April 17 – September 12, 2010

History Happened Here chronicles explorers, pioneers, industrialists, immigrants, and others who blazed trails in this part of America. The exhibit examines events that determined the course of history for northern Indiana. Some of the milestones spanned decades; some took place in the blink of an eye. All made significant differences for the generations that followed.

The History Happens Here Exhibit

As visitors enter History Happened Here, they learn that in the 1600s every king in Europe kept a watchful eye on explorers searching for a waterway that would join the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. During French explorer Robert de LaSalle’s quest for such a passage, he found that a five-mile land portage between the St. Joseph and Kankakee Rivers in what is now northern Indiana, connected an entire system of lakes and rivers from the St. Lawrence Seaway to the Gulf of Mexico. The discovery ignited European interest in the region.

Dredging the Kankakee Swamp

The next stop for visitors in the gallery is 1823, the year that Alexis Coquillard, an agent for John Jacob Astor’’s American Fur Company, built a trading post on the St. Joseph River. Although it was little more than forests and prairie at the time, Coquillard, along with fellow fur-trader Lathrop Taylor, saw great potential for the area and within eight years, plotted the town of South Bend. From those beginnings grew one of the largest industrial regions in the Midwest by the nineteenth century.

In another section of History Happened Here, visitors learn that those burgeoning industries of the St. Joseph River Valley drew millions of immigrants from the 1840s – 1920s. Most were looking for jobs as well as seeking to escape their homelands’ political, religious and economic turmoil. The region would prosper in many ways because of the newcomers.

Immigrants and Store Front

As exhibit visitors continue their journey through time, they come upon natural history specimens reflecting the diverse wildlife of the Grand Kankakee Swamp. Here they find that in the late 1800s, the swamp, which stretched from just west of St. Joseph County, Indiana, into Illinois, became a conservation battleground between early settlers and those who would profit by draining the swamp to create fertile farmland. The wildlife and vegetation that once thrived in the Grand Kankakee Marsh gave way to mechanical dredges that “straightened” the Kankakee River, thereby creating acres of rich soil.

The next “top moment” in History Happened Here showcases business entrepreneurs whose innovative ideas made a difference for the area as well as the world. On view is the rarely-seen gold loving cup presented to industrialist James Oliver by the City of South Bend in appreciation for his numerous contributions to the area. As visitors explore a nearby area on Notre Dame’s Knute Rockne, they are reminded that inventive minds weren’t limited to industry. The indelible mark Rockne left on college football is explored here.

The Sandpipe Section

Towering from another section of the exhibit is a scale model of the South Bend standpipe, built in 1873 to ensure large quantities of high pressure water to the hydrants in the city of South Bend for fire protection. The replica serves as a reminder of a time when cities struggled to avoid the type of devastation caused just two years prior by the Great Chicago Fire. The “water tower,” constructed of cast iron plates and covered with red brick, stood 221 feet tall, and held 30,000 gallons of water.

These stories of local history are as captivating as the one-of-a-kind artifacts on view, like the tree stump blazed by LaSalle’s men in the seventeenth century to mark their route. Portraits of Chief Leopold Pokagon and other Potawatomi, painted from life in the 1800s by little-known artist Van Sanden, can also be seen. Nineteenth-century letters written by immigrants to friends and family in the “homeland” underline the reality of establishing a fresh life in a new country, and journals kept by early fur-traders are equally impressive.

LaSalle Tree with Markings

Those who live in the region will be intrigued to learn––and re-learn–these historical stories, some of which are well-known even to youngsters and some of which may be new even to scholars. Those who live in other parts of the country will be fascinated to know how much American history found its roots in this area.

History Happened Here is on view in the Changing Gallery.