In the 1600s the French explorers LaSalle, Jolliet, Marquette, Xavier, Charlevoix and others roamed what is now Illinois and saw plenty of buffalo, sometimes as many as 500-600 in a herd. Their letters and journals document this. Unfortunately, buffalo had disappeared from Illinois by 1830. I've been doing some research on buffaloes in central Illinois, specifically right around here in Champaign County. Historical records point to three distinct buffalo traces, or wide paths, created long ago by large numbers of the slow moving giants. It's going to take some detective work, but I want to shed some light on these traces that stretched from the Champaign area to the Sangamon River and the Mahomet area, then northwest toward Bloomington and beyond. I'll keep y'all posted on what I find.
Friday, January 23, 2009
Did Buffalo Swim the Sangamon? A Dive into History
In the 1600s the French explorers LaSalle, Jolliet, Marquette, Xavier, Charlevoix and others roamed what is now Illinois and saw plenty of buffalo, sometimes as many as 500-600 in a herd. Their letters and journals document this. Unfortunately, buffalo had disappeared from Illinois by 1830. I've been doing some research on buffaloes in central Illinois, specifically right around here in Champaign County. Historical records point to three distinct buffalo traces, or wide paths, created long ago by large numbers of the slow moving giants. It's going to take some detective work, but I want to shed some light on these traces that stretched from the Champaign area to the Sangamon River and the Mahomet area, then northwest toward Bloomington and beyond. I'll keep y'all posted on what I find.
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