Born 1625,
Northern France
Died 1698,
Sorel, Quebec

Pierre Esprit Radisson

Medard Chouart des Groseilliers was born in northern France on his parents’ farm, which was called Les Groseilliers, or the Gooseberry Bushes. He went to New France, which is now Canada, at an early age, probably as a soldier. Groseilliers married in Quebec City and stayed there to raise a family. After his first wife died, he remarried in 1653 and moved to the town of Trois Rivières. His second wife’s half-brother, Pierre Esprit Radisson, was to become Groseilliers’s companion on many of his trips. The two have been known as “Gooseberries and Radishes” to generations of Canadian schoolchildren.

Pierre Esprit Radisson was born in Avignon in the south of France sometime around...