Jean+Baptiste+Point+du+Sable


 * Biography of Jean Baptise Point DuSable **

John Baptise Point DuSable arrived in Chicago Jean Baptise was born 1745 in Saint Dominique, Haiti, to a slave named Suzanna and a French pirate named Point DuSable. When DuSable started school his father sent him to France to learn how to speak English and Spanish. His mother was killed in a raid on Haiti, Jean Baptise escaped by swimming out to his father’s ship. His father sent him to study in a catholic school in France, where he met his friend Jacques Clamorgan, where both traveled from Louisiana to Michigan, where Du Sable married a Potawatomi woman named Kittahawa. Jean Baptise married at 25 but it wasn’t easy, he had to become apart of her tribe by taking the eagle as his tribal symbol. Jean Baptise is the first African American pioneer, who was the first person to discover Chicago as a trading center. In doing so John Baptise operated the first elaborated fur-trading post during the two decades before his departure in 1800. DuSable became Chicago’s first permanent resident along with his wife and son and daughter (Jean & Susanne). His motivation was to survive and provide his wife and children with a satisfying life. During the Revolutionary War, DuSable was imprisoned by the British at Detroit, Michigan as a suspicion of being a U.S. spy. He convinced the British that he was just an African American pioneer settling in Chicago. DuSable is worthy of recognition because he became the first African American pioneer to settle into Chicago and own much property such as: a house, two barns, a horse-drawn mill, a bake house, a poultry house, a dairy and a smokehouse. DuSable’s story taught me that even though you’ve been through some difficult situations since birth doesn’t that is how your life will end up and you not becoming successful in receiving your earnings. Being raised by your maternal parents don’t always mean you will follow into their footsteps. DuSable was raised by a pirate and a slave but he became a pioneer. His father did lead him on by making him study different languages to being able to communicate with different races to own certain properties he desired to own. Not being raised by his maternal parents only effected him in a good way by making him stronger to be able to survive in the world on his own and being able to provide for his family. DuSable’s legacy has lived on by having a famous high school named after him who attendees/graduates such as: Nat King Cole, Dinah Washington, Harold Washington and Redd Fox has taught there. His famous DuSable Museum of African American History on Chicago’s south side was created in his honor also. **__Career Highlights of Jean Baptise Point DuSable__** · The famous harbor and Urban Park created in his honor · John Baptise’s homesite created as a National Historic Landmark

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Baptiste_Pointe_du_Sable http://www.lib.niu.edu/1995/ihy951204.htm http://www.africanamericans.com/JeanBaptistePointduSable.htm http://library.thinkquest.org/CR0215480/dusable.htm