As Euro-Americans penetrated the Chicago region in the 1820s, they encountered a widespread network of Indian villages occupied by people of many distinct tribes, some places containing families of more than one group. This comparatively dense pattern of settlements favored sites along the margins of rivers and lake shores, wherever fish, game, and plant resources were abundant. By 1830, American intrusion was evident in the villages and small towns along the Wabash Valley of Indiana, and in the thin scatter of trading posts, forts, villages, and Christian missions across other parts of the area.

Authors: Helen Hornbeck Tanner and Michael P. Conzen
Source: Newberry Library