Mississippi River

primary river of the largest drainage basin in the United States

32 dated entries naming Mississippi River, drawn from 29 separate years between 1541 CE and 1993 CE. Nothing here is written by us: each line is the sentence a Wikipedia year article used, and the link beside it opens the exact revision.

JSON Wikipedia article Wikidata Q1497

16th century

1541May 8 – Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto reaches the Mississippi River, naming it the Rio de Espiritu Santo ("River of the Holy Spirit").source
1543March 7 – Massive flooding of the Mississippi River and the Arkansas River begins in southeastern North America over a 40 day period while Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto and his team are passing through. The event is noted by the chronicler of the DeSoto Expedition, Inca Garcilaso de la Vega.source

17th century

1673June 17 – French explorers Father Jacques Marquette and Louis Joliet reach the headwaters of the Mississippi River, and descend to Arkansas.source
1673May 17 – In America, trader Louis Joliet and Jesuit missionary-explorer Jacques Marquette begin exploring the Mississippi River and the Great Lakes.source
1679December 3 – French explorers René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle (commonly called "La Salle") and Henri de Tonti set off from their fort near Niagara Falls in North America on the first European expedition to explore the upper Mississippi River.source
1682April 7 – René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, exploring rivers in America, reaches the mouth of the Mississippi River.source
1682April 9 – At the mouth of the Mississippi River, near modern Venice, Louisiana, Robert de La Salle buries an engraved plate and a cross, claiming the territory as La Louisiane for France.source
1684July 24 – René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle sails again from France, with a large expedition designed to establish a French colony on the Gulf of Mexico, at the mouth of the Mississippi River.source
1685February 20 – René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, intending to establish a colony near the mouth of the Mississippi River, lands with 200 surviving colonists at Matagorda Bay on the Texas coast, believing the Mississippi to be near. He establishes Fort St. Louis.source
1687March 19 – The men under explorer Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle mutiny, while searching for the mouth of the Mississippi River. Pierre Duhaut murders La Salle, near what is now Navasota, Texas.source
1699May 1 – Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville founds the first European settlement in the Mississippi River Valley, at Fort Maurepas (Ocean Springs, Mississippi).source

18th century

1716August 3 – Natchez, one of the oldest towns on the Mississippi River, is founded by French civilians at the site of Fort Rosalie.source
1764March 20 – After the British victory in the French and Indian War, the first post-war British expedition to explore the newly acquired territories east of the Mississippi River comes under attack by Tunica warriors. The 340 British Army men, under the command of Major Arthur Loftus, were at a spot south of Natchez, Mississippi and were forced to flee in their boats back toward the port of New Orleans while under fire from an unknown number of Tunicas firing from both banks.source
1767March 14 – Antonio de Ulloa, the Colonial Governor of Spanish Louisiana (Luisiana), dispatches Captain Francisco Ríu y Morales up the Mississippi River to establish two forts, one at San Luis (now St. Louis, Missouri) and to set up a colony for displaced French-speaking Acadians and protect shipping on the river.source
1774June 22 – The Parliament of Great Britain passes the Quebec Act, setting out rules of governance for the colony of Quebec in British North America, enlarging its territory as far south as the Ohio River and west to the Mississippi River, in the area now occupied by the U.S. states of Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Ohio and granting freedom of religion for Roman Catholics.source

19th century

1802October 16 – The port of New Orleans and the lower Mississippi River are closed to American traffic by order of the city's Spanish administrator, Juan Ventura Morales, threatening the economy in the western United States, and prompting the need for the Louisiana Purchase.source
1838July full date unknown – Bass Reeves, one of the first black Deputy U.S. Marshals west of the Mississippi River (d. 1910)source
1839February 11 – The University of Missouri is established, becoming the first public university west of the Mississippi River.source
1843Saint Louis University School of Law becomes the first law school west of the Mississippi River.source
1844June 12 –In the United States, after nine days of heavy rains, the Missouri River and the Mississippi River overflow their banks as the Great Flood of 1844 begins. The water begins to recede by June 28 and the rivers return to their normal level by mid-July.source
1849May 3 – The Mississippi River levee at Sauvé's Crevasse breaks, flooding much of New Orleans.source
1854June – The Grand Excursion takes prominent Eastern United States inhabitants from Chicago to Rock Island, Illinois, by railroad, then up the Mississippi River to Saint Paul, Minnesota, by steamboat.source
1855January 23 – The first bridge over the Mississippi River opens in modern-day Minneapolis, a predecessor of the Father Louis Hennepin Bridge.source
1861August 10 – American Civil War: The first major battle west of the Mississippi River, the Battle of Wilson's Creek, is fought, with a Confederate victory.source
1862August 5 – Battle of Baton Rouge – Along the Mississippi River near Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Confederate troops drive Union forces back into the city.source
1862August 6 – Confederate ironclad is scuttled on the Mississippi River after suffering damage in a battle with , near Baton Rouge, Louisiana.source
1865April 27 – The steamboat Sultana, carrying 2,300 passengers, explodes and sinks in the Mississippi River, killing 1,800, mostly Union survivors of the Andersonville Prison.source
1881September 12 – Francis Howell High School (Howell Institute) in St. Charles, Missouri, and Stephen F. Austin High School in Austin, Texas, open on the same day, putting them in a tie for the title of the oldest public high school west of the Mississippi River.source

20th century

1910January 12 – Bass Reeves, one of the first African-American Deputy U.S. Marshals west of the Mississippi River (b. 1838)source
1925May 8 – African-American Tom Lee rescues 32 people from the sinking steamboat M.E. Norman on the Mississippi River.source
1976October 20 – The Mississippi River ferry MV George Prince is struck by a ship while crossing from Destrehan, Louisiana to Luling, Louisiana, killing 78 passengers and crew.source
1993April–October – Great Flood of 1993: The Mississippi and Missouri Rivers flood large portions of the American Midwest.source