page_title: Joliet, Illinois
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Joliet, Illinois / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Joliet Veteran's Memorial Bicentennial Park
context_page_description: Joliet is a city in Will and Kendall Counties in the U.S. state of Illinois, 30 miles southwest of Chicago. It is the county seat of Will County and a major part of the southwest Chicago metropolitan area. At the 2010 census, the city was the fourth-largest in Illinois, with a population of 147,433. A population estimate in 2019 put Joliet's population at 147,344, which would make it the third-largest city in Illinois if accurate.
context_section_description: In 1673, Louis Jolliet, along with Father Jacques Marquette, paddled up the Des Plaines River and camped on a huge mound, a few miles south of present-day Joliet. Maps from Jolliet's exploration of the area placed a large hill or mound on what is now the southwest corner of the city, since no point is farther southwest. That hill was named Mound Jolliet. The spot was mined by early settlers and is now a depression.
  In 1833, following the Black Hawk War, Charles Reed built a cabin along the west side of the Des Plaines River. Across the river in 1834, James B. Campbell, treasurer of the canal commissioners, laid out the village of "Juliet", named after his daughter.  Just before the economic depression of 1837, Juliet incorporated as a village, but to cut tax expenses, Juliet residents soon petitioned the state to rescind that incorporation. In 1845, local residents changed the community's name from "Juliet" to "Joliet". Joliet was reincorporated as a city in 1852. Cornelius Covenhoven Van Horne was active in getting the city its first charter, and because of this, he was elected Joliet's first mayor. When the city later built a new bridge, it was named the Van Horne Bridge.
caption: Joliet Veteran's Memorial Bicentennial Park
exif: {"Image Make": "EASTMAN KODAK COMPANY", "Image Model": "KODAK EASYSHARE C315 DIGITAL CAMERA", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image Software": "Version 1.0000", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "2232", "Image Padding": "[]", "EXIF ExposureTime": "371/200000", "EXIF FNumber": "9/2", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "100", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2008:08:24 03:09:14", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2008:08:24 03:09:14", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "16/5", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "907/100", "EXIF ApertureValue": "433/100", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "433/100", "EXIF MeteringMode": "CenterWeightedAverage", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, auto mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "6", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2576", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1932", "EXIF ExposureIndex": "100", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "0", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "36", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "None", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "0", "EXIF Padding": "[]", "EXIF OffsetSchema": "4168"}