Last October, we hosted a panel discussion at the UIC Latino Cultural Center about the history and future of the Chicago River. As moderator, I had the honor of introducing the panelists and providing students and other attendees with a brief historical overview of the river, to start everyone on the same page with some general information. I thought others might benefit from reading this succinct history.
"Whose River: Culture, Condos, and Controversy Along Chicago's Waterway" program Introduction
The Chicago River was once a sleepy stream that meandered slowly through the flatland marshes to Lake Michigan. A relatively short stretch of land divided the Chicago River from the Desplaines, which flowed to the Illinois and eventually the Mississippi River. The first nations here (like the Potawatomi, Ojibwe, and Odawa, plus Menominee, Miami, & Ho-Chunk) used this area as a point of connection between the two great mid-American watersheds: the Great Lakes and the Mississippi river system. The marshland also inspired our name, Shikaakwa, for the skunky stinky onion that grew along the riverbanks.
As European influence spread into this area, and people came from French, English, & occasionally Spanish colonies, Chicago became a multilingual hub of commerce. Our first non-indigenous settler, Jean Baptiste Pointe DuSable was a black haitian fur trader who, along with his Potawatomi wife Kittahawa, built a cabin on the north bank of the river (where the new Apple store is being built today). Growing American greed and colonialism would overcome the years of relatively peaceful coexistence here, and in the 1830s, the Native Americans were kicked out of Chicago. Their lands were sold to fund a new canal, to slice through the narrow stretch of land dividing these great midwest watersheds, paving the way for barges and shipping infrastructure.
Chicago boomed in the mid to late 1800s, growing faster than any other city to become the second largest in the country. The freshwater resources were used for industry, as a steel manufacturing coolant, a beer brewing base, and dumping ground for thousands. Generations of immigrants and migrants alike came and interacted with the river over the years, like the Irish who dug the canal, the Mexicans who worked in the riverside railroad yards, and the Cambodian refugees who built a memorial overlooking the north branch at Lawrence. You can’t forget the Germans who fought for immigrant rights in the Lager Beer riot of 1855, pitched into the river by the Clark swing bridge while trying to march to city hall.
Chicago’s famous stockyards on the south side contributed animal waste from meatpacking to a stream, now appropriately known as “Bubbly Creek.” The waste in the Chicago river no longer filtered slowly through marshland on its way to the lake, but instead seeped in muddy streets and rushed through concrete walls, bringing sewage to taint our drinking water. In response to this public health crisis, the original MWRD, who you’ll hear from later, took a bold step, deciding to reverse the flow of the Chicago river and rehaul the city’s the sewer system. The city streets were raised several feet, bringing Chicago up above the marsh level to provide room for a new sewer system underground. A new canal on the southwest side was dug deeper than the first to encourage water to flow the opposite direction, now drawing water into the city from the lake instead, to flush out the waste. This meant our waste would head south to the Mississippi and eventually the Gulf of Mexico. St. Louis tried to sue to stop it, but was unsuccessful.
Over the course of the 20th century, MWRD would continue to add to our water infrastructure, with new canals, water treatment facilities, and flood remediation efforts. Begun in the 1970s, the Deep Tunnel or TARP project is now coming to fruition, providing additional space for excess water in deeper tunnels and reservoirs in the metropolitan area in order to prevent flooding and combined sewer overflows. Deindustrialization over the past few decades has sparked new questions for the city about what to do with former factory sites along the riverbanks, and environmental groups like Friends of the Chicago River have worked tirelessly to improve water conditions for waterey life and human life alike. The new riverwalk downtown, the boathouses on the north branch near Lane Tech and the south branch near Chinatown are examples of the river’s new place in our collective conscience. But there are sites still forgotten along our waterways, industrial toxins remain, threats of invasive species knock at our door, and communities are at risk of being displaced by rising rents and fancy condos.
So today’s panel is a great opportunity to explore some of these questions, but if you want to read more, or share your own stories, I wanted to point out a couple of websites where you can do so. Chicago River Stories is a page I launched with a couple of fellow students, as our Freshwater lab project. The blog hosts lots of stories, but we’ve also got a Facebook page where you can find news and events. If you’re interested in the Great Lakes more broadly, a team in Canada launched a Great Lakes Commons map to share stories across the watershed. And last but not least, the Freshwater Lab has been building a Freshwater Stories website to critically explore some of our midwest challenges and creative ideas for the future. Just beautiful, so check those out after the panel today, and with that I’ll introduce our panelists.
Speaker Introductions
Representative Theresa Mah, 2nd District of Illinois General Assembly
Representative Theresa Mah represents the 2nd district of Illinois in our state General Assembly, a district which includes Back of the Yards, Bridgeport, Brighton Park, Chinatown, McKinley Park, and Pilsen. Mah taught history and ethnic studies as a college professor for 15 years, before working for groups like the Illinois Coalition on Immigrant and Refugee Rights and the Coalition for a Better Chinese American Community. She worked for former Governor Pat Quinn, before running for office herself, and was elected last fall as the first Asian American to serve in the Illinois House. Welcome Representative Mah!
Commissioner Debra Shore, Cook County Metropolitan Water Reclamation District
Debra Shore was elected to the Board of Commissioners of the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago in 2006, and was re-elected in 2012. A strong advocate for resource recovery and cleaning up the Chicago waterways, she received the Public Officials Award from the Water Environment Federation in 2013. Debra lives with her partner-in-life, Kathleen Gillespie, in Skokie, Illinois. She has climbed 42 of Colorado’s 54 mountains more than 14,000’ high. Welcome Commissioner Shore!
Director Kimberly Wasserman Nieto, Little Village Environmental Justice Organization
Kimberly Wasserman Nieto has been the director of the Little Village Environmental Justice Organization (LVEJO) since 2005, where she previously served for seven years as community organizer. Raised in La Villita, she joined environmental activism in 1998 after her son was afflicted with asthma due to air pollution in the community. LVEJO built a community coalition to draw attention to the Fisk & Crawford coal-fired power plants, and successfully pushed them them to clean up or shut down, which they did in 2012. LVEJO continues their work on many issues, including the toxic Collateral Channel, along the south branch of the river. Welcome Ms. Wasserman Nieto!
Student and Assistant Program Director Edith Tovar, UIC College of Urban Planning & Public Affairs and Latino Cultural Center
Edith Tovar is a staff member here at the Latino Cultural Center, and currently serves as Assistant Program Director. Edith was born and raised in Chicago’s La Villita community and is a first generation grad student, in the College of Urban Planning & Public Affairs, concentrating on Environmental Planning and Policy. She is also an alum of Freshwater Lab course! Her research interests include, cultural planning, Place Lab’s ethical redevelopment, water remediation efforts of the Chicago River, specifically Bubbly Creek in Brighton Park and the Collateral Channel located in Little Village. Welcome Ms. Tovar! Now please help me in welcoming our wonderful panelists!
