” Kaskaskia, IL USDA Loan”

Kaskaskia is a village in Randolph County, Illinois. Having been inhabited by indigenous peoples, it was settled by France as part of the Illinois Country. It was named for the Kaskaskia people. Its population peaked at about 7,000 in the 18th century, when it was a regional center. During the American Revolutionary War, the town, which by then had become an administrative center for the British Province of Quebec, was taken by the Virginia militia during the Illinois campaign. It was designated as the county seat of Illinois County, Virginia, after which it became part of the Northwest Territory in 1787. Kaskaskia was later named as the capital of the United States’ Illinois Territory, created on February 3, 1809. In 1818, when Illinois became the 21st U.S. state, the town briefly served as the state’s first capital until 1819, when the capital was moved to more centrally located Vandalia.

Most of the town was destroyed in April 1881 by flooding, as the Mississippi River shifted eastward to a new channel, taking over the lower 10 mi (16 km) of the Kaskaskia River. This resulted from deforestation of the river banks during the 19th century, due to crews taking wood for fuel to feed the steamboat and railroad traffic. The river now passes east rather than west of the town. The state boundary line, however, remained in its original location. A small bridge crosses the old riverbed, now a creek that is sometimes filled with water during flood season.

In the 2020 United States Census the population was 21, making it the third-least populous incorporated community in Illinois behind Valley City (pop. 14) and Florence (pop. 17). Kaskaskia has an Illinois telephone area code (618) and a Missouri ZIP Code (63673). Its roads are maintained by Illinois Department of Transportation, and its few residents vote in Illinois elections. The town was evacuated in the Great Flood of 1993, which covered it with water more than 9 ft (3 m) deep.

The site of Kaskaskia near the Mississippi River was long inhabited by varying Native American indigenous peoples for thousands of years. The Kaskaskia, part of the Illiniwek peoples, colonized this area in the 1600s, and lived there at the time of European encounter and traded with the early French colonists. Historically this name was referred to with many spelling variations, as Kasklas, Kaskasky, Cas-caskias, Kasquskias, and Kaskaskias.

During the Beaver Wars, Kaskaskia grew as people sought common defense against Iroquois raids. The numbers swelled to around twenty thousand people by the 1680s. Kaskaskia aligned with the French to aid in defense against the Iroquois. The French also gave them trade goods, which Kaskaskia merchants used to trade with nations too far South or West for French traders to reach. Kaskaskia became heavily involved in the slave trade, capturing and selling people from neighboring nations.