This marker sits right in the middle of what was once Fort Duquesne, the French attempt to hold a vast inland empire that the British coveted. The British attempts to dislodge the French began a world war unprecedented in its scale; we call it the French and Indian War, but in other parts of the world it’s known as the Seven Years’ War. The marker shows the plan of the fort and the French names of the rivers; note that the French, logically enough, considered the Allegheny a part of the Ohio, and the Monongahela a tributary. Had the outcome of the war been different, not only would Pittsburghers—or rather Duquesnois—speak French, but we would have only two rivers.
