Geography of the Northwest Territories

In the 18th century, the main land[clarification needed] was explored by Samuel Hearne for the Hudson's Bay Company and by Alexander Mackenzie.

[1] European settlers were mainly whalers, fur traders, and missionaries until the 1920s, when oil was discovered and the territorial administration had formed.

[1] The principal industry is now mining, and centers of the petroleum and Natural Gas fields in the western Arctic coastal regions.

Sir John Franklin contributed scientific expeditions to the Arctic Northwest in the first half of the 19th century, gaining valuable geographic data.

[1] The area of present Northwest Territories and Nunavut was part of the vast lands sold by the Hudson's Bay Company to the new Canadian confederation in 1870.

This split the Northwest Territories along a ziz-zag path running from the Saskatchewan-Manitoba border through the Arctic Archipelago on the North Pole.

[1] Geographically, the area is mainly south of the tree line, which runs roughly northwest to southeast, from the Mackenzie River delta in the Arctic Ocean into the southeastern corner of the territory.

[1] Tundra is characteristic of the land north of the tree line; there the native people depend on hunting, arts and crafts, fur-trapping; and they obtain many resources from fish, seals, reindeer, and caribou.

[1] The majority of the development in this area takes place south of the tree line, where the land is covered with soft woods and rich minerals.

Great Slave Lake is the source of one of the world's longest rivers, the Mackenzie, that runs 1,120 miles (1,800 km) to its outlet into the Arctic Ocean.

[1] The Northwest Territories is the site of the northern end of Wood Buffalo National Park (est.

[2] Around 1,269-1,267 million years ago, the Slave craton was partly uplifted and intruded by the giant Mackenzie dyke swarm, radiating from a mantle plume center west of Victoria Island.

The Northwest Territories extends for more than 1,300,000 km2 (500,000 sq mi) and has a large climate variant from south to north.

[4] Agriculture is nearly impossible in the Northwest Territories except for limited cultivation south of the Mackenzie River area.

[1] The territory is governed through a 22-member Legislative Assembly which elects a premier and cabinet; an appointed commissioner holds a position similar to that of a Canadian lieutenant governor.