Living on Potawatomie Land

By Jeff Gahris

As I write this, I am anticipating a public meeting on February 22nd about a proposed American Indian cultural and environmental center at Churchill Woods Forest Preserve. Why does this excite me? Although the Forest Preserve District of DuPage County has prepared and read a land acknowledgment, I find it more meaningful to have descendants of the people who had lived at Churchill in pre-settlement times to have a presence on this special site.

Original people of the Americas lived in northeast Illinois for centuries, including the Illinois, Potawatomi, Odawa, and Ojibwe. Until as late as the 1830s, there was a Potawatomi village at Churchill, the largest in DuPage County. The location was ideal, with a river and other resources nearby, not to mention an important trail – now known as St. Charles Road. For me to truly appreciate a natural area, I must know its history--how it was valued and used by those who came before us.

Currently there is a fundraising effort to restore the historic McKee House. A collaboration of the Village of Glen Ellyn, the Midwest SOARRING Foundation, and the Forest Preserve District of DuPage County has enabled a new nonprofit, Friends of the McKee House, to be established to raise funds. The goal is to have an inter-tribal educational, cultural, and environmental center operating at a site that includes 260 acres of pristine prairie, savannah, and woodland. Such a facility will help teach us how to reconnect to the land from an Indigenous American point of view. For more details see the Website at https://fundthecenter.org/.