 00:10:13.139 --> 00:10:15.820 was powered entirely by enslaved people. This 00:10:15.820 --> 00:10:18.440 is where the whole liberal reformer image just 00:10:18.440 --> 00:10:20.759 falls apart for me. He's in parliament fighting 00:10:20.759 --> 00:10:22.820 for the reform bill, fighting for representation, 00:10:23.139 --> 00:10:25.779 while simultaneously owning human beings on the 00:10:25.779 --> 00:10:28.419 other side of the Atlantic. It is a deep moral 00:10:28.419 --> 00:10:31.399 chasm. But for men like Elise, liberty often 00:10:31.399 --> 00:10:33.899 meant the liberty to protect property. And enslaved 00:10:33.899 --> 00:10:36.240 people were viewed legally and economically as 00:10:36.240 --> 00:10:38.779 property. And this is where the timeline gets 00:10:38.779 --> 00:10:41.960 really cynical. Elise is in government during 00:10:41.960 --> 00:10:44.379 the exact time the British government is moving 00:10:44.379 --> 00:10:46.480 toward the abolition of slavery. That's right. 00:10:46.600 --> 00:10:49.279 And when emancipation finally happens, it came 00:10:49.279 --> 00:10:52.779 with a catch, a very expensive catch. The British 00:10:52.779 --> 00:10:54.940 government agreed to compensate the owners for 00:10:54.940 --> 00:10:57.659 their loss of property. Not the enslaved people 00:10:57.659 --> 00:10:59.940 who had been exploited for generations. No, the 00:10:59.940 --> 00:11:04.350 owners. And the bear got paid. He did. The records 00:11:04.350 --> 00:11:07.330 show Elise received £35 ,000 in compensation. 00:11:07.669 --> 00:11:10.730 That was for the liberation of over 300 enslaved 00:11:10.730 --> 00:11:14.649 people. £35 ,000 in the 1830s? I'm trying to 00:11:14.649 --> 00:11:16.429 do the inflation math in my head, but that is 00:11:16.429 --> 00:11:19.490 millions in today's money. It is a fortune. It 00:11:19.490 --> 00:11:21.870 represents a massive transfer of public wealth 00:11:21.870 --> 00:11:24.509 to private hands. And it highlights a critical 00:11:24.509 --> 00:11:27.470 mechanism of the British Empire. Even when social 00:11:27.470 --> 00:11:30.570 progress happened, like the end of slavery. The 00:11:30.570 --> 00:11:32.909 merchant class ensured they didn't lose out financially. 00:11:33.629 --> 00:11:36.750 Elise pivoted from fur to sugar. And when the 00:11:36.750 --> 00:11:39.169 sugar labor system collapsed, he took a government 00:11:39.169 --> 00:11:42.789 payout. It's the ultimate hedge. It really solidifies 00:11:42.789 --> 00:11:45.509 the idea that for him, everything was a transaction. 00:11:45.690 --> 00:11:49.690 Politics, war, human rights. It all ends up on 00:11:49.690 --> 00:11:52.370 a balance sheet. Exactly. He wasn't an ideologue. 00:11:52.649 --> 00:11:55.350 He was a capitalist. If the market for beaver 00:11:55.350 --> 00:11:57.710 pelts is down, merge the company. If the market 00:11:57.710 --> 00:12:00.629 for sugar is changing, take the buyout. So what 00:12:00.629 --> 00:12:03.009 does a man like this do with all that money and 00:12:03.009 --> 00:12:06.009 power? He's won the game. Does he retire? No. 00:12:06.169 --> 00:12:08.730 He doubles down on dominance. He lives like a 00:12:08.730 --> 00:12:11.610 tycoon. He buys the Glencoitch estate in Lochaber, 00:12:11.710 --> 00:12:13.929 Scotland in 1838. And he doesn't just buy a little 00:12:13.929 --> 00:12:17.269 cottage. No. He hires Alexander Ross, a prominent 00:12:17.269 --> 00:12:20.429 architect, to build a massive lodge. And this 00:12:20.429 --> 00:12:22.570 lodge becomes a revolving door for the elite. 00:12:23.309 --> 00:12:25.549 Artists, writers, diplomats, statesmen, everyone 00:12:25.549 --> 00:12:28.360 came to visit. The bear in his den. It was a 00:12:28.360 --> 00:12:30.000 place where business was done over whiskey and 00:12:30.000 --> 00:12:31.779 hunting. A lot of hunting. But the thing that 00:12:31.779 --> 00:12:33.779 really earned him the nickname wasn't just his 00:12:33.779 --> 00:12:36.960 personality, it was his sporting habits. The 00:12:36.960 --> 00:12:39.179 numbers here, I honestly had to read them twice. 00:12:39.559 --> 00:12:42.480 They're industrial. He was a tenant at the Inversia 00:12:42.480 --> 00:12:45.019 estate, and the game books record his kills. 00:12:46.000 --> 00:12:50.399 Over a seven -year period, he shot 14 ,560 grouse. 00:12:50.580 --> 00:12:54.960 Wait, hold on. 14 ,007 years? Yes. That's roughly 00:12:54.960 --> 00:12:58.629 2 ,000 birds a year. If you account for the seasons, 00:12:58.769 --> 00:13:01.409 he must have been shooting dozens of birds every 00:13:01.409 --> 00:13:03.690 single day he was out there. That's not hunting. 00:13:03.870 --> 00:13:06.070 That's slaughter. It's an extermination. And 00:13:06.070 --> 00:13:10.330 don't forget the rest. 810 ptarmigan, 146 black 00:13:10.330 --> 00:13:14.110 cock, and 34 deer. It sounds less like sport, 00:13:14.210 --> 00:13:16.669 more like a harvest. It sounds obsessive. It 00:13:16.669 --> 00:13:19.070 was. He attacked leisure with the same intensity 00:13:19.070 --> 00:13:21.669 he attacked the fur trade. He needed to dominate 00:13:21.669 --> 00:13:24.809 the landscape. In fact, he was so intense. that 00:13:24.809 --> 00:13:26.909 he became a nightmare for the locals. The sources 00:13:26.909 --> 00:13:29.730 mention he was considered a problem tenant, which 00:13:29.730 --> 00:13:31.769 is hilarious considering he was one of the most 00:13:31.769 --> 00:13:35.169 powerful men in the empire. Yes. Sir George MacPherson 00:13:35.169 --> 00:13:37.250 Grant, the owner of the estate, actually complained 00:13:37.250 --> 00:13:39.850 about him. Elise's sporting activities were so 00:13:39.850 --> 00:13:41.690 aggressive, they were disrupting the farming 00:13:41.690 --> 00:13:44.370 tenants. Trampling crops, disturbing livestock. 00:13:44.909 --> 00:13:47.370 He essentially acted like he owned the place, 00:13:47.509 --> 00:13:50.029 even when he was just renting. It's very the 00:13:50.029 --> 00:13:52.450 bear, isn't it? Just barging through, taking 00:13:52.450 --> 00:13:54.789 what he wants. And if a few farmers' crops get 00:13:54.789 --> 00:13:56.730 ruined, well, that's just the cost of doing business. 00:13:57.070 --> 00:13:59.210 It fits the psychological profile perfectly. 00:14:00.210 --> 00:14:02.330 Dominance over the landscape, whether it is the 00:14:02.330 --> 00:14:04.330 Canadian wilderness, the Caribbean plantations, 00:14:04.330 --> 00:14:08.940 or a Scottish moor, he consumes resources. That 00:14:08.940 --> 00:14:11.059 is what he does. Now, despite being a figure 00:14:11.059 --> 00:14:14.379 from the 1800s, his name hasn't completely disappeared. 00:14:14.460 --> 00:14:16.600 You can actually still find Elise on the map 00:14:16.600 --> 00:14:18.860 today. You can, and in some pretty surprising 00:14:18.860 --> 00:14:22.399 places. Most notably, the Elise Islands. Which 00:14:22.399 --> 00:14:24.360 most people would know today as. The independent 00:14:24.360 --> 00:14:27.240 nation of Tuvalu. They were formerly part of 00:14:27.240 --> 00:14:29.360 the Gilbert and Elise Islands colony. It's a 00:14:29.360 --> 00:14:32.799 fascinating legacy. A tropical island nation 00:14:32.799 --> 00:14:35.600 in the Pacific, named after a man who made his 00:14:35.600 --> 00:14:38.250 fortune in the frozen Canadian north. It just 00:14:38.250 --> 00:14:40.450 shows the reach of his network. And speaking 00:14:40.450 --> 00:14:42.870 of Canada, his name is still all over the geography 00:14:42.870 --> 00:14:45.509 there, too. Oh, absolutely. You have the rural 00:14:45.509 --> 00:14:48.590 municipality of Elise in Manitoba. You have Fort 00:14:48.590 --> 00:14:51.009 Elise, which was a major trading post. And if 00:14:51.009 --> 00:14:53.389 you have ever driven in Winnipeg, you might have 00:14:53.389 --> 00:14:55.750 driven down Elise Avenue. It's a testament to 00:14:55.750 --> 00:14:58.269 just how deeply embedded the Hudson's Bay Company 00:14:58.269 --> 00:15:00.789 was in the founding of Western Canada. These 00:15:00.789 --> 00:15:02.549 guys weren't just traders. They were the founding 00:15:02.549 --> 00:15:05.429 fathers of the infrastructure. And his legacy 00:15:05.429 --> 00:15:08.159 continued through his family as well. His son, 00:15:08.360 --> 00:15:11.480 Edward Elyse Jr., also sat in Parliament. And 00:15:11.480 --> 00:15:13.519 Elyse himself remained connected to the highest 00:15:13.519 --> 00:15:17.039 levels of nobility until the very end. His second 00:15:17.039 --> 00:15:19.820 marriage was to Anne Amelia Lester, the widow 00:15:19.820 --> 00:15:22.360 of the Earl of Leicester. So he starts as a merchant's 00:15:22.360 --> 00:15:24.799 son and ends up married to a countess, having 00:15:24.799 --> 00:15:27.500 reshaped the army, the fur trade, and the map 00:15:27.500 --> 00:15:30.120 of the world. It is a complete trajectory of 00:15:30.120 --> 00:15:33.120 19th century British power. So let's try to summarize 00:15:33.120 --> 00:15:35.940 the bear. When you look at all the source material, 00:15:36.259 --> 00:15:38.600 what is the picture that emerges? Because he's 00:15:38.600 --> 00:15:41.299 not a villain in the cartoon sense. No. But he's 00:15:41.299 --> 00:15:43.519 certainly not a hero. No, he's something more 00:15:43.519 --> 00:15:46.779 complex. He is the embodiment of the British 00:15:46.779 --> 00:15:49.980 Empire's operating system. He combined aggressive 00:15:49.980 --> 00:15:52.340 commercial expansion, that's the fur and the 00:15:52.340 --> 00:15:56.100 sugar, with political reform at home. He understood 00:15:56.100 --> 00:15:58.740 that to keep making money, the government needed 00:15:58.740 --> 00:16:01.529 to be stable and efficient. He didn't fix the 00:16:01.529 --> 00:16:04.509 system because he loved democracy. No, he fixed 00:16:04.509 --> 00:16:06.850 it because a broken system is bad for business. 00:16:07.149 --> 00:16:09.850 Exactly. And he lived a life of immense privilege 00:16:09.850 --> 00:16:12.889 and consumption, literally extracting resources 00:16:12.889 --> 00:16:15.950 from every corner of the globe. He's the operator, 00:16:16.190 --> 00:16:18.669 the guy who merges the companies, writes the 00:16:18.669 --> 00:16:21.610 bylaws and centralizes the appointments. Precisely. 00:16:21.879 --> 00:16:24.460 It really makes you think. We tend to focus on 00:16:24.460 --> 00:16:26.460 the kings and queens or the prime ministers, 00:16:26.559 --> 00:16:29.659 the people giving the speeches. But Edward Elise 00:16:29.659 --> 00:16:32.340 suggests that the real power lies with the people 00:16:32.340 --> 00:16:34.600 who own the infrastructure. Yes. The people who 00:16:34.600 --> 00:16:37.120 are in the back room at the reform club deciding 00:16:37.120 --> 00:16:39.379 who gets to be the prime minister. I think that 00:16:39.379 --> 00:16:41.659 is the key takeaway. The Edward Olysees of the 00:16:41.659 --> 00:16:43.600 world are the ones who actually pour the concrete 00:16:43.600 --> 00:16:46.360 that the rest of us walk on. So here is a thought 00:16:46.360 --> 00:16:49.460 to leave you with. Edward Ellis was nicknamed 00:16:49.460 --> 00:16:52.539 the bear for his trade dealings. But looking 00:16:52.539 --> 00:16:55.799 at his ability to merge giant companies, reshape 00:16:55.799 --> 00:16:58.360 the military from the inside and found the clubs 00:16:58.360 --> 00:17:00.820 where the elite made their decisions. Was he 00:17:00.820 --> 00:17:03.159 actually the architect of what we now call the 00:17:03.159 --> 00:17:05.779 establishment? And it begs the question. How 00:17:05.779 --> 00:17:07.539 many Edward Ellis's are out there right now? 00:17:07.619 --> 00:17:09.759 People whose names you might not know, who aren't 00:17:09.759 --> 00:17:11.859 on the cover of magazines, but who essentially 00:17:11.859 --> 00:17:14.500 own the infrastructure of our world. That is 00:17:14.500 --> 00:17:16.799 a very unsettling, but a very important question. 00:17:17.230 --> 00:17:20.049 Who is the bear of the 21st century? Something 00:17:20.049 --> 00:17:22.150 to mull over next time you look at a map. Thanks 00:17:22.150 --> 00:17:23.970 for listening to this deep dive. We'll catch 00:17:23.970 --> 00:17:24.650 you on the next one.