The Bismarck Tribune

Trader Brown
Annual Trip

Mahogany-tanned like dried chokecherries and more cheerful than he was a year ago, Trader Brown, last of the Missouri river cruising storekeepers, tied up to the bank near the old Fort Bismarck Tuesday and announced his floating emporium was open for business.

As regular as the geese fly north in the spring, Trader Brown floats south on the Yellowstone and Missouri rivers bound for the lower Mississippi from his winter headquarters near Glendive.

For years Brown has been swapping his heterogeneous supplies-fish nets, fish hooks, clothes, shoes, twine, trinkets of all kinds with the people who live along the banks of the greatest river system in the world.

This year Brown has but one boat, larger than all three on which he rode the waves to New Orleans last year. He built it during the winter, will sell it somewhere in Dixie when he finds a taker, ride the cushions back to Glendive and his dugout home in the side of the Yellowstone's clay banks.

"Business is better this year," said Brown. "It has rained almost steadily since I left Home. People are more ready to swap. Why last year I had a hard time keeping the dust from the river out of my eyes."

Trade needs of Brown's customers vary with the locality. He says that clothing is what the people of Montana and Dakotas want, Shoes especially always are in demand.

South of Yankton fish nets and other accoutrements of the men who make their living from the river are most in demand. When he gets down in the share-cropping belt Negroes want doo-dads, gew-gaws and other trinkets that will amuse them.

Brown will trade anything. He will as readily swap a horse collar for piston rings as a watch for a shotgun. He claims he can a trading basis for any article that is offered him.

Trader expects to be in Bismarck for four or five days before casting off.