HISTORY
ACCORDING TO THE VICTORS
The cable news
networks have a camera station set up inside the capitol building in Washington
D.C. Reporters stand in front of the cameras, microphones in hand, and report
the latest happenings from the House and Senate. In the background stands a
white marble statue of Jacques Marquette, a Jesuit priest, who in 1673,
accompanied by Louis Jolliet, laid eyes upon the mighty Mississippi. The
engraving on the base of the statue reads:
WISCONSIN’S TRIBUTE
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JAMES MARQUETTE
S.J.,
WHO, WITH LOUIS JOLIET
DISCOVERED THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER
AT PRAIRIE DU CHEIN, WIS.
JUNE 17, 1673
Marquette: Oh joy, oh
rapture! Jolliet, look at this magnificent river. Such power, such potential!
Jolliet: Praise be to
God, the creator!
Marquette: [Speaking
to his guide and interpreter, a Sioux known as Many Tongues LeBeau] LeBeau,
ask our native friends if they are familiar with this mighty stream.
LeBeau: [Speaking to Proud
Eagle, a chief of the Menomonee tribe] Chief, the white devil wants to know if
you are ‘familiar’ with the river.
Eagle: Is this white
mans' humor? Are we ‘familiar’? Our people have lived on this river since
time began. Tell him we were here while his ancestors lived in caves and ran
from the giant lizards.
LeBeau: [To
Marquette] He says he’s never before seen these waters.
Marquette: But how
can that be?
LeBeau: There is a
legend of a great flood where only a handful of beasts survived. Native people
stay far away, on the other side of yonder ridge.
Marquette: Did you
hear that, Jolliet? We are the first to stand on this ground.
Jolliet: Praise the
Lord!
Marquette: Ask him
how far—in legend—the river extends.
LeBeau: He wants to
know how far the river runs.
Eagle: It begins upstream
at a lake we call Itaska and extends far down river to where it empties into a
vast open sea. By canoe, a brave would take a hundred suns to reach the sea.
LeBeau: [to Marquette]
He says he has no idea.
Marquette: It appears
to be navigable. Think of the commerce, think of the trade, think of great
cities rising on its banks! Ask him if legend has given this mighty torrent a
name.
LeBeau: What do you
folks call the river?
Eagle: We call it Misi-ziibi.
It means Big River.
LeBeau: Big River?
That’s the best you’ve got?
Eagle: It sounds
better when you say Misi-ziibi.
LeBeau: The chief
says it is called Misi-ziibi, which means ‘Mother of all waters, flowing
swiftly to the heavenly sea’.
Marquette: Oh
rapture! Oh joy! Jolliet, we have discovered the Mississippi. I will call it ‘River
of the Immaculate Conception’.
Jolliet: Halleluiah!
Eagle: These people
are crazy. Why are they so worked up?
LeBeau: They think they
discovered the river.
Eagle: Sheesh… Tell
him there were other white devils, way down river, who were here in the time of
my great great grandfather.
LeBeau: Father
Marquette, the chief congratulates you and your friend, Monsieur Jolliet, on
this grand discovery.
So it is written. So
let it be carved in stone. Back to Wolf Blitzer in the studio…
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