Paving the way for settlements

The unknown is often filled with many risks, but it is also filled with many rewards. The rewards of discovery sometimes open a new chapter in history, as was the case of the life of Father Jacques Marquette.

Driven by an intense curiosity about the world as well as his desire to serve God and his fellow man, Marquette undertook a daring expedition in 1673. With his venture, he and his fellow voyagers became the first Frenchmen to arrive in Arkansas, paving the way for French settlements and trade in the area.

Jacques Marquette was born in Laon, an ancient city in northeastern France in 1637. In 1654, at age 17, he joined the Jesuit order, also known as the Society of Jesus, a scholarly Roman Catholic monastic order. He spent the next several years learning and eventually teaching.

In 1666, he was sent to New France in modern- day Canada to work as a missionary to the local Native American tribes. Marquette worked hard to learn the customs and languages of the different tribes, steadily building a rapport with them. He founded a number of missions in the Great Lakes area, most notably Sault Ste. Marie, at the tip of Michigan on Lake Superior in 1668.

By 1671, he had founded the mission at La Pointe, in the northern reaches of Wisconsin near Lake Superior. While in Wisconsin, members of the local Illinois tribes told Marquette about the Mississippi River, which had been a major trade route for tribes across what became the continental United States for cen-

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turies. French explorers were only beginning to understand the interior of North America as they steadily moved beyond the Great Lakes. Intrigued, Marquette sought permission to explore the great river, which was soon granted.

Marquette teamed up with Louis Jolliet, a French explorer and fur trader, and five others to explore the river.

The team set out in May 1673, rowing along Lake Superior in two canoes to Green Bay and up the Fox River.

Eventually, they had to carry their canoes overland to the Wisconsin River. With a few more days of rowing, they reached the Mississippi River, one month after they started.

They spent several days journeying down the river, taking careful note of all they saw along the way. The expedition stopped at the confluence of the Arkansas and Mississippi River, some 800 miles from where they first encountered the river. They encountered the Quapaw tribe at their village of Kappa, not far from the Mississippi. They were greeted warmly by the natives, participating in their calumet friendship rituals.

They spent three days as their guests learning about the tribe and the region.

The Illinois had called the Quapaw, who had only lived in the area for a couple of generations, the “Akamsea,” or “the downriver people,” as the Illinois told the explorers about the different tribes they were likely to encounter on their expedition. It is believed that word could have already reached the Quapaw about their pending arrival.

Marquette taught the Quapaw about Catholicism. The explorers also asked whether the Mississippi flowed all the way to the Gulf of Mexico, a question still unknown to the Europeans. The Quapaw confirmed their question about the river but warned them against traveling further south, noting many dangerous tribes further down the river.

The Quapaw had long been enemies of the Chickasaw tribe in modern-day Mississippi.

Encouraged by the success of their mission and the prospect of new trading allies, the expedition set out to return to Canada. The journey upstream took far longer and arrived at the shores of Lake Michigan by fall near the present-day site of Chicago.

They made it back to a French mission in Wisconsin shortly afterward. He would never return to Arkansas. Marquette continued to work with the tribes of the region.

In 1674, spent several months with the Illinois, becoming the first Europeans to winter in what became Chicago.

However, the many journeys had taken a toll on Marquette’s health. On his return to French mission in Michigan in May 1675, he died at the age of 37.

The expedition of Marquette and Joliet inspired other French explorers to come to the region. While the Spanish had previously explored Arkansas during the disastrous Hernando de Soto Expedition in 1541, they had done little to enforce their claim on the area. Encouraged by the success of the Marquette-Joliet Expedition, France soon laid claim to the land with the arrival of Louis Cavalier, Seuer de la Salle in 1682. The French continued to refer to the Quapaw as “Akamsea,” which the French variation eventually became “Arkansas,” the name given to the area. Arkansas Post, a French trading post at the Arkansas and Mississippi Rivers, was founded in 1686 as the first European settlement in Arkansas.

Marquette today is widely honored across the Great Lakes region. Jesuits established Marquette University in Wisconsin in 1881 in his memory. Several parks and public schools have been named after him as well as the Marquette River in Michigan, Lake Marquette in Canada, and Marquette Island in Lake Huron. Nine cities are named for him in the American Midwest and Canada.

Ken Bridges is a Professor of History and Geography at South Arkansas Community College in El Dorado where he lives with his wife and six children. He is also Resident Historian for the South Arkansas Historical Preservation Society, based in El Dorado. Reach him by e- mail at kbridges@ southark. edu.