Nature Bulletin No. 607-A   June 5, 1976
Forest Preserve District of Cook County
George W. Dunne, President
Roland F. Eisenbeis, Supt. of Conservation

****:THE DES PLAINES RIVER -- PART TWO: ITS HISTORY

The recorded history of Chicago, and the Des Plaines River which has 
had a vital part in its growth, began in 1673. Father Marquette and 
Louis Joliet, returning from their discovery and exploration of the 
Mississippi, had been told by Indians of a short-cut to Lake Michigan. 
So they paddled up the Illinois and Des Plaines Rivers to the Chicago 
Portage and thence to the lake. LaSalle and his voyageurs commanded 
by Tonty were the next white men to chronicle travels across the 
portage and on the Des Plaines.

However, Chicago had been a crossroads and the Des Plaines an artery 
of travel since prehistoric times. From Channahon to Wisconsin there 
used to be manmade mounds, singly or in groups, along the river. 
From artifacts and skeletons found in them it has been determined that 
most of those in Cook County were built by two ancient races of 
Indians. A few were effigy mounds typical of those found in Wisconsin 
and the copper regions near Lake Superior. The others were types 
common along the Illinois, Mississippi and Ohio Rivers, but smaller. 
Copper nuggets, utensils and ornaments were found in them.

Obviously, this was the place where the northern and southern races of 
mound builders came to trade and they carne along the Des Plaines, 
either in dugouts or on nearby trails. Being natural highways, with 
shallow fords at several places, those trails were adopted by the 
Indians who succeeded the mound builders and had large villages at 
seven strategic locations in Cook County alone. Later, they were used 
also by white explorers, traders and travelers.

Chicago and all or parts of 14 counties including Cook are in Illinois, 
instead of Wisconsin, solely because it was recognized that a waterway 
from Lake Michigan to the Mississippi could be obtained by 
constructing a canal through the Chicago Portage, down the Des 
Plaines valley, and thence to LaSalle-Peru where the Illinois River 
became navigable in all seasons.

The Northwest Territory Ordinance of 1787 established the north 
boundary of Indiana and Illinois territories at an east-west line through 
the southern tip of Lake Michigan. In 1816 the governor of Illinois 
Territory, Ninian Edwards, negotiated a treaty with the Potawatomi, 
Ottawa and Chippewa tribes whereby they ceded a strip of land 
between two boundary lines: 20 miles wide from the mouth of the 
Chicago River to the junction of the Des Plaines with the Kankakee, 
and 10 miles wide -- on the north side of the Illinois -- from there to 
the Fox River.

When Illinois became a state in 1818 its northern boundary was 
established at latitude 42  30', 61 miles north of the 1787 Ordinance 
line, in order that a canal  from Lake Michigan to the Illinois River 
would be entirely within and could be built by the new state. 
Accordingly, the Illinois and Michigan Canal, authorized by Congress 
on March 30, 1822, was begun in 1836 and finally completed in 1848.  
It eliminated the series of arduous portages that, in very dry seasons, 
extended as far as Starved Rock -- over 80 miles. Its stimulating 
effects upon Chicago, northeastern Illinois and the Illinois River valley 
were tremendous.