who explored the entire mississippi to the gulf of mexico
René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, or Robert de La Salle (November 22, 1643 – March 19, 1687) was a French explorer. He explored the Great Lakes region of the United States and Canada, the Mississippi River, and the Gulf of Mexico. He claimed the entire Mississippi River basin for France.
Gulf of Mexico The Gulf of Mexico (Spanish: Golfo de MÃ©xico) is an ocean basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean,[1] largely surrounded by the North American continent.[2] It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United States, on the southwest and south by Mexico, and on the southeast by Cuba. The U.S. states of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida border the Gulf on the north, which are often referred to as the "Third Coast" in comparison with the U.S. Atlantic and Pacific coasts, or sometimes the "south coast", in juxtaposition to the Great Lakes region being the "north coast." One of the gulf's seven main areas is the Gulf of Mexico basin.