 One of the most famous of the early African Americans in the territory was George Bonga . He was born in Minnesota in 1802 , his father Pierre Bonga the son of a freed slave and his mother a member of the Ojibwe tribe . Bonga was <unk> in Montreal and eventually became a fur trader in the Northwest territories . He went on to serve as an interpreter in negotiations with the Ojibwe ( particularly as a representative of Michigan Governor Lewis Cass ) . His brother Stephen served as the Ojibwe interpreter at Fort Snelling for the 1837 treaty . 
