DCHP-1 Online

Northwest North-West, North-west, northwest, etc. Hist.

• 1a n. the vast region north and west of Lake Superior, as known by the fur traders and explorers.

  See also: Canadian Northwest  Great West  Northwestern Territory  Northwest territory  

  • 1775  (1901)  I was now [at the Grand Portage] in what is technically called the north-west; that is, the country north-west of Lake Superior.
  • 1871  (1883)  The men who went out to the North-west as voyageurs and servants in the employment of the rival companies from Canada and from Scotland hardly ever returned to their native lands.
  • 1963  . . . the Canadian government had yet to face the problem of actually establishing order in the great North West.

• 1b n. the early administrative districts which later became Saskatchewan and Alberta.

  See also: Northwest Territories (def. 1b)  

  • 1860  What true Canadian can witness the tide of immigration now commencing to flow into the vast territories of the North-west without longing to have a share in the first settlement of that great and fertile country.
  • 1908  The year 1857 was an eventful one in the annals of "The North-West," the name by which the Territories were generally known in Canada.
  • 1958  At eighteen Uncle Dan had left his Ontario village for the "North West." This was a vague wilderness near a place called Winnipeg, where you could file on a homestead of 160 acres of bald prairie.

• 2 n. the general region making up the present Yukon and Northwest Territories (def. 2b) and adjacent areas of the western provinces.

  See also: Northwest Territories (def. 2b)  

  • 1914  This is far from being a true picture of life as it is lived in the far North-West.
  • 1952  The Northwest is a vast region occupying about ten per cent of the area of Canada.
  • 1961  Alberta farmers, caught in drought-parched areas, are also increasing the demand for homestead land in the northwest.