Marquette Mission Park

In the side garden at Marquette Mission Park, interesting interpretive panels tell about the peoples who came together near Father Marquette's Jesuit mission at the Straits in the 1600s: Huron and Odawa refugees from the east, native Ojibwa, French voyageurs and fur traders.

The Museum of Ojibwa Culture may occupy the very site of Marquette's Jesuit mission (1671-1701). Significant archaeological digs have occurred here. In this vicinity were villages of Huron and Odawa people, driven from their homes in southern Ontario in the 1640s by the hostile, expansionistic Iroquois.

There's enough good reading on the outdoor interpretive panels here to fill you in about many aspects of the rich history of peoples at the Straits. This might best be done in the cool of the morning or evening. Park benches let visitors rest in the shade. Displays are in two areas: back by the Ojibwa tipi and Huron longhouse, and on the museum/church's south side at Marquette Mission Park.

The longhouse, two stories high, has a stone fire pit with a pole tripod in the center. Smoke went out a slit.The interior bracing system is interesting. Amenities included benches along the walls, pleasantly scented cedar boughs, and woven floor matting to keep dirt down. The first Huron village here consisted of perhaps ten such longhouses, each the home of a grandmother and her husband, plus her daughters and their husbands and their children. Corn, beans, and squash were their main crops.

A fountain is the centerpiece of a pleasant, tucked-away park commemorating Father Marquette. In 1877 a gardener discovered a limestone foundation here, and soon "all concerned came to the conclusion that the [long-lost] chapel and grave of Father Marquette had indeed been found." So states "A Suitable Monument Is Erected," one panel on the hexagonal kiosk near the fountain.

The "Black Robes of the Wilderness" panel explains how Jesuits (unlike, for instance, early Puritan settlers in Massachusetts) "believed that native peoples already believed in the Creator, and that native cultures were inherently good. They also believed these people would benefit by Christian teaching."

"Priest, Missionary, Explorer" puts Father Jacques Marquette in context. Other Jesuits had already been active in New France by the time he came to Quebec in 1666 to study native languages, at the age of 29. First he was assigned to begin a mission for the Ojibwa at Sault Ste Marie in 1668. Then he moved to the existing La Pointe mission in the Apostle Islands on Chequamagon Bay. In 1671 he started the mission to the Hurons here.
Marquette's skills in languages and cartography, and his interest in exploring, may have led his boss, Father Claude Dablon, head of missionaries on the Upper Great Lakes, to suggest to Louis Jolliet that he take Marquette on his expedition to discover the great river west of the Great Lakes. (Jolliet was a fur trader good at navigation and map-making.) Jean Talon, a high official of New France, developed the trip to establish French dominance in the interior before the English extended their influence from Hudson Bay southward.

After he reached the Mississippi, Marquette wanted to return on his own and establish a mission among the Illinois Indians. He did go back. But his health, not good at the outset, became worse. He died on Lake Michigan, probably near the site of today's Ludington, and was buried. Two years later, Christian Odawa found Marquette's bones - at least, they thought the bones were his - and reburied them under the chapel floor at the St. Ignace mission.

"A Gathering Place" is the panel that gives a good overview of the changes taking place in the mid 1600s. The well-written panel states, "Hundreds of Huron and Odawa fled their Ontario homeland after their defeat by the Iroquoois in 1649. They retreated through the Straits to Green Bay, then to Chequamegon Bay [near today's Ashland, Wisconsin], where they met Father Marquette. By 1671 hostilities had developed with neighboring Lakota and they fled again to the Straits. A chapel was built at the head of the protected bay [right here, on Moran Bay], and the Huron and Odawa each constructed palisaded villages directly to the north.

"The village and mission continued here for 30 years, the Huron becoming principal players in the fur trade. In 1701 Commandant Cadillac moved the French fort to Detroit and convinced most of the Huron to go with him. The Jesuits maintained a presence among the Odawa, who remained in the St. Ignace area, probably until Fort Michilimackinac was built across the Straits in 1714."

The park is next to the Museum of Ojibwa Culture at 500 N. State/Bus. I-75, at the north end of downtown St. Ignace. No admission fee. Open year-round. Wheelchair-accessible.

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