Biddle House, Mackinac Island

The Biddle House is a historic house and fur trade shop space, built before 1800 on Market Street on Mackinac Island in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is part of Mackinac Island State Park. It is a Michigan Registered Site and a contributing resource to Mackinac Island's status as a National Historic Landmark.
The origins of the Biddle House are unknown, but its New France architectural lines and heritage indicate that it was built about 1780, at the time of the first settlement of Mackinac Island by Euro-Americans. The American fur trade grew significantly on Mackinac Island after the War of 1812, and about 1822, fur trader Edward Biddle, a member of the Philadelphia-based Biddle family, occupied the house and refitted it to serve as a home for his family and a shop space to exchange trade goods for furs of the Upper Great Lakes ecosystem, including pelts from the beaver, mink, otter, and raccoon.
Edward Biddle's success in the fur trade was associated with two significant factors: his marriage to Agatha Biddle, a leading member of the Ojibwa nation of Native Americans who possessed an extensive regional kinship network, and his close ties with the then-dominant American Fur Company (AFC); most furs bought or sold by Edward and Agatha Biddle would also have passed through the hands of the AFC at some point. The Biddles bought the house outright in 1832.

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