Illinois: A Historical Timeline

Prior to 1699 Pre-European Settlement
5000 BCE	Native American tribes hunt in the Illinois region. By 650 B.C. they have establish the settlement of Chahokia. The civilization vanishes around 1400 for unknown reasons. Remains can be found at the Chahokia Mounds, North American’s largest prehistoric earthwork relic.
3000 BCE	Six united tribes, known as the Illiniwek or Illini, are present in the region, giving Illinois its eventual name. The Illini consist of the Cahokia, Kaskaskia, Michigamea, Moingwena, Peoria, and Tamarosa tribes. By the time of European contact they number in the several thousand.
1673	French explorers Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet descend the Mississippi River to the Arkansas River and return to Wisconsin via the Illinois River. They are the first Europeans to reach the region of Illinois.
1675	Marquette founds a mission at the Great Village of the Illinois, near present-day Utica.
1680	The Iroquois enter the region to attack the Illinois tribes. By 1800 the Inniniwek’s numbers dwindle to almost nothing as they are replaced by Pottawatomie, Miami, and Sauk, among others. French traders René-Robert Cavelier and Henry de Tonty build Fort Crèvecoeur on the Illinois River, near present-day Peoria, to celebrate Mass and preach the Gospel.
1696	Jesuit priest Pierre François Pinet establishes the Guardian Angel mission at present-day Chicago.
1699–1800 Early European Exploration and Settlement
1699	Priests of the Quebec Seminary of Foreign Missions found the Holy Family mission at Cahokia, the first permanent European settlement in the Illinois country.
1717	By order of King Louis XV, Illinois is annexed to the French province of Louisiana, with the Illinois River serving as its northern border.
1730	(September 9) French troops and their Native American allies massacre nearly 500 Fox Native Americans due to the tribe’s fierce opposition to French meddling in the fur trade.
1763	The Seven Years’ War ends, and France cedes Illinois country to Britain as part of the Treaty of Paris.
1769	According to legend, a band of Potawatomi besiege and starve a group of Illiniwek at Fort St. Louis, believing the Illinois Native Americans to be responsible for the Ottawa Chief Pontiac’s death. The site is now known as Starved Rock.
1772	Jean Baptiste Point DuSable builds a trading post near Lake Michigan, becoming the first resident of the settlement that will be Chicago.
1778	American military officer George Rogers Clark defeats the British at Kaskaskia, securing the Illinois country for Virginia.
1783	The Treaty of Paris extends the United States boundary to include the Illinois country.
1784	Virginia relinquishes its claims to Illinois.
1787	The Northwest Ordinance places Illinois in the Northwest Territory.
1800–1860 State of Illinois
1800	Congress creates the Indiana Territory, which includes Illinois.
1803	The Kaskaskia Native Americans cede nearly all of their Illinois land to the United States.
1809	Congress organizes the Illinois Territory with Kaskaskia as the capital.
1812	The Potawatomi Native Americans massacre 52 troops and civilians while destroying Fort Dearborn. It is later rebuilt in Chicago in 1816.
1818	(December 3) Illinois becomes the 21st state.
1823	Galena, Illinois becomes a center for lead mining. In the 1830s, 80 percent of the lead mined in the U.S. comes from the town.
1824	Voters defeat a constitutional convention call to permit slavery in the state.
1832	Abraham Lincoln runs for the General Assembly of Illinois and loses. In 1834 he runs again and wins. The Black Hawk War is fought in Illinois over land disputes. Black Hawk is the war chief of the Sauk, Fox, and Kickapoo Native Americans. When he refuses to move his tribes from land claimed by the state, federal troops arrive. Black Hawk’s band defeats the militia at the Battle of Stillman’s Run, but the war ends with a decisive victory for the militia at the Battle of Bad Axe. Black Hawk and eight other Native American leads are imprisoned, and the Native Americans are pushed further west.
1833	The Treaty of Chicago provides for the United States acquisition and settlement of the last remaining Native American lands in Illinois.
1835	The General Assembly grants a charter for the Jacksonville Female Academy, the first institution in the state for women’s education.
1839	Joseph Smith chooses Nauvoo as headquarters for the Mormon Church. In 1844 anti-Mormons assassinate Smith and his brother Hyram at Carthage, and the Mormons leave Nauvoo to follow Brigham Young to the Great Salt Basin in Utah. The Mormon temple in Nauvoo is burned to the ground in 1847 and rebuilt in 2002.
1846	The Donner Party leaves Springfield by wagon train for California. They later become known for resorting to cannibalism to survive the winter after being stranded in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Seeking religious freedom from their native Sweden, Erik Jansson and Jonas Olson establish a colony of Swedish immigrants at Bishop Hill. The communal society is founded upon economic and religious principles.
1853	The Illinois General Assembly passes legislation that prohibits free African Americans from settling in Illinois.
1854	Abraham Lincoln makes his first political speech at the Illinois State Fair.
1856	The first railroad bridge across the Mississippi River is completed between Rock Island and Davenport, Iowa. Rand McNally is established in Chicago. By 1880 it is the world’s largest mapmaking company.
1858	(June 16) Accepting the Republican nomination for an Illinois U.S. Senate seat, U.S. Representative Abraham Lincoln delivers his famous "A House Divided" speech in Springfield, highlighting the danger of slavery to the solidity of the Union. (August–October) During the Illinois senatorial campaign, Lincoln challenges Democrat Steven Douglas to a series of seven joint debates, primarily on slavery and its impact on the nation. The debates are held at various cities throughout Illinois over the next three months, bringing Lincoln to national prominence. However, Douglas is re-elected to the Senate by a narrow margin.
1860–1900 The Civil War and Reconstruction Eras
1860	Lincoln is elected 16th president of the United States, the first Republican to secure the office.
1861	The Civil War erupts. Roughly 250,000 Illinois men serve in the Union Army, and the state becomes a major launching point early in the war for General Ulysses S. Grant's campaigns to seize control of the Mississippi and Tennessee rivers.
1864	George Pullman’s Pullman Palace Car Company of Chicago manufactures the first railroad sleeping car. After President Lincoln’s assassination, Pullman arranges for the body to be shipped home to Springfield in one of his sleeping cars, garnering national attention that results in exploding sales.
1865	Illinois becomes the first state to ratify the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery. The Chicago Union Stock Yards opens as the meatpacking district in Chicago; by 1900 it employs more than one-third of packing industry laborers in the nation and is the center of the American meatpacking industry for decades.
1871	(October 8–11) Much of Chicago is destroyed in the Great Fire that rages for three days. The fire kills hundreds and destroys 18,000 downtown buildings with losses estimated at $200 million. Though the fire is one of the largest U.S. disasters of the 19th century, the rebuilding spurs Chicago’s development into one of the most populous and economically important American cities.
1872	In the U.S. Supreme Court case Bradwell v. State of Illniois, Myra Bradwell sues the state for denying her membership to the Illinois State Bar because she is a woman. The Supreme Court upholds the state’s decision, ruling that the right to practice a profession is not among the privileges upheld by the 14th Amendment.
1873	Frances Willard founds the Women’s Christian Temperance Union in Evanston, the oldest continuing non-sectarian women’s organization worldwide. The group spearheads the crusade for prohibition.
1885	The Home Insurance Building is built in Chicago. At 10 stories and 138 feet in height, it is the world’s first modern skyscraper. The building is demolished in 1931.
1886	(May 4) The Haymarket Square bombing and riot. Beginning as a rally in support of striking workers, an unknown person throws a bomb at police as they disperse the public meeting. The bomb blast and subsequent gunfire result in the deaths of 8 police officers and a number of civilians.
1889	Architect Frank Lloyd Wright establishes a home and studio in Oak Park with a $5,000 loan from his employer Louis Sullivan. The studio serves as his workspace for the first 20 years of his career and is declared a National Historic Landmark in 1976.
1890	African-American surgeon Daniel Hale Williams organizes Provident Hospital in Chicago, the first African-American owned and operated hospital in the U.S.
1892	Work on the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal begins, which will reverse the flow of the Chicago River carrying wastewater away from the Lake Michigan to the Mississippi River and Gulf of Mexico. The canal system is completed in 1900.
1893	The World’s Columbian Exposition (or World’s Fair, as it’s popularly known) is held in Chicago to commemorate the 400th anniversary of European exploration to the western hemisphere.
1894	Workers at the Pullman factory strike over lowered wages and high rents. Eugene Debs calls the American Railway Union to strike in sympathy with Pullman workers, blocking freight traffic in and out of Chicago. Federal troops are called in to suppress mob violence.
1899	The Illinois General Assembly creates the first juvenile court system in the nation.
1900–1950 Early-to-mid 20th Century
1903	(December 30) A fire destroys the Iroquois Theater in Chicago, killing nearly 600 people in 20 minutes in the single deadliest single-building fire in U.S. history.
1905	Paul Harris and other Chicago businessmen organize the Rotary Club, an organization of service clubs. At the time, members choose the name Rotary because they rotate club meetings at each member’s office each week.
1908	(August 14–15) The Springfield Race Riot of 1908. Set off by reports that an African-American man had sexually assaulted a white woman and another had murdered a white man, whites demanded the suspects be turned over to the mob. When authorities refuse, rioters destroy dozens of black-owned homes and businesses and lynch African Americans. Only one man is ever convicted for acts during the riot, but it does directly lead to the formation of the National Association for the Advanced of Colored People (NAACP) in 1909. A coalmine fire at Cherry leads to 259 deaths. It is one of the worst mine disasters in U.S. history.
1913	The General Assembly grants women the right to vote for presidential electors.
1915	(July 24) The steamship Eastland rolls over while docked in the Chicago River, killing all 835 on board. It remains the largest loss-of-life disaster from a single shipwreck in Great Lakes history.
1919	The Chicago White Sox players are accused of throwing the World Series, intentionally losing a game to the Cincinnati Reds. Eight members of the team are banned for life from baseball, becoming infamous as the "Black Sox." (July 27–August 3) Sparked by tensions over competitive labor and housing markets, the Chicago race riots leave 38 dead, more than 500 injured, and 1,000 homeless. (June 10) Illinois is the first state to ratify the 19th Amendment, granting women the right to vote.
1925	(March 18) The great Tri-State Tornado kills 695 people in Illinois, Indiana, and Missouri and injures 13,000 people, causing $17 million in property damage.
1926	Aviator Charles Lindbergh begins daily mail delivery flights between Chicago and St. Louis. The Monsanto Corporation founds the town of Monsanto in southeast Illinois as a tax-free and regulation-free dumping location. The area is later identified as one of the most polluted communities in the region, now named Sauget.
1929	Gunmen of the South Side Italian gang led by Alphonse Capone murder seven rival North Side Irish gang members in the "St. Valentine’s Day Massacre" on Chicago’s North Side. Since Prohibition, Chicago’s criminal underworld has flourished, creating the notorious gangland operation the Chicago Outfit, which is run by infamous bootlegger and smuggler Al Capone.
1930	Adler Planetarium, the first planetarium in the Western Hemisphere, opens in Chicago.
1934	(July 2) FBI gunmen shoot and kill notorious bank robber John Dillinger in the alley next to the Biograph Theater in Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood.
1935	The state legislature "outlaws" English and designates "the American language" as the official language of Illinois. (January 19) During a blizzard, Coopers Inc. sells the world's first briefs at the Marshall Field’s State Street store in downtown Chicago. The company will eventually become Jockey International.
1950–present Modern Illinois
1955	The first McDonald's franchise opens in Des Plaines
1956	Edwina Froehlich co-founds the La Leche League in Franklin Park to promote the breastfeeding of babies. It currently has a presence in 68 countries.
1968	(August 26–August 29) The 1968 Democratic National Convention is held in Chicago. Anti-war demonstrators arrive en masse, and Chicago mayor Richard J. Daly authorizes the police department to use force against what most say are peaceful, even light-hearted, protests. Riots ensue, and the National Guard is deployed. When the convention is over, eight men known as the "Chicago 8" are arrested and charged with conspiracy, inciting riots, and other related charges.
1969	The Chicago 8 trial opens. Initially all defendants are tried together, but defendant Bobby Seale is severed from the proceedings and sentenced to four years in prison for contempt of court, one of the longest sentences for that crime in U.S. history. Ultimately five are convicting of inciting riots, but those convictions are overturned in 1972.
1974	The Sears Tower in downtown Chicago is completed, becoming the world’s tallest building, standing 1,450 feet tall and 108 stories.
1975	Deposed Chicago Outfit crime boss Sam Giancana is shot and killed at his home in Oak Park. Before his death, Giancana was scheduled to testify at a Senate committee hearing regarding possible CIA and mafia connections in the 1963 assassination of President Kennedy.
1981	Morton Grove bans the possession of handguns in the most restrictive gun control measure in the nation at the time.
1982	The General Assembly fails to ratify the proposed Equal Rights Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which would prohibit discrimination on the basis of gender.
2003	Governor George Ryan gains national attention when he commutes the sentences of everyone on or waiting to be sent to death row in Illinois due to his belief that the death penalty is incapable of being administered fairly. Later Ryan is indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of racketeering and sentenced to 6.5 years in federal prison.
2008	(February 14) Former student Steven Kazmierczak opens fire and kills six people at Northern Illinois University before committing suicide. Fifteen people are wounded. (November 4) Illinois’ junior senator, Barack Obama, is elected the President of the United States, becoming the first African-American president in U.S. history.
2009	Governor Rod Blagojevich is removed from office and Republicans call for the resignation of Democratic Senator Roland Burris. In taped conversations, Blagojevich allegedly tries to "sell" Obama’s vacated senatorial seat for political favors, and Burris, who assumes the vacated seat, is accused of lying under oath regarding his dealings with the governor. Ethics charges against Burris are ultimately dropped.