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Western Great Lakes: Illinois, Minnesota, Wisconsin

The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 established U.S. control over territory west of Pennsylvania and northwest of the Ohio River. The states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota were eventually created from this territory.

colonies rose up against, and defeated, the British in the Revolutionary War. The Treaty of Paris officially ended the war in 1783. In the treaty, Britain ceded the territory north of the Ohio River and west of the Appalachian Mountains to the newly independent United States. Four years later, the region was organized as the Northwest Territory. It included today’s Illinois, along with all of Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, and Wisconsin, as well as part of Minnesota. Congress decided that new states would be created from the Northwest Territory. They would be admitted to the Union after certain conditions were met. The population of an area first had to reach 5,000 for a new ter- ritory to be created. When its popula- tion had grown much larger and it had

created an acceptable constitution, the territory could apply for state- hood. Illinois Territory was created in 1809. It included all of today’s Illinois,