Little Menominee River Little Menominee River The Little Menominee River is a tributary of the Upper Mississippi River, which it joins in Jo Daviess County, Illinois. The Little Menominee rises in Grant County, Wisconsin. It flows south, to the east of the Menominee River, into Illinois. It crosses the northwestern corner of Illinois for about six miles before joining the Mississippi at the southern end of East Dubuque. The town of Menominee, Illinois is located on the river. The name "Menominee" refers to the Menominee, a Native American people. The name means "good seed" or "wild rice". The river is part of the
Muddy River (Nevada) to the Colorado River and followed it westward. In 1844, the expedition of John C. Frémont discovered a cutoff route that avoided the Colorado River, following a route between Resting Springs in California, and the Virgin River Valley that passed through Las Vegas Springs and crossed the Muddy River near modern Glendale. Mormon pioneers blazed a wagon road from Salt Lake City to Los Angeles along this pack trail in 1847, followed by Forty-niners attempting avoid the winter snows of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and wagon trains of Mormon colonists on their way to settle in San Bernardino in 1852.