The Origins of Milwaukee Avenue

An old map of Native American trails and villages in the Chicago area.(Chicago History Museum)

Before Milwaukee Avenue became one of Chicago's immigrant, working-class main streets, it was a centuries-old trade route used by the Ottawa, Chippawa, Potawatomi and other Algonquian tribes. In 1833 the Treaty of Chicago forced their removal to west of the Mississippi. Potawatomi Trail of Death

In 1833 when the first plat of Chicago drew the city's grid, it made exceptions for these important diagonal trails that we know today as Milwaukee Avenue, Ogden Street, and parts of Grand Avenue.

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Without Native Americans, Would We Have Chicago As We Know It?

by Jesse Dukes for WBEZ Curious City, Nov. 12, 2017