1637-1675

French Jesuit missionary who accompanied French-Canadian explorer Louis Jolliet on the first voyage down the Mississippi River. In 1673, The two men traveled far enough to determine that the river emptied into the Gulf of Mexico, rather than west into the Pacific as had been proposed. Marquette's primary calling was as a missionary, however. He established two missions at Sault Ste. Marie and St. Ignace in what is now the Upper Peninsula of Michigan in 1668 and 1671, respectively. A year after the Mississippi voyage, Marquette set out for Illinois to set up another mission, but died en route where the river now known as Pere Marquette flows into Lake Michigan.