Did you know The Jesuits were founded in 1540 by Ignatius of Loyola who wanted to spread the Catholic faith He thought priests should have military-type discipline Loyola called his followers Soldiers of Christ Meet the Boss In 1673 Father Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet teamed up to explore the mighty Mississippi River They came from different backgrounds and had separate ambitions but together they made history MISSION TO THE NEW WORLD Called to the priesthood Moves to New World Jacques Marquette right was born in 1637 He was the sixth child born into a wealthy French family At age 17 Marquette began studying to become a Jesuit priest He wanted to be a missionary and spread the Catholic faith in the New World which is now known as North America This has been my thought since my earliest childhood he wrote In 1666 he arrived in New France the French colony in what is now Canada LEARNING THE LINGO Language skills help to spread the message After he arrived in New France in 1666 Marquette spent two years studying the dialects of local Native languages such as Algonquian and Iroquoian This proved useful later when he met and camped with people on his travels He was able to communicate with them and learn about their cultures The Jesuits sent Marquette to the city of Sault Sainte Marie in the Great Lakes region He soon left to set up his own mission St Ignace in what is now Michigan 4 TRAVEL WITH THE GREAT EXPLORERS
A CANADIAN EXPLORER Young man trains for priesthood Then chooses new path Louis Jolliet was born in 1645 near Quebec a settlement in New France His father Jean repaired wagons As a boy Jolliet attended a Jesuit college At age 17 he began studying for the priesthood but he soon changed his mind Instead he left for France to study cartography for a year When he returned to New France he decided to look for a life of adventure IT RUNS IN THE FAMILY Life in the wilderness Jolliet’s older brother Adrien was a fur trapper When Jolliet returned from France he decided to join Adrien and become a coureur de bois Jolliet learned to speak the languages of the Algonquian people and traveled across the wilderness to Sault Sainte Marie There in June 1671 Jolliet was one of the men who signed a declaration claiming a vast area of land for King Louis XIV of France LET'S GO Explorers team up Native peoples around Lake Michigan talked about the Misi-ziibi which means big river in Ojibwe Father Claude-Jean Allouez a Jesuit missionary heard these stories in the early 1670s The French wanted to explore more of North America It is not clear when Jolliet and Marquette first met They may have known each other in Quebec or Sault Sainte Marie In 1673 the two men decided to find and explore the Big River EXPLORE WITH MARQUETTE AND JOLLIET 5
Big River The Mississippi is 2,320 miles 3,730 km long It flows from northern Minnesota to the Gulf of Mexico The river's many tributaries flow through 31 US states and two Canadian provinces Where Are We Heading From the Great Lakes region Jolliet and Marquette headed southwest They mapped one of the greatest rivers in North America the mighty Mississippi STINKING BAY New land made out of mud From the mission at St Ignace Marquette and Jolliet traveled to Green Bay on Lake Michigan The French called the basin Baye des Puans or Stinking Bay but no one knows why Marquette claimed that the water was full of mire and mud He and Jolliet passed through the area in the spring so the conditions may have been damp and muddy From Green Bay the explorers sailed down the Fox River TRAVEL UPDATE TRAVEL UPDATE Take a tip from the locals If you’re traveling in unknown lands get some local help Marquette and Jolliet were guided by two members of the Mascouten tribe who lived in what is now Wisconsin The guides helped the Europeans sail down a wide sandy river the Native peoples called the Meskousing Today it is called the Wisconsin River It flows through a varied landscape of hills forests and prairies Mississippi River Its current which flows southward is slow and gentle To the right is a large chain of very high mountains and to the left are beautiful lands Jacques Marquette describes reaching the 6 TRAVEL WITH THE GREAT EXPLORERS
THE BIG RIVER Reaching the big river On June 10 1673 Jolliet and Marquette arrived at the point where the Wisconsin River meets the Mississippi above This is now Prairie du Chien Wisconsin As the expedition entered the Mississippi Marquette wrote that he was full of a joy I cannot express The explorers had reached their first goal FIRST ONE TO THE EAST Rumored route to Asia But where is it From the 1500s the Europeans had been searching for the Northwest Passage This was a fabled water route through North America to the Pacific Ocean and Asia and to its riches such as spices Jolliet hoped that the big river might be this route However Jolliet soon realized the river flowed south leading to the Gulf of Mexico not the Pacific Ocean LET’S TAKE A SHORTCUT A new route home Crossing the prairies When the expedition headed back up the Mississippi the explorers decided to travel along the Illinois River as a quicker way back to Green Bay This allowed them to map another river and meet new people Marquette also made notes and sketches of the amazing variety of wildlife on the prairies EXPLORE WITH MARQUETTE AND JOLLIET 7
