What is the history of Kankakee County?

What does Kankakee stand for?

Kankakee /kæŋkəˈki/ is a city in and the county seat of Kankakee County, Illinois, United States. The city's name is probably derived from the Miami-Illinois word teeyaahkiki, meaning: "Open country/exposed land/land in open/land exposed to view", in reference to the area's prior status as a marsh. As of 2017, the city's population was 26,216.

Serving successfully in its native state, the hunter, the trapper, the marsh-hay cutter and then the professional sportsman, the modern dredged Kankakee-ditched and drained—had added over half a million acres to the famous drift farming section of the Central Plains.

Rising within a few miles of the St. Joseph River and forming a head-water branch of the Illinois River, the Kankakee with its St. Joseph portage provided a strategic link in the Great Lakes-Mississippi route of early travelers—the French explorers, the traders, and the missionaries.