Welcome to
the Chicago Portage
National Historic Site. Father Jacques Marquette and Louis
Jolliet were the first Europeans to be shown this spot, the west
end of a seven mile divide between the DesPlaines and the Chicago
River. Native Indians had been using this portage for hundreds of
years. Numerous explorers, settlers, traders and trappers followed
in Marquette and Jolliet's footprints.
This
strategic portage was the beginning of Chicago's history, the
reason the city was built where it is, and grew as rapidly as it
did.
Marquette
visualized a canal between the rivers, which would effectively link
the Great Lakes and Atlantic Ocean with the Mississippi River and
Gulf of Mexico. That dream was realized with the opening of the
Illinois & Michigan Canal in 1848. All this history is well
known and documented.
But few
people know that the great explorers Meriwether Lewis and William
Clark also passed through here, quite recently, in the form of
THE CORPS OF DISCOVERY traveling cache, containing theLEWIS
& CLARK travelbug. They arrived here on 2/22/11 traveling
from the Lewis and
Clark State Memorial Park in Madison County, Illinois. They
camped here until March 5th, when they continued east on their epic
journey.
Some of
you had the pleasure of meeting Lewis & Clark during their
brief stay. If you missed them, check the above links periodically
to see where they are currently camping. Maybe you will run into
them someday.
But you
may still come here and see where the Corps of Discovery camped
while in Portage Woods. There is a small cache marking the spot
where they stayed.
To find
the cache: At the listed coordinates you will gaze upon an
impressive statue of Marquette and Jolliet.
The year
that they made history here = MJ
The year
that this preserve became a National Historic Site = HS
MJ - 1388
= ABC
HS - 1563
= XYZ
The cache
is at N41 48.ABC W087 48.XYZ
The cache is not under the rocks where the Lewis & Clark
ammo box was once hidden, so there is no need to move any of them.
You will find the small Lock & Lock very close by.