Father Jacques Marquette (June 1, 1635 - May 18, 1675) was a French Jesuit missionary and explorer. The Jesuits assigned him to New France in 1666 as a missionary to the Indigenous peoples of the Americas. He showed great proficiency in learning the local languages. He helped found missions at Sault Ste. Marie (Michigan) and at La Pointe, on Lake Superior (Wisconsin). At La Pointe he encountered members of the Illinois tribes, who told him about the important trading route of the Mississippi River. In 1673, he joined the expedition of Louis Jolliet, a French-Canadian explorer. The Joliet-Marquette expedition traveled to within 435 miles of the Gulf of Mexico but turned back at the mouth of the Arkansas River, for fear of encountering explorers or colonists from Spain. Marquette and his party returned to the Illinois Territory in late 1674, becoming the first Europeans to winter in what would become the city of Chicago. He died in 1675, at the age of 37, suffering from a bout of dysentery.