Manitoba Heritage Council Commemorative Plaques

Pembina-Emerson Area

After 1790 the junction of the Red and Pembina Rivers was the site of fur-trading posts of the Hudson's Bay Co., North-West Co., and XY Co. Here at Fort Daer the early Selkirk Settlers hunted buffalo when food was scarce at the Red River Settlement. In 1874 a townsite was laid out on the east side of the Red River, just north of the international boundary. It was named after the poet Ralph Waldo Emerson, and incorporated in 1879. The village of West Lynne, established by the Hudson's Bay Co. hoping to settle the land near their post at Pembina, united with Emerson in 1883.