AMERICAN INDIAN ARCHAEOLOGY OF VERNON COUNTY, WISCONSIN

Jim Theler, Ph.D.

Department of Sociology and Archaeology      

University of Wisconsin-La Crosse

La Crosse, WI 54601

E-Mail: theler.jame@uwlax.edu  Phone: 608-785-6780

 

 

The hill country of western Wisconsin is extremely rich in the remains left behind by American Indian peoples who lived in the region for thousands of years before European arrival. Vernon County has the greatest number of archaeological sites of any county in Wisconsin, with 1445  sites recorded so far, 91 of them in Harmony Township. Importantly, the Harmony Township sites include the Tollackson Mound Group and the Cade Archaeological District (which has two mound groups). These two districts have the distinction of being placed on the National Register of Historic Places. Among other archaeological treasures, they have beautifully preserved animal-shaped effigy mounds. Like other ancient burials in Wisconsin, these mounds are protected by state law.

 

Vernon County has been of interest to archaeologists since the 1850s, when Wisconsin's first scientist, Increase A. Lapham, recorded mounds there. Additional work was undertaken by the Smithsonian Institution and the Northwest Archaeological Survey in the 1880s, the Milwaukee Public Museum in the 1930s, the State Historical Society of Wisconsin in the 1960s, and the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse since the 1980s.

 

An Outline of Vernon County's Ancient Past

A succession of ancient peoples who once occupied what is now Vernon County can be traced through the artifacts they left behind. The distinct styles of spear or arrow points, decorations on broken pottery vessels, and the shapes of burial mounds have been used to classify and order the remains left by humans in the past, with the aid of an accurate method for determining age, called radiocarbon dating. Archaeologists do not know what these ancient peoples called themselves, and have given names to distinct groups of artifact styles that persisted for long periods of time. In general, archaeologists divide the succession of Native American human cultures in western Wisconsin into four broad divisions based on their life-ways and artifacts. These divisions are Paleoindian, Archaic, Woodland, and Oneota.

 

Paleoindians: 13,500-10,000 years before present

The first people known to live in western Wisconsin are called the Paleoindians, and they arrived in the region some 13,500 years ago. These people were specialized big-game hunters who made beautifully fashioned stone spear tips called fluted points. These hunters pursued and killed large, Ice Age animals, or megafauna, that are now extinct--especially mammoths and mastodons, relatives of modern elephants. Paleoindian fluted points have been found in Vernon County, and a mastodon kill site has been identified in nearby Richland County close to the town of Boaz.    

 

The Archaic Peoples: 10,000-2,500 years before present

Archaic cultures developed out of Paleoindians following the Ice Age. The Archaic spans a long period of time that archaeologists often subdivide based on the shape of stone spear and knife points found in radiocarbon-dated levels at living sites. Archaic peoples did not make pottery vessels, build burial mounds, or practice agriculture. During the Archaic the human imprint on the landscape was light. Based on artifacts and living debris recovered at open air and winter rock shelter living sites in Vernon County, there are two peaks in human population, one about 6,000 years ago and a second at about 3,500 years ago.

 

Archaeologists know that by about 7,000 years ago, Archaic people followed an annual schedule to position themselves to hunt animals and gather wild plants at the best locations and times of the year. Cool-season living sites were in protected locations, including the rock shelters that abound in Vernon County, where the principle food animal was the white-tailed deer. Elk, black bear, and a wide range of small animals were harvested, but deer were overwhelmingly preferred. The animals= size, quality of meat, and skin for clothing made the white-tailed deer the perfect package and the primary target for hunters. Archaic levels at some rock shelters excavated in western Wisconsin contained thousands of animal bones. One shelter produced remains from more than 200 individual deer. Warm season camps were generally along rivers where a variety of plants and animals could be taken.    

    

The Woodland Peoples: 2,500-900 years before present

Archaeologists have divided the Woodland cultures based on evolving technology and life-ways. Three characteristics are commonly used to distinguish Woodland peoples from their predecessors. The first is the manufacture of pottery vessels or pots for cooking and storing food. Pottery vessels were first made in western Wisconsin about 2,500 years ago. This innovation marked the beginning of the Woodland period and became commonplace after 2,000 years ago. Archaeologists use distinctive decoration often found on broken pottery shards, together with manufacturing techniques and radiocarbon dating, to help identify divisions during the Woodland period.    

 

About 2,000 years ago, Woodland peoples began building large, cone-shaped mounds along the Mississippi River in western Wisconsin. Some of these mounds were excavated in the 1880s to1930s and were found to contain artifacts as well as remains of the dead. Many of the artifacts were made of exotic raw materials, such as copper from northern Wisconsin, Michigan, or Minnesota, and volcanic glass called obsidian that has been traced to Yellowstone Park in Wyoming. This mode of burial with exotic artifacts under large conical mounds marks the middle of Woodland and is often called Hopewell after a similar find in Ohio.  

 

The beginning of the final Woodland era about 1,250 years ago was marked by a number of regional innovations, including the first widespread use of the bow and arrow, new and better types of pottery vessels, and most dramatically, the construction of the effigy-shaped mounds that dot all of southwestern Wisconsin. These effigy mounds contain human burials and are sacred cemeteries to the Woodland peoples= Ho-Chunk descendants. The mounds are commonly in the shape of various animals, often bears or birds, and archaeologists believe that they represent clans and mark clan territories as well as serving as burial places.

 

Harmony Township lies in the heart of the Effigy Mound Culture, as it is often called. In 1884-85 Theodore Lewis of the Northwestern Archaeological Survey conducted a mound survey in portions of Vernon County, focusing on the North and South Forks of the Bad Axe River. Lewis recorded an astonishing 176 mounds in 29 distinct groups in the county. One effigy mound group Lewis mapped in 1884 was relocated by Ms. Chris Hall in 1993 after being lost for over a century. This group includes 14 effigy mounds of the Tollackson Group in Harmony Township, now listed on the National Register of Historic Places and preserved by The Archaeological Conservancy. This mound group is located less than 2 miles north of Dairyland Power's preferred location for the ash landfill. We know that many mounds in Harmony Township were not surveyed by Lewis. For example, two previously unreported effigy mound groups were located and reported by Mr. Loren Cade, and are now part of the National Register-listed Cade Archaeological District. This district is less than two miles northeast of Dairyland's second choice for the proposed ash landfill.

 

About 950 years ago mound construction stopped and Effigy Mound people seem to have abandoned most if not all of the interior hill country of western Wisconsin. Archaeologists have suggested that human populations in the region became too large to be supported by wild resources. White-tailed deer may have become scarce in the open oak savannas and prairies of western Wisconsin, and the Effigy Mound people might have had too few deer to survive the winters. It is at the end of Effigy Mound time that these people begin to grow corn, suggesting that their needs were no longer met by wild resources. 

 

The Oneota people: 750-400 years before present

The last Indian people to live in western Wisconsin just before and at European contact are known to archaeologists as Oneota. After the abandonment of western Wisconsin at the end of the Effigy Mound Culture, the region was reoccupied by groups (some of whom probably had Effigy Mound people ancestry) influenced by cultures to the south in Illinois. These southern groups had developed field systems of corn agriculture. About 750 years ago, the Oneota people began farming the terraces along the Mississippi River from Stoddard in Vernon County up to Red Wing, Minnesota. These people lived in large summer villages adjacent to their fields. In addition to growing corn, beans, and squash they harvested many aquatic resources of the Mississippi River and its backwaters.