Geography and Glaciers

Chicago's geography resulted from the action of large glaciers during the Ice Age which created Lake Michigan.  The Chicago region is a flat plain that was the bottom of the ancestral Lake Chicago.

The Glacier over Lake Michigan was approximately one mile high. It formed a very large river valley along the Des Plaines and Illinois Rivers when it melted.  At one point the Glacier blocked the Mississippi River and the Chicago / Desplaines/ Illinois Rivers drained the melting waters of the Glacier, resulting in a very wide river valley. 

The highest point within the city limits is in the Beverly neighborhood. This ridge was called Blue Island because it looked like an island set in the prairie.  

When Chicago was founded the land was a swamp. It took a major effort to raise the grade of buildable areas and create storm and sanitary sewers to drain the region.

City limits of Chicago

A very large limestone quarry has been excavated south of the city in Thornton.  The Thornton quarry was a coral reef when the area was covered by a sea many millions of years ago. 

1. Geography of Chicago - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

   en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geography_of_Chicago

   Chicago's present natural geography is a result of the large glaciers of the Ice Age, namely the Wisconsinan Glaciation that carved out the modern basin of Lake ...
2. Glacial Lakes - Department of Geography - Michigan State University

   www.geo.msu.edu/geogmich/glacial.html

   Initially, excess water from Glacial Lake Maumee flowed southwest to the Wabash River, and Glacial Lake Chicago drained west and south by way of the ...
3. Glaciers - An Overview of Glaciers - Geography - About.com

   geography.about.com/od/geographyintern/a/glaciers.htm

   A comprehensive overview of glaciers. Includes the types of glaciers, how glacierscarve the land, and the importance of glaciers. From Colin Stief of Geography ...
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   The Elementary School Teacher and the Course of Study - Volume 3 - Page 573 - Google Books Result

   books.google.com/books?id=GDUVAAAAIAAJ

   University of Chicago. Dept. of Education, University of Chicago. Graduate School of Education - 1903 - Education, Elementary

   Hills, valleys, and plains — due to glaciers. Contributions of glaciers to the localgeography of Chicago. (Study of work of glaciers at Cary, Glencoe, and Stony ...
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   Bulletin of the Geographic Society of Chicago - Issue 1 - Page 19 - Google Books Result

   books.google.com/books?id=C94bAAAAMAAJ

   Geographic Society of Chicago - 1920 - Geography

   Geographic Society of Chicago. been called interglacial. During the glacial epochs the climate was severe, and the ice-sheets were enlarged; during the ...
6. Geography of Palos Hills, Illinois

   www.liskahaas.org/stagg/palosgeography.htm

   Geography of Palos Hills, Illinois ... That extensive area of water was called glacialLake Chicago. It is right here in the Palos area where the moraines broke and ...
7. BBC - GCSE Bitesize - Glacial landscapes and processes

   www.bbc.co.uk › Home › Geography

   A secondary school revision resource for GCSE Geography on the topic of glaciallandscapes and processes, glacial deposition and erosion.
8. What role did glaciers play in shaping the physical geography of ...

   www.chacha.com › Categories › Society & Culture

   Chicago's present natural geography is a result... 436 days ago. What is the role ofGlacier Park International Airport? Glacier Park International Airport is loacted ...
9. Chicago Geology - Faculty Home

   faculty.ccc.edu/jtassin/.../Chicagogeo/chicagogeology.htm

   In the Chicago region, glacial melt was dammed first by the Lake Border Moraine. ...Another major change in the geography of Chicago occurred with the in ...

   
   

   
   

   
   

Location, Location, Location

Why has Chicago grown so rapidly?  Location, Location, Location. The map below shows water way links in the United States.  Chicago is near the south end of Lake Michigan. 

The Great Lakes provide a great water way to transport people and cargo around the Lakes and down the St Lawrence River to the Atlantic Ocean. This was important to the Native Americans and French, and it is important today.

And the Great Lakes were only a short portage to the DesPlaines River connecting to the Illinois River and then the Missississipi. So a very large portion of North America was connected by water, with Chicago in the central Hub.

Lake Michigan and the Great Lakes also form a very large barrier.  All the trails and later roads and railroads north of the south end of Lake Michigan had to move to the south to get around Lake Michigan.

All Roads Lead to Chicago - Or at Least a Lot of Them do

A Busy Crossroads

Vincenzo Coronelli, detail of globe gore showing eastern North America (Venice, 1688?). Hermon Dunlap Smith Collection, The Newberry Library

Chicago's role as a continental crossroads came from its location linking two great navigable water systems. To the east, the waters of the Great Lakes flowed out the St. Lawrence River to the Atlantic Ocean; to the west and south, the Illinois River flowed into the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico. Native Americans and early European explorers understood this, as the 17th-century map shows. Connection between the two water systems was initially made by a short and easy portage over land from the South Branch of the Chicago River to the Des Plaines River. In 1848, the new Illinois and Michigan Canal provided an all-water connection between the Chicago and the Illinois rivers, solidifying Chicago's strategic position.

Paleo Indians - First Chicagoans

10000-8000 BC Paleo Indians roam the area 

8000-500 BC Archaic Indians inhabit forests, hunt deer and small game use stone tools

500 BC-900 AD Woodlands Indians grow maize, build villages and burial mounds

900-1500 AD Misissippian culture improve agricultural methods 

Search Results

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   Chicago history: Paleo-Indians - Chicago History | Examiner.com

   www.examiner.com/article/chicago-history-paleo-indians‎
   

   
   
   

   Feb 11, 2013 – The first human beings, also called Clovis People, migrated to theChicago area after the Laurentide Ice Sheet withdrew around 10000 years ...
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   Paleo-Indians - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

   en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paleo-Indians‎
   

   
   

   Paleo-Indians (Paleoindians) or Paleoamericans is a classification term given to the first peoples who entered, and subsequently ..... University of Chicago. 1958 ...
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   Paleo-Indians settled North America earlier than thought, study ...

   www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-03/uoia-psn031711.php‎
   

   
   

   Mar 24, 2011 – Earth scientists at the University of Illinois at Chicago determined the age ... younger, previously dated Paleo-Indian Clovis-culture artifacts.
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   Paleo-Indian culture -- Encyclopedia Britannica

   www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/439369/Paleo-Indian-culture‎
   

   
   

   Paleo-Indian culture. ... Although most of the routes used by the Paleo-Indians are difficult to investigate because they are now under water or deeply buried or ...
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   What does paleo-indian mean? - Definitions.net

   www.definitions.net/definition/paleo-indian‎
   

   
   

   Style:MLAChicagoAPA. "paleo-indian." Definitions.net. STANDS4 LLC, 2013. Web. 13 May 2013. <http://www.definitions.net/definition/paleo-indian>.
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   Paleoindian - Bama.Ua.Edu

   bama.ua.edu/~alaarch/prehistoricalabama/paleoindian.htm‎
   

   
   

   Small, nomadic groups of people, known as Paleoindians, were some of the first humans to live in Alabama as early as 11,000 B.C. They hunted megafauna ...

7. Images for paleo indians chicago

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   paleo-indians - WBEZ

   www.wbez.org/tags/paleo-indians‎
   

   
   

   Mar 24, 2011 – WBEZ 91.5 Chicago ... Subscribe to paleo-indians ... previously thought, and a Chicago researcher played a key role in nailing down the dates.
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   Paleo Indian stone totem figurine art - Ice-Age Indian Art

   www.iceageartifacts.com/paleo_indian_art.htm‎
   

   
   

   Note Middle Devonian deposits (dark purple) in the northeast (Chicago) region. These Paleo Indian artifact stones hold Devonian fossils 354 million years old ...
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    Paleoindian Biblio Annotated - The University of Iowa

    www.uiowa.edu/~osa/IAM/Resources/PaleoBiblio.pdf‎
    

    
    

    Oct 1, 2004 – A short, illustrated summary of Paleo-Indian times in New England. While many of ... Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002. Cohen tells ...
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    Paleo-Indians - DiscoverSEAZ

    www.discoverseaz.com/History/PaleoInd.html‎
    

    
    

    Paleo-Indians hunted in southeastern Arizona more than 10000 years ago.

Native American Trails

There were numerousNative American trails leading to Chicago. The most important means of transportation was canoes in the Great Lakes and on the rivers.

Trails interconnected areas not on the waterways. Sauk Trail was a Native American trail running through Illinois, Indiana and Michigan. The trail ran from Rock Island on the Mississippi River to the Illinois River near modern Peru, Illinois, then along the north bank of that river to Joliet, and on to Valparaiso, Indiana. Then it ran northeasterly to LaPorte and into southern Michigan running through Niles,Three Rivers, Ypsilanti and ending at the Detroit River near Detroit.The trail followed a winding path around natural topography including following the ridges of dune and moraines that mark the earlier glacial period Lake Michigan shorelines. European settlers improved the trail into a wagon road and later into modern highways, although these often have been straightened and rerouted.

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   INDIAN TRAILS OF CHICAGO - Chicago History Museum

   www.chicagohistory.org/static_media/pdf/historyfair/indian_trails.pdf‎
   

   
   

   INDIAN TRAILS OF CHICAGO. Reference. qF38AP. Indian Trail markers. C38. InChicago, v. 1, no. 11, p. 54-55, Jan. 1955. v.1. F383D. S492. Shapiro, Dena ...

3. Sauk Trail - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sauk_Trail‎
   

   
   

   Later traders and their Indian suppliers would continue to use the trail. ... The surveying for this Chicago Road began in 1825 but financial shortfalls led to a ...