1661-1706

French-Canadian naval captain and discoverer who led explorations of the southeastern United States. Born to a wealthy fur trader in Montreal, Quebec, Iberville spent a good deal of his youth at sea on his father's ship. As an adult, he joined French expeditions that captured English-held Hudson's Bay Company posts in James Bay. His military career eventually took him to the Gulf Coast where he established forts in what are now the states of Mississippi and Louisiana. He died while attacking the English on the islands of the West Indies.