Saturday Night Genealogy Fun - Ancestor with Most Unusual Occupation

From Randy over at Genea-Musings: 

it's Saturday Night - 

time for more Genealogy Fun!!!

 Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to:

1)   Which of your ancestors had an unusual occupation?

2)  Tell us in a blog post of your own, in a comment on this blog, or in a Facebook post.

Here's mine:

I think my ancestor with the most unusual occupation is my 9th great-grandfather, George Hubbard, Sr. (1601-1684/85).  

According to the book "1000 Years of Hubbard History, 866-1895," Edward Warren Day, Harlan Page Hubbard, New York, 1895:

"About 1650, or when he left Hartford, he carried with him a commission from the Colonial Government as 'Indian Agent and Trader for the Mattabesett District.'"  

(He had sold his land in Hartford, Connecticut and moved with about 15 other families to Mattabesett, which later became Middletown.)

"One record of him says that he was "highly respected, and of marked integrity and fairness."... "He must have been a man of "marked integrity and fairness" to have been selected by the colony as its Indian Trader.  Much judgment had to be used by this representative of the colony in these dealings.  Promiscuous trading by any one was forbidden, as fire-arms and fire-water were frequently bartered by indiscreet persons, which produced direful results.  This resulted in the selection of one man to do the trading for all.  On his judgment and prudence much depended.  He must have erred, however, at one time for the Colonial Court fined him... for exchanging a gun with an Indian."

I should note that this indiscretion and fine occurred in 1649, either right before or right about the time he was chosen as Indian Trader.

I personally like to think that because he was a man of marked integrity and fairness, he got along well with the Native Americans and treated them fairly.  

This is definitely a job I had never heard of before!