Kankakee: The City the Railroad Built

The name Kankakee comes from a Native word for the river here that settlers approximated, and it stayed even as the people were pushed out. A French Canadian community called Bourbonnais had already put down roots nearby when the Illinois Central Railroad came through in eighteen fifty-three. The railroad builders bypassed Bourbonnais and chose the ground that would become Kankakee for their station.

The railroad's arrival that year created the town, which was founded the following year. The limestone-rich riverbed made quarrying important, and rail connections brought manufacturing. In eighteen sixty-five the city reorganized under a mayor and council and shortened its name to Kankakee.

Today it is one of the largest cities on the Illinois Central line between Chicago and Champaign, carrying the old Native name into the present.