Abandoned Shoreline of Lake Michigan Marker

This historical marker serves as a reminder that Lake Michigan's shoreline extended much further west until glacial changes eight to fourteen thousand years ago made what was once underwater into marshy lands along the shore. After the glaciers melted but before Chicago matured into a sizable metropolis, the area was an expansive swampy visited by Native Americans but not used as a year-round home. The swampiness spoke to the area's geological history, notably that much of the modern city once within what is today's Lake Michigan.

About 14,000 years ago, a Wisconsinan glacier began its ice-age retreat from modern-day northeast Illinois, leaving "Lake Chicago" in its wake (as Geologists refer to the body of water before it settled into its present-day Lake Michigan location). Indeed, today's Chicago once sat completely underwater. The glacier shrank in stages, with each stage leaving behind sandy beach ridges. Roughly 8,000 years ago, the shoreline sat in modern-day Lincoln Park east of modern-day Clark Street. The historical marker in Lincoln Park, entitled Abandoned Shoreline of Lake Michigan, notes that ancient western extension. 

The marker does more than note the area's geological history; it speaks to the history of Chicago itself. The retreating shoreline left an area abounding in swampland, rivers, and creeks used by Native Americans and later European and American trappers. As the United States began beginning canals in the early- and mid-twentieth century in an attempt to connect the eastern seaboard with a nation expanding westward, speculators began looking at the Fort Dearborn location (modern-day Chicago) as a good place to invest. It became necessary to turn the swampland into a usable location for both farming and industry. In addition to an abundance of wooden structures that followed, builders installed a network of wooden sidewalks that helped people avoid the swampy land beneath. By 1871, the number of wooden buildings and wooden walkways allowed a once-swampy environment to burn in what became The Great Chicago Fire. After the fire, a host of modern architects arrived to rebuild the city, leading to the birth of skyscrapers (The Chicago School); Chicago grew into one of the world's largest cities with nary a reminder of the swamp that once existed in its place. 

Today, people can traverse Clark Street, which sits atop the ridge that once rose above the nearby Lake Michigan (Lake Chicago) shoreline nearly 8,000 years ago. Lake Michigan to its east serves as a reminder of its ancient past, while the massive skyline to the west points to the area's transformation from swamp to concrete, glass, and steel. But, it's a never-ending battle between the engineers that have built the city and mother nature — Lake Michigan is not done changing its shape and size, and global climate change is making the battle tougher each day.

Brosnan, Kathleen A., Ann Durkin Keating, and William C. Barnett, eds. City of Lake and Prairie: Chicago's Environmental History. University of Pittsburgh Press, 2020.

Cronon, William. Nature's Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1991. 

Egan, Dan. The climate crisis haunts Chicago’s future. A Battle Between a Great City and a Great Lake. New York Times. July 7, 2021. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/07/07/climate/chicago-river-lake-michigan.html.

Farrand, William R. "The Glacial Lakes around Michigan." Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, Geological Survey Division: Bulletin 4. 1988. https://www.michigan.gov/-/media/Project/Websites/egle/Documents/Programs/OGMD/Catalog/03/GIMDL-BU04.PDF?rev=6ac620c532204df2b15406f595bffdf5.

Gale, Neil. "The History of Ancient Lake Chicago and Today's Lake Michigan." The Digital Research Library of Illinois History Journal. June 16, 2018. https://drloihjournal.blogspot.com/2018/06/the-history-of-lake-chicago-todays-lake-michigan.html. 

"Illinois Historical Markers: Abandoned Shoreline of Lake Michigan marker - Lincoln Park, Chicago, IL." Waymarking.com. Accessed August 15, 2023. https://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/wm9BC8_Abandoned_Shoreline_of_Lake_Michigan_marker_Lincoln_Park_Chicago_IL.

"It Began Along the Lake." LakeView Historical Chronicles. June 15, 2015. https://www.lakeviewhistoricalchronicles.org/2015/06/researcher-sources.html.

Swackhamer, Barry. "Abandoned Shoreline of Lake Michigan." The Historical Marker Database. January 30, 2023. https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=47816.