PERE MARQUETTE AND
SIEUR JOLLIET
In 1673. Louis Jolliet, Canadian fur-trader
and explorer, and Father Jacques Marquette.
French Jesuit Missionary, with five French
Canadian boatmen. were the first white men to
enter the upper Mississippi River.
Indians directed them to the Great River via
the Fox-Wisconsin waterway front the present
site of Green Bay to Prairie du Chien. The
Frenchmen entered the Mississippi River
June 17, 1673.
Descending the river until July 16, the
explorers turned back at the Arkansas River
because they anticipated possible danger ahead
from the Spanish and Indians. Returning
North. the expedition pioneered what is now
the Illinois - Des Plaines ~ Chicago River
passage to Lake Michigan.
• Marquette and Jolliet were back at the mouth •
of the Fox River by the end of September. The
trip had taken them over 2,000 miles through
country never before seen by white men.
Erected 1973