The city occupies a location near where Jacques Cartier, in a 1535 trip along the St. Lawrence, stopped to plant a cross on Saint-Quentin island.

Together with the regional county municipality of Les Chenaux, it forms the census division (CD) of Francheville (37).

As Sieur Gravé Du Pont sailed upriver toward Montreal, he saw what appeared to be three separate tributaries.

[12] In 1603, while surveying the Saint-Lawrence River, Samuel de Champlain recommended establishing a permanent settlement in the area.

The settlement grew into a village, officially formed on July 4, 1634, by its first governor, Sieur de Laviolette.

Given its strategic location, it played an important role in the colony and in the fur trade with First Nations peoples.

French sovereignty in Trois-Rivières continued until 1760, when the city was captured as part of the British conquest of Canada during the Seven Years' War.

Sixteen years later, on June 8, 1776, it was the theatre of the Battle of Trois-Rivières (part of the ill-fated invasion of the province of Quebec by les Bostonnais, Americans from the Boston area) during the American Revolutionary War who arrived with the goal of weakening the British settlement.

Douglas' college was intended as a boarding school to educate the young sons of officers, amongst others, in Latin, English, French, history, geography, drawing and mathematics.

In the 1960s, Trois-Rivières undertook a large-scale project of economic diversification, including founding several cultural institutions and attractions.

The Laviolette Bridge, linking Trois-Rivières to Bécancour and the south shore of the Saint-Lawrence River, was opened officially on December 20, 1967.

On October 7, 1535, Jacques Cartier planted a cross on the island and proclaimed the sovereignty of France on this territory.

The island belonged at the time to Quebec Savings and Trust Company Limited and the Canada Power and Paper Corporation.

[17] Since then, many facilities have been developed on the island, including a marina, a bike path, an interpretative trail, an ice rink, and camping ground.

The city of Bécancour and the enclaved Indian reservation of Wôlinak are located opposite Trois-Rivières on the South shore of the Saint Lawrence River.

[32] The first port facility was built in 1818 near rue Saint-Antoine, and today handles 2.5 million tonnes of cargo annually.

Trois-Rivières had an industrial decline in the 1980s and 1990s, when several textile mills were closed after owners moved jobs offshore.

[36] Trois-Rivières is attempting an industrial revitalization by establishing technology parks and taking advantage of its central location to both Montreal and Quebec City, its university and port.

An example of the new economy is Marmen Incorporated, which manufactures wind turbine towers and employs 1,000 people between its operations in Trois-Rivières and Matane.

The city's other prominent industries include metal transformation, electronics, thermoplastics, and cabinet making.

The city's main thoroughfare is Boulevard des Forges, an area several blocks long in the heart of the Old Town composed of century-old buildings housing a great variety of cafés, restaurants, clubs, bars, and shops.

In the warmer months, the area is regularly closed to vehicular traffic to accommodate various festivals and events, turning the downtown core into a pedestrian mall.

Notable landmarks include the Forges du Saint-Maurice, a foundry dating back to the 1730s, the Ursulines Monastery, and Notre-Dame-du-Cap Basilica.

In professional ice hockey, the city is host to the ECHL's Trois-Rivières Lions (farm team of the Montreal Canadiens) beginning with the 2021–22 season, and has had several teams in the Ligue Nord-Américaine de Hockey, typically with home games at the Colisée de Trois-Rivières.

In 2014, the hippodrome has resurrected the Prix d'Été, a once major Canadian race for four-year-old pacers that had been contested in Montreal until 1992.

The Laviolette Bridge links Trois-Rivières to Bécancour of the Centre-du-Québec administrative region on the south shore of the Saint Lawrence River.

Known for its impressive structure, its elegant aesthetics, the bridge has become a major landmark of Trois-Rivières and the Mauricie region.

On April 8, 2014, during morning commute an SUV fell into a giant pothole in Trois-Rivières caused by heavy rain accumulation.

[45] The city hosts a major ice-free port on the Saint Lawrence River, handling about 300 ships per annum.