On July 12, 1834, Louis Hooker, a son of Samuel Hooker, was aboard the schooner Illinois from Sackets Harbor when it was the first commercial ship to enter Chicago harbor, a sign of what was soon to be greatly increased Great Lakes trade with that city and region.Lloyd Lewis and Henry Justin Smith, Chicago: The History of Its Reputation, Chicago: 1929;, Kessinger Publishing, LLC, reprint 2009, p. 29, accessed August 20, 2010 Samuel F. Hooker and his sons had shipping interests in Sackets Harbor with national networks; their firm had steamboats based in Louisville, Kentucky. These were part of the Mississippi River trade to and from New Orleans, a major port and one of the wealthiest cities in the nation before the American Civil War. Thus Hooker and similar upstate New York businessmen gained some of their wealth from the domestic slave trade, as Louisville was a major shipping point for slaves sold to New Orleans markets and the Deep South.
On July 12, 1834, Louis Hooker, a son of Samuel Hooker, was aboard the schooner Illinois from Sackets Harbor when it was the first commercial ship to enter Chicago harbor, a sign of what was soon to be greatly increased Great Lakes trade with that city and region.Lloyd Lewis and Henry Justin Smith, Chicago: The History of Its Reputation, Chicago: 1929;, Kessinger Publishing, LLC, reprint 2009, p. 29, accessed August 20, 2010 Samuel F. Hooker and his sons had shipping interests! in Sackets Harbor with national networks; their firm had steamboats based in Louisville, Kentucky. These were part of the Mississippi River trade to and from New Orleans, a major port .and one of the wealthiest cities in the nation before the American Civil War. Thus Hooker and similar upstate New York businessmen gained some of their wealth from the domestic slave trade, as Louisville was a major shipping point for slaves sold to New Orleans markets and the Deep South.