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CAHOKIA: PROLOGUE
ALL life and achievement is evolutionary; present wisdom comes from past experiences, and present commercial or industrial or agricultural prosperity has come from past exertion and suffering. The deeds and motives of men that have gone before us have been instrumental in shaping the destinies of later communities and cities and states and nations. The development of a new country by civilized men was at once a task and a privilege. It required great courage, sacrifice and privation. Compare the present conditions of St. Clair County, Illinois, of the fertile American Bottoms ... in which fertile delta of the Mississippi River, lies the Village of Cahokia, outpost of civilization in this territory ... with what it was two hundred and seventy years ago, in 1673 ... in 1680, when first historical mention is made of the village of the "Cahokians" of the tribe of "Illini." From a trackless wilderness and virgin prairie this section of the American Bottoms has become a center of civilization ... with millions and millions of wealth, numerous systems of intersecting railroads and great concrete highways, grand educational institutions and splendid churches ... palaces of amusement, marvelous industrial plants and immense agricultural productiveness. Into this then wilderness that once had been peopled by a primitive Mongoloid race, capable only of building in sand and perishable materials, devoid of the talent of the Mayans and Aztecs, came the voyageurs of France ... the vanguard of the missionaries, who aided so materially in exploration, while bent spiritually on the conversion of the savage tribes, that in 1673, 1680 roamed this trackless land. Far to the North came Cartier, who discovered the St. Lawrence; came De Monte and Champlain; and Quebec and Montreal and Three Rivers were founded. Forts and Mission Stations were erected and by 1670 Canada had made decided progress and was in charge of an Intendant who administered affairs on behalf of the French government at Quebec, which was the seat of government New France. Champlain was far-seeing and patriotic. saw that the influence which the Jesuit and Recollet priests would have upon the Indians would greatly assist New France in the conquest of the wilds of the New World In 1615 Champlain returned to France and succeeded in enlisting in his cause a number of priests of the Recoll Order. The French authority in the New World afterwards called to their assistance the more vigorous Jesuit and now the real onward-movement toward the interior toward the Illinois country began. Mission stations and trading posts were established along the lakes as far we as Green Bay, Wisconsin. Missionaries and traders came and went and the geography of the interior became better known every day. After more than a quarter of a century of the most unexampled activity in the cause of his country, his king, and his religion Champlain laid down his burdens and bid adieu to the scenes of his life work. He died in 1635. From the time of his death to 1649 there was a period of marked inactivity in everything except possibly the work of individual priests, of individual traders. But progress was not to be definitely halted.
Came then the lure of the spiritual conquest of all the territory adjacent and South of the Great Lakes. Jesuit Fathers, Mesnard and Allouez built the first pioneer missionary station at the extreme Northwestern Lake region. Fathers Dablon and Marquette worked in the same field. Father Claude Jean Allouez, S. J., in 1670 conceived the idea of a Peace Conference between the representatives of the western Indian tribes and the Canadian government. In that same year, Perrot, an adventurous soul, made his appearance at Sault Sainte Marie or Mary's of the Falls; came also Talon, the French Intendant of Canada and as representative of the French government of Louis XIV, and appointed his personal representative for the purpose of conveying a universal Indian Congress at that spot. And from that Congress sprang the true founding of Cahokia, Illinois.
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