Iroquois Finger Lakes region, and upstate New York along the St. Lawrence River area downstream to today's Montreal. French, Dutch and British colonists in both New France (Canada) and the what became the Thirteen Colonies recognized a need to gain favor with the Iroquois people, who occupied a significant portion of lands west of colonial settlements. Their first relations with them were for fur trading, which was favorable and became lucrative to both sides. The colonists also sought to establish positive relations to secure their settlement borders. For nearly 200 years the Iroquois were a powerful factor in North American colonial
Iroquois River (Indiana-Illinois) Iroquois River (Indiana-Illinois) The Iroquois River is a tributary of the Kankakee River in northwestern Indiana and northeastern Illinois in the United States. It was named for the Iroquois people. Via the Kankakee and Illinois rivers, it is part of the watershed of the Mississippi River. The Iroquois River rises in Jasper County, Indiana, and flows generally west-southwestwardly through Newton County, Indiana, and Iroquois County, Illinois, where it turns northward and flows into Kankakee County, Illinois. It enters the Kankakee River from the south in Kankakee County, opposite the village of Aroma Park, about southwest of the city of Kankakee.