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So, the fact of the matter is that DuSable was a black man who originally came from Haiti. And he came to the United States as a free man, while slavery was still rampant, and racial stereotypes were common. One can only imagine how difficult it would be for a black man with a foreign accent to get a decent education. But DuSable was a curious and keen observer.
And he saw that the stinky onion fields that would become today's Chicago were at the crossroads of culture and commerce. So, he settled down and built a farm where nobody wanted to live, not even the local Natives. But Jean-Baptiste Pointe DuSable saw that goods and commodities were shipped through the area from the Caribbean to Canada and back.
Coffee, sugar and rum made their way up north, while animal furs and cod traveled back south. The mouth of the Chicago River at Lake Michigan was a strategic point between the Great Lakes and the Mississippi. So, building a trading post right there was a smart move.
Etzer Cantave calls it 'the triangular commerce between Canada, the Caribbean, and Europe'. And DuSable's homestead and trading post was located at the heart of that international triangle. No wonder Carl Sandburg would end up calling the city built right at that spot the 'crossroads of the nation'.
Everything was shipped through the area. Everybody stopped by. And doesn't that sound like today's Chicago?

Anyway, one thing you could not expect or take for granted, if you ran into Jean-Baptiste Baptiste Pointe DuSable at the mouth of the Chicago River, is to hear English. People spoke several languages, and the predominant European language in the Great Lakes region was actually French. Mix that with DuSable's likely practice of Creole and of several local indigenous languages, and you get a colorful mosaic of wonderful sounds and accents.

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from Let's talk about it, anywhere in the world # 1: Etzer Cantave about Jean​-​Baptiste Pointe DuSable, released December 30, 2021

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Radio Aula Mundi Chicago, Illinois

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