Meskwaki - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

"Outagamie" redirects here. For the Wisconsin county, see Outagamie County, Wisconsin
Outagamie County, Wisconsin
Outagamie is a county in the northeast region of the U.S. state of Wisconsin. Its county seat is Appleton. As of the 2009 census estimate, its population was 177,155....

.

The Meskwaki (sometimes spelled Mesquakie or Meskwahki) are a Native American

Native Americans in the United States

Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...

people often known to outsiders as the Fox tribe. They have often been closely linked to the Sauk people. In their own language, the Meskwaki call themselves Meshkwahkihaki, which means "the Red-Earths." Historically their homelands were in the Great Lakes

Great Lakes

The Great Lakes are a collection of freshwater lakes located in northeastern North America, on the Canada – United States border. Consisting of Lakes Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, and Ontario, they form the largest group of freshwater lakes on Earth by total surface, coming in second by volume...

region. The tribe coalesced in the St. Lawrence River Valley in Ontario

Ontario

Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....

; it later moved to Michigan

Michigan

Michigan is a U.S. state located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word mishigamaa, meaning "large water" or "large lake"....

, Wisconsin, Illinois, and Iowa.
In the 19th century, Euro-American colonization and settlement proceeded, forcing resettlement of the people south into the tall grass prairie in the American Midwest. The Meskwaki, within the designation 'Sac and Fox,' currently have reservations in Iowa, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska.

Etymology and language

The name is derived from the Meskwaki creation myth, in which their culture hero

Culture hero

A culture hero is a mythological hero specific to some group who changes the world through invention or discovery...

, Wisaka, created the first humans out of red clay. The name Fox originated from a French mistake of applying a clan

Clan

A clan is a group of people united by actual or perceived kinship and descent. Even if lineage details are unknown, clan members may be organized around a founding member or apical ancestor. The kinship-based bonds may be symbolical, whereby the clan shares a "stipulated" common ancestor that is a...

'fox' name to the entire tribe. Anglo-Americans, including the United States government, adopted the French term Renards (the Foxes) into English.

Meskwaki are of Algonquian

Algonquian peoples

The Algonquian are one of the most populous and widespread North American native language groups, with tribes originally numbering in the hundreds. Today hundreds of thousands of individuals identify with various Algonquian peoples...

origin from the prehistoric Woodland period

Woodland period

The Woodland period of North American pre-Columbian cultures was from roughly 1000 BCE to 1000 CE in the eastern part of North America. The term "Woodland Period" was introduced in the 1930s as a generic header for prehistoric sites falling between the Archaic hunter-gatherers and the...

culture area. The Meskwaki language is a dialect of the language spoken by the Sauk and Kickapoo, within the Algonquian languages family

Algonquian languages

The Algonquian languages also Algonkian) are a subfamily of Native American languages which includes most of the languages in the Algic language family. The name of the Algonquian language family is distinguished from the orthographically similar Algonquin dialect of the Ojibwe language, which is a...

.

Meskwaki and Sauk are two distinct tribal groups. Linguistic and cultural linkages between the two tribes have made them often associated in history. Under US government recognition treaties, officials treat the Sac (anglicized Sauk term) and Meskwaki as a single political unit, despite their distinct identities.

History

According to archeologists, about ten thousand years ago, peoples from the Eurasian landmass migrated to modern-day North America via the Bering Strait land bridge. Approximately seven thousand years ago, groups of these earlier migrants reached and settled in what is now known as Ontario

Ontario

, in Central Canada

Central Canada

Central Canada is a region consisting of Canada's two largest and most populous provinces: Ontario and Quebec. Due to their high populations, Ontario and Quebec have traditionally held a significant amount of political power in Canada, leading to some amount of resentment from other regions of the...

. Around the turn of the 1st century, the "Great Drought" took place. The lands which the ancestors of the Meskwaki inhabited did not receive enough rain to sustain their population, and the group lost about 98% of its members.

Great Lakes region

The Meskwaki lived along the Saint Lawrence River

Saint Lawrence River

The Saint Lawrence is a large river flowing approximately from southwest to northeast in the middle latitudes of North America, connecting the Great Lakes with the Atlantic Ocean. It is the primary drainage conveyor of the Great Lakes Basin...

in present day Ontario, east of Michigan. The tribe may have numbered as many as 10,000, but years of war with the Huron, whom the French colonial agents supplied with arms, and exposure to European infectious disease

Infectious disease

Infectious diseases, also known as communicable diseases, contagious diseases or transmissible diseases comprise clinically evident illness resulting from the infection, presence and growth of pathogenic biological agents in an individual host organism...

s reduced their numbers. In response to these pressures, the Meskwaki migrated west, first to the area between Saginaw Bay

Saginaw Bay

Saginaw Bay is a bay within Lake Huron located on the eastern side of the U.S. state of Michigan. It forms the space between Michigan's Thumb region and the rest of the Lower Peninsula of Michigan. Saginaw Bay is in area...

and Detroit west of Lake Huron

Lake Huron

Lake Huron is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. Hydrologically, it comprises the larger portion of Lake Michigan-Huron. It is bounded on the east by the Canadian province of Ontario and on the west by the state of Michigan in the United States...

in present-day eastern Michigan

Michigan

. Later they moved further west into Wisconsin

Wisconsin

Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...

.

The Meskwaki gained control of the Fox River

Fox River (Wisconsin)

The Fox River is a river in eastern and central Wisconsin in the United States. Along the banks is a chain of cities, including Oshkosh, Neenah, Menasha, Appleton, Little Chute, Kimberly, Combined Locks, and Kaukauna. Except for Oshkosh, these cities refer to themselves as the Fox Cities...

system in eastern and central Wisconsin. This river became vital for the colonial New France

New France

New France was the area colonized by France in North America during a period beginning with the exploration of the Saint Lawrence River by Jacques Cartier in 1534 and ending with the cession of New France to Spain and Great Britain in 1763...

fur trade

Fur trade

The fur trade is a worldwide industry dealing in the acquisition and sale of animal fur. Since the establishment of world market for in the early modern period furs of boreal, polar and cold temperate mammalian animals have been the most valued...

through the interior of North America between northern French Canada

French Canada

French Canada, also known as "Lower Canada", is a term to distinguish the French Canadian population of Canada from English Canada.-Definition:...

to the French ports on the Gulf of Mexico

Gulf of Mexico

The Gulf of Mexico is a partially landlocked ocean basin largely surrounded by the North American continent and the island of Cuba. 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. In...

. As part of the Fox–Wisconsin Waterway, the Fox River allowed travel from Lake Michigan

Lake Michigan

Lake Michigan is one of the five Great Lakes of North America and the only one located entirely within the United States. It is the second largest of the Great Lakes by volume and the third largest by surface area, after Lake Superior and Lake Huron...

and the other Great Lakes via Green Bay to the Mississippi River

Mississippi River

The Mississippi River is the largest river system in North America. Flowing entirely in the United States, this river rises in western Minnesota and meanders slowly southwards for to the Mississippi River Delta at the Gulf of Mexico. With its many tributaries, the Mississippi's watershed drains...

system.

At first European contact in 1698, the French estimated the number of Meskwaki as about 6,500. By 1712, the Meskwaki were down to 3,500.

Fox Wars

The Meskwaki fought against the French, in what are called the Fox Wars, for more than three decades (1701–1742) to preserve their homelands. The Meskwaki resistance to French rule was so effective that the King of France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

and then signed a decree commanding the complete extermination of the Meskwaki only edict of its kind in history. The Sauk and Meskwaki allied in 1735 to fend off the Europeans and other Indian tribes.

The First Fox War with the French lasted from 1712-1714. The first Fox War with Europeans was purely economic in nature. The French wanted rights to use the river system to gain access to the Mississippi. After the Second Fox War of 1728, the remaining 1,500 Meskwaki were reduced to 500 people. They found shelter with the Sac, but French competition carried to that tribe. In the Second Fox War, the French increased their pressure on the tribe to gain access to the Fox

Fox River (Wisconsin)

and Wolf

Wolf River (Fox River)

The Wolf River, long, is one of the two National Scenic Rivers in Wisconsin, along with the St. Croix River. The scenic portion is long. It rises in the north woods of the state, with the northernmost fork stemming from Pine Lake in Forest County. The river then flows south through Langlade and...

rivers.

Mid-west region

Members of the Meskwaki tribe spread through southern Wisconsin, and along the present day Iowa

Iowa

Iowa is a state located in the Midwestern United States, an area often referred to as the "American Heartland". It derives its name from the Ioway people, one of the many American Indian tribes that occupied the state at the time of European exploration. Iowa was a part of the French colony of New...

-Illinois

Illinois

Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

border. In 1829 the US government estimated there were 1,500 Meskwaki (along with 5,500 Sac, or Sauk). Both tribes moved southward from Wisconsin

Wisconsin

into Iowa

Iowa

, Illinois

Illinois

, and Missouri

Missouri

Missouri is a US state located in the Midwestern United States, bordered by Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. With a 2010 population of 5,988,927, Missouri is the 18th most populous state in the nation and the fifth most populous in the Midwest. It...

. The Anishinaabe

Anishinaabe

Anishinaabe or Anishinabe—or more properly Anishinaabeg or Anishinabek, which is the plural form of the word—is the autonym often used by the Odawa, Ojibwe, and Algonquin peoples. They all speak closely related Anishinaabemowin/Anishinaabe languages, of the Algonquian language family.The meaning...

peoples called the Meskwaki Odagaamii, meaning “people on the other shore,” a name which the French adopted into their pronunciation system as Outagamie. This name was used to designate today's Outagamie County

Outagamie County, Wisconsin

Outagamie is a county in the northeast region of the U.S. state of Wisconsin. Its county seat is Appleton. As of the 2009 census estimate, its population was 177,155....

of Wisconsin

Wisconsin

Kansas and Oklahoma

The Meskwaki and Sac were forced to leave their territory by land-hungry American settlers, and President Andrew Jackson

Andrew Jackson

Andrew Jackson was the seventh President of the United States . Based in frontier Tennessee, Jackson was a politician and army general who defeated the Creek Indians at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend , and the British at the Battle of New Orleans...

signed the Indian Removal Act

Indian Removal Act

The Indian Removal Act was signed into law by President Andrew Jackson on May 28, 1830.The Removal Act was strongly supported in the South, where states were eager to gain access to lands inhabited by the Five Civilized Tribes. In particular, Georgia, the largest state at that time, was involved in...

of 1830, authorizing removal of eastern American Indians to lands west of the Mississippi River. They refused and many were murdered by Lieutenant Jefferson Davis

Jefferson Davis

Jefferson Finis Davis , also known as Jeff Davis, was an American statesman and leader of the Confederacy during the American Civil War, serving as President for its entire history. He was born in Kentucky to Samuel and Jane Davis...

and militia volunteers in 1830.

Some Meskwaki were involved with Sac members in the Black Hawk War

Black Hawk War

The Black Hawk War was a brief conflict fought in 1832 between the United States and Native Americans headed by Black Hawk, a Sauk leader. The war erupted soon after Black Hawk and a group of Sauks, Meskwakis, and Kickapoos known as the "British Band" crossed the Mississippi River into the U.S....

over homelands in Illinois. After the Black Hawk War of 1832, the United States officially combined the two tribes into a single group known as the Sac & Fox Confederacy for treaty-making purposes. Through a series of land cessions under the name of “Sac & Fox”, the Sauk and Meskwaki tribes lost all their lands. Soon after, the U.S. government forced the Sauk to a reservation in Indian Territory

Indian Territory

The Indian Territory, also known as the Indian Territories and the Indian Country, was land set aside within the United States for the settlement of American Indians...

(present-day Oklahoma

Oklahoma

Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...

).

The Dakota Sioux called the Meskwaki who successfully fled west of the Mississippi River

Mississippi River

the "lost people".

The United States persuaded the Sauk and Meskwaki to sell all their claims to land in Iowa in a treaty of October 1842. They moved to land west of a temporary line (Red Rock Line) in 1843. They were removed to a reservation in east central Kansas

Kansas

Kansas is a US state located in the Midwestern United States. It is named after the Kansas River which flows through it, which in turn was named after the Kansa Native American tribe, which inhabited the area. The tribe's name is often said to mean "people of the wind" or "people of the south...

in 1845 via the Dragoon Trace

Dragoon Trace

The Dragoon Trace or Dragoon Trail is an historic trail that runs north and south through central Iowa and Missouri, including Ringgold County. It was originally made by the migration of animals, such as buffalo and deer. Because the Native Americans knew the animals had searched out the best...

. Some Meskwaki remained hidden in Iowa, with others returning within a few years.

Iowa

In 1851 the Iowa legislature passed an unprecedented act allowing the Meskwaki to purchase land and stay in the state. American Indians had not generally been permitted to do so in the U.S. Government officials had said that the Meskwaki could not own land because legally Indians were not US citizens.

In 1857, the Meskwaki purchased the first 80 acres (323,748.8 m²) in Tama County

Tama County, Iowa

-2010 census:The 2010 census recorded a population of 17,767 in the county, with a population density of . There were 7,766 housing units, of which 6,947 were occupied.-2000 census:...

; Tama was named for Taimah
Taimah
Taimah was an early 19th century Meskwaki leader. Often called Chief Tama in historical accounts.-Life:...

, a Meskwaki chief

Tribal chief

A tribal chief is the leader of a tribal society or chiefdom. Tribal societies with social stratification under a single leader emerged in the Neolithic period out of earlier tribal structures with little stratification, and they remained prevalent throughout the Iron Age.In the case of ...

of the early 19th century. Many Meskwaki later moved to the Meskwaki Settlement near Tama

Tama, Iowa

Tama is a city in Tama County, Iowa, United States. The population was 2,731 at the 2000 census. Tama is located a few miles from the Meskwaki Settlement, Iowa's only significant Native American community. Tama was located on the historic Lincoln Highway and is home to an original Lincoln Highway...

, which was started in 1857.

The U.S. government tried to force the tribe back to the Kansas reservation by withholding treaty-right annuities. Ten years later, the U.S. finally began paying annuities to the Meskwaki in Iowa. They recognized the Meskwaki as the Sac and Fox of the Mississippi in Iowa. The jurisdictional status was unclear. The tribe had formal federal recognition with eligibility for Bureau of Indian Affairs

Bureau of Indian Affairs

The Bureau of Indian Affairs is an agency of the federal government of the United States within the US Department of the Interior. It is responsible for the administration and management of of land held in trust by the United States for Native Americans in the United States, Native American...

services. It also had a continuing relationship with the State of Iowa due to the tribe’s private ownership of land, which was held in trust by the governor.

For the next 30 years, the Meskwaki were virtually ignored by federal as well as state policies. Subsequently, they lived more independently than tribes confined to regular reservations which were regulated by federal authority. To resolve this jurisdictional ambiguity, in 1896 the State of Iowa ceded to the Federal Government all jurisdiction over the Meskwaki.

20th century

By 1910, the Sac and Meskwaki together totaled only about 1,000 people. By the year 2000, their numbers had increased to nearly 4,000.

In World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, the Meskwaki were engaged not only as fighters but code talker

Code talker

Code talkers was a term used to describe people who talk using a coded language. It is frequently used to describe 400 Native American Marines who served in the United States Marine Corps whose primary job was the transmission of secret tactical messages...

s, along with Navajo and some other speakers of uncommon languages. Meskwaki men used their language against the Germans in North Africa

North Africa

North Africa or Northern Africa is the northernmost region of the African continent, linked by the Sahara to Sub-Saharan Africa. Geopolitically, the United Nations definition of Northern Africa includes eight countries or territories; Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, South Sudan, Sudan, Tunisia, and...

. Twenty-seven Meskwaki, then 16% of Iowa's Meskwaki population, enlisted together in the U.S. Army in January 1941.

The modern Meskwaki Settlement

Meskwaki Settlement, Iowa

The Meskwaki Settlement is an unincorporated community in Tama County, Iowa, United States, west of Tama. It is often called "the Sett" by residents. It is home to a sizable community of Meskwaki Indians, enrolled in the Sac and Fox Tribe of the Mississippi in Iowa, who maintain a tribal school,...

in Tama County maintains Casino, tribal schools, tribal courts, and tribal police, and a public works department.

Contemporary tribes

Today the federally recognized Sac and Fox tribes are:

Sac and Fox Nation
Sac and Fox Nation
The Sac and Fox Nation is the largest of three federally recognized tribes of Sac and Meskwaki Native Americans. They are located in Oklahoma and are predominantly Sac....

, headquartered in Stroud
Stroud
Stroud a town and civil parish in the county of Gloucestershire, England.Stroud may also refer to:*Stroud, New South Wales, Australia*Stroud, Ontario, Canada*Stroud , Gloucestershire, UK*Stroud...

;
Sac and Fox of the Mississippi in Iowa, headquartered in Tama; and
Sac and Fox Nation of Missouri in Kansas and Nebraska
Sac and Fox Nation of Missouri in Kansas and Nebraska
The Sac and Fox Nation of Missouri in Kansas and Nebraska is one of three federally recognized Native American tribe of Sac and Meskwaki peoples. Their name for themselves is Nemahahaki and they are an Algonquian people and Eastern Woodland culture....

, headquartered in Reserve, Kansas
Reserve, Kansas
Reserve is a city in Brown County, Kansas, United States. The population was 100 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Reserve is located at . According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , all of it land....

.

External links

The 1730 Mesquakie Fort
Official Site of the Meskwaki Nation (of Iowa)
Sac and Fox Nation (of Oklahoma)
"Estimating the Location of the Red Rock Treaty Line in Iowa" (Historical summary and effort to locate original position)

Selected bibliography

Buffalo, Jonathan 1993 Introduction to Mesquaki History, Parts I-III. The Legend:p. 11, 4.6, 6–7.
Daubenmier, Judith M. 2008 The Meskwaki and Anthropologists. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln.
Edmunds, R. David, and Joseph L. Peyser 1993 The Fox Wars: The Mesquakie Challenge to New France. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, Oklahoma.
Green, Michael D. 1977 Mesquakie Separatism in the Mid 19th Century. Center for the History of the American Indian, The Newberry Library Chicago, Chicago.
Green, Michael D. 1983 “We Dance in Opposite Directions”: Mesquakie (Fox) Separatism from the Sac and Fox Tribe. Ethnohistory 30(3):129–140.
Gussow, Zachary 1974 Sac, Fox, and Iowa Indians I. American Indian Ethnohistory: North Central and Northeastern Indians American Indian Ethnohistory: North Central and Northeastern Indians. Garland Publishing, New York.
Leinicke, Will 1981 The Sauk and Fox Indians in Illinois. Historic Illinois 3(5):1–6.
Michelson, Truman 1927, 1930 Contributions to Fox Ethnology. Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletins 85, 95. Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.
Peattie, Lisa Redfield 1950 Being a Mesquakie Indian. University of Chicago, Chicago.
Rebok, Horace M. 1900 The Last of the Mus-Qua-Kies and the Indian Congress 1898. W.R. Funk, Dayton, Ohio.
Smith, Huron H. 1925 The Red Earth Indians. In Yearbook of the Public Museum of the City of Milwaukee, 1923, Vol. 3, edited by S. A. Barrett, pp. 27–38. Board of Trustees, The Milwaukee Public Museum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Smith, Huron H. 1928 Ethnobotany of the Meskwaki Indians. Bulletin of the Public Museum of the City of Milwaukee 4(2):175-326.
Stout, David B., Erminie Wheeler-Voegelin, and Emily J. Blasingham 1974 Sac, Fox, and Iowa Indians II: Indians of E. Missouri, W. Illinois, and S. Wisconsin From the Proto-Historic Period to 1804. American Indian Ethnohistory. Garland Publishing, New York.
Stucki, Larry R. 1967 Anthropologists and Indians: A New Look at the Fox Project. Plains Anthropologist 12:300–317.
Torrence, Gaylord, and Robert Hobbs 1989 Art of the Red Earth People: The Mesquakie of Iowa. University of Iowa Museum of Art, Iowa City.
VanStone, James W. 1998 Mesquakie (Fox) Material Culture: The William Jones and Frederick Starr Collections. Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago.
Ward, Duren J. H. 1906 Meskwakia. Iowa Journal of History and Politics 4:178–219.

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Etymology and language

History

Great Lakes region

Fox Wars

Mid-west region

Kansas and Oklahoma

Iowa

20th century

Contemporary tribes

See also

External links

Selected bibliography