 Frontier Fighters! There's in the heroic lives of the Buckskin trailblazers who won the American West. One of these was Dr. John McLaughlin, the warm-hearted and courageous chief factor or governor of the Hudson's Bay Company, who, though a Canadian employed by a British trading company operating on British control territory, did more to encourage the American emigration movement into the Oregon country than any other single individual. 1840, Fort Vancouver, capital of the Pacific Northwest, on the Columbia River north of the mouth of the Willamette. For a penny-pinching Scotsman, you're a poor man. Can I be poor darling on my salary of $12,000 a year? But you are. John, I've just finished your private account and you've only $200 to your name. Well, this month will soon be over and I'll then be worth $1,200. If you keep on giving those Yankee emigrants credit on money, real money, you and I'll die in the Montreal poor house. Oh dear, you can I'm a doctor. Hey John, I can too, you're a businessman, an employee of Hudson's Bay. It doesn't mind if you treat sick Americans, but it do mind if you sell them forbidden goods on credit too. My dear, as chief fucker of Hudson's Bay, I'm practically absolute ruler of 443,000 square miles of territory. You're mine. I didn't see the connection. But I do. If you didn't have put away that ledger, I'll invoke the power of my official capacity and punish you. Punish me? How? By giving that $200 to the first American who comes through Yan Door. Oh John, you wouldn't. Oh wouldn't I? Hey, come in. Reverend Jason Lee, good evening. Good evening, Mrs. McLaughlin. Good evening, Doctor. And what can we do for you, Reverend? Doctor, you must do something for Daniel, my brother. There is not much I can do, except I recommend a warmer climate to heal those weak lungs I use. But I haven't any money. My Indian mission has taken all that I brought with me from the United States. How much will it take? I can buy him a passage on a schooner bound for the Sandwich Islands for exactly... $200. Yes, yes, $200. But how did you know? Don't mind my wife, Reverend Lee. Every so often she gets inspired about money. Darling. Yes, dear? Please give Reverend Lee that $200. You are speaking to me about the new... with God's blessing. Unflinchingly loyal to the Hudson's Bay Company's interests, and more than generous and helpful to the American fur trappers, missionaries and emigrants, fighting tooth and nail for a foothold in the Northwest, Dr. McLaughlin's tact and diplomacy was put to its severest test whenever the Indians went on one of their period rampages. Look, Eagle Wing, pale face wigwam on the river bank. Built tricea thunderbird, it is big and built of the trees which belong to us. And it is filled with skins of animals which are ours who have always held this land. When do we attack? At dawn when pale faces sleep. I have spoken. Sun rises. It is the signal. Yes, attack and take no prisoners. Look, co-punderbird, a white squaw. I see her. She makes music with hollow reeds. What new medicine is this? Look, co-chief, she comes nearer. A warrior squaw walking to her death. How low the pale face has fallen to send the squaw a sacrifice. Look, thunderbird, your graves. They've laid down their arms. The magic reeds have enchanted them. She has bewitched them. You, Eagle Wing, will make the sacrifice. Kill her. I cannot thunderbird. She is a squaw. When red blood turns to white water, even the great chief is without power. I will speak to her. I? Speak, white devil squaw. I'm Nea Squaw. I'm a scot of the clan McGregor. A pale-faced warrior? But your dress? It is a white squaw. It is Nea Squaw's, but the kilt, spore, and Tamashanta are the healings of Bonnie Scotland. Why do you confuse my braves with your devil music? The white doctor is ready for the council. The council? Aye, the council. He's a cunning one, our good doctor. He thought you'd forget the council, so he set me to remind you. Come, I'll pipe your dune to Fort Vancouver. For many hours, the Indians were held spellbound by the Scotch bagpipe music, completely forgetting they had come for white scouts. When the exhausted piper was carried from the council chamber, the chiefs, hypnotized by the wild music of the fighting Highland clans, signed a treaty with Dr. McLaughlin never again to make war on Fort Vancouver. One evening, as Dr. McLaughlin entertains some of his friends in his cabin. This is indeed a troll situation. I joke bien vie, a Frenchman. And for my hero, the Wellington Duke, while the good doctor and Englishman chooses Napoleon. Well, if Dr. McLaughlin takes a Napoleon, so will I. But not Napoleon Bonaparte. Well, then Napoleon who? Dr. McLaughlin, I choose the greatest Napoleon of them all, Napoleon Brandy. Oh, here, here in the fire. Well, why, sir John, welcome under Fort Vancouver, sit your dune and hair spot a brandy. Not now, doctor, later perhaps. What's troubling your mind, sir John? Doctor, I have a letter with me, authorizing me. Why can't I can? Authorizing you to give me a good talking to. Admonish me to stop feeding the starving Americans. She's giving them seed and farm implements. No, doctor, it's more serious than that. Dr. McLaughlin, you've been dismissed from Hudson's Bay. Dismissed? Well, that's impossible, man. Hudson's Bay wouldn't, they couldn't dismiss me. Here's the letter, I'll read it to you. No, no, no, no, no. I'll take your wallet for it. But, man, it is a blow, a terrible blow. Vitting farewell to Fort Vancouver, the log castle from which he ruled so benevolently the company's great private empire, Dr. McLaughlin journeyed to Oregon to begin life anew. Here he built a saw and grist mill, but there were some Americans south of the Columbia River who did not prove as hospitable as the good doctor anticipated. Oh, look, John, coming up the hill, a mob of men. Oh, losteert is now a mob. Probably a delegation to inform my help in some great project. Oh, it is a mob, John, an angry mob. Listen. Oh, shut yourself in your mill, John. That mob's coming for you. Oh, but why for me? I haven't harmed anyone. Because your Hudson's Bay is born a chief factor and a hated man. This is the United States, John, not Panama. Oh, hush, now, here they are. That big fella in the beaver hat is the sportsman. Gentlemen, your numbers overwhelm me and your enthusiasm leaves me speechless. Never mind the sort putting you Hudson's Bay company's wine. Oh, but men, I'm no longer in the employ of Hudson's Bay. I've left Canada for good. I'm going to become a citizen of the United States. You may have wilder intentions of becoming an American citizen. You may lead our Fourth of July parade, and you may bribe our territory. Lachlan, you'll never become a citizen of our union. Hush, darling, hush. John, I'm going to have a say if they kill me. American, before you stand, one of North America's greatest men. His only mistake was that he loved and served humanity to such an extent that today Dr. John McLachlan is a man without a country. Canada ignores him. The English despise him and your Americans hate him. Why? Great and lasting good he has done your countrymen and making safe the very ground on which you stand. Ah, more so if it's like us. But talk to him, what do you better, God? What are you going to do? Do. Why, McLachlan, you renegade. Not in a strictly physical sense, Mrs. McLachlan. But John's heart is broken. We Americans have sacrificed a saint. Where are you? Here I am, John, dear, beside your bed. Tell them, those Americans, that John McLachlan forgives us. Oh, John, rest now, so you'll be strong tomorrow. There'll be not tomorrow for me, but there'll be a tomorrow for the Pacific Northwest. Many grand tomorrows, I see vast farms with full trees and full bloom. Big cities with tall white buildings. Laughing, happy children attending fine schools. Oh, John, dear. Ah, you cannot stop progress, it is God's will. And the Americans yet unborn who will settle on this land will be the most progressive people on our heavenly Father's green earth. His pride crushed, even denied the right to own a single acre of American land to become a citizen of the country he had grown to love. Dr. John McLachlan, the man whom history has glorified as the father of Oregon, crossed the last frontier to great and everlasting immortality. Another glorious human document of the pioneers who penetrated the American wilderness and made it safe for those who sought the gold of peace and security in the land of the setting sun.