Ste. Genevieve

In the late 1600s and early 1700s, the French established forts, such as Fort de Chartres, in the mid—Mississippi Valley, as well as villages, such as River des Peres and Mine la Motte. Ste. Genevieve was founded in the late 1740s when French Canadians settled on the rich soil of the floodplain. They built homes, cultivated crops (including corn and cotton), and mined the rich veins of lead and the bluffs for stone. The great flood of 1785, referred to by early residents as l'année des gran...